Stuck in the Middle With You

The high-neoliberal period, from 1989 to 2008, was also the triumph of political centrism. This was theorised as the "third way", but as that name made clear, it was a theory that gained definition only in opposition to the other two: neither the sclerotic social democracy of the 1970s nor the antisocial free-market deregulation of the 1980s. As the alternatives on both the left and the right appeared to fall away under the weight of history (the fall of the Berlin Wall, the failure of monetarism), centrism became harder to define beyond banalities such as "what works" and an unthinking technophilia (which still motivates those who pine for that era, such as Tony Blair). Whereas "neither left nor right" appeared to have a clear if negative meaning in the 1970s, by the 1990s this provided less of a sharp contrast. There were no positive ideas to expound beyond the rhetoric of the "vital centre", which partly explained the turn to the headier air of international relations and the proselytisation of liberal democracy. In practice, centrism after 1979 did little beyond repackaging the foundations of the postwar consensus: the commitment to free markets, the (grudging) acceptance of the welfare state and a preference for technocratic governance.

Since the financial crash, there has been an intellectual revival on both the right and the left, though it can be argued that both actually started to recover some years earlier - the one in response to 9/11, the other in response to the Iraq War - but their theory (as opposed to their praxis) was largely ignored by a media still obsessed with the nominal centre and managerialist virtue. But a paradox is that this return to a greater definition on the flanks has not led to greater clarity in the centre in the manner of the 1970s and 80s. Nor has it produced a fresh flowering in centrist thought, let alone any vibrancy in its political practice. There are no thinkers of the calibre of Anthony Giddens to give a progressive gloss to the centre's renewed political hegemony (the "adults" are most definitely back in charge across the political landscape in the UK), while the likes of Jurgen Habermas and John Rawls would today be considered too far to the left in their concerns with democracy and equality. Once novel ideas such as the embrace of the service economy or the positive impact of workfare are now tired if not wholly discredited.

The marginalisation of thinkers such as Habermas and Rawls highlights the extent to which the spectrum of acceptable politics has shifted sharply to the right. That's not in the sense of the Overton Window - i.e. the policies that are now considered palatable for the electorate - but in the narrower sense of what the political cartel itself considers permissible. The UK offers a stark example of this, with the mild social democracy of Jeremy Corbyn anathematised and the xenophobic bigotry previously associated with UKIP now embedded in the Conservative Party and espoused even by ministers. This has happened at the same time that leftwing policies have become increasingly popular, from nationalisation and wealth taxes to state-led green investment, while previously popular rightwing positions, notably the need for austerity and leaving the EU, have lost much of their attraction. There is a sense of the political caste and the electorate moving in opposite directions, yet there is also a clear (and cynical) expectation that this simply means we will be obliged to elect the slightly less rightwing party as our new government next year.

In the Guardian (where else?), Steve Richards bemoans this lack of clarity on where the centre ground actually lies. Ignoring the boundaries that historically provided its definition, he seeks consistency and internal coherence within the centrist space but finds only contradiction. Thus "On economic policy, the former Conservative MP Rory Stewart was and is a supporter of the austerity policies introduced by David Cameron and George Osborne in 2010, the real-terms spending cuts that went deeper than any of Margaret Thatcher’s in the 1980s. In contrast, the Labour MPs who formed the short-lived centrist Change UK party were passionate opponents of Osborne’s economic policies – a problem as the Conservative backbenchers who defected to the same party were proud advocates of the cuts. On the most fundamental issue, a radical economic policy, “centrists” take opposite positions." Leaving aside the dubious claim that the Labour right were "passionately opposed" to austerity, there's an obviously simpler explanation for this apparent paradox, namely the priority given to stopping Corbyn, but that would mean accepting that centrism is, and always will be, defined negatively, not positively.

There is no great mystery in the differences of opinion among centrists over tax and spend or public service reform. These are tactical arguments, comparable to the issues that divided the New Labour administrations or the 2010-15 coalition government. The strategic objectives - to avoid deficit spending, to privilege wealth over income and to reduce the cost and extent of the public sector - remain unifying goals. The centre ground is fundamentally conservative (the third way was never equidistant) and this means there will be disagreements over the pace of "reform" and the precise balance between rewarding the deserving and punishing the undeserving. It also means that its social policy will be essentially opportunistic, which doesn't mean responding to public opinion but to the positioning on its flanks. Thus every step that the right takes further rightwards opens up new space into which centrism can move while preserving its relative position. An obvious example of this is the way that the right's increasingly overt transphobia has allowed the Labour Party to water-down its commitment to trans rights.

In contrast, every shift towards the centre that the left takes will be fiercely resisted, if necessary by inventing a strawman left of extreme views and malign intent. That shift is partly the Overton effect - the way that previously marginal left positions on public ownership and taxation have become popular with voters due to material circumstance - but it also reflects the secular trend by which the left has come to absorb the traditions of social democracy and even liberalism since the 1980s as centrism has shifted away from both in the right's wake. The centrist resistance to the left is not simply factional antipathy: it reflects the need to establish a clear boundary against which it can define itself. If the right were to move towards the centre ground, so jeopardising the incumbents, there would be a similar resistance, though perhaps not so hysterical (recall Labour's resistance to the advance of the BNP and particularly the tactical divisions in 2010 between "No pasaran!" in Barking and Dagenham and "Maybe we should be more racist" in Oldham East & Saddleworth).

Ultimately, as an essentially conservative disposition, centrism will always define itself more sharply against the left than the right. It is wedded to the preservation of social and economic hierarchies, even if it does demand greater "opening up" to merit. It is inclined to view demands for greater social justice with scepticism ("the timing isn't right") if not outright hostility ("that goes too far"). Its focus on prudent financial management and minimising government deficits is identical to that of the conservative right, the only difference being a self-congratulatory claim to superior virtue. Above all, it stoutly defends the rights and privileges of property. Insofar as it sees itself as a torch-bearer for the progressive tendencies within society, it is in the form of technocratic managerialism and the celebration of a capital-inflected image of science (the obsession with translating primary research into "world-beating" business opportunities is emblematic). In its emphasis on maturity, it treats it opponents to left and right as children and hysterics respectively.

Centrism saw its historic mission as the defence of liberal democracy against communism (and socialism) primarily, and fascism secondarily (though much has been made of national conservative parties facilitating the parliamentary rise of the far-right in the 1920s and 30s, it shouldn't be forgotten that this accommodation also included parties that saw themselves as centrist or liberal). Since 1989 it has longed for enemies of equivalent stature, first seeking them among the recalcitrant abroad (the "Axis of Evil" etc) and then the rebarbative at home (the crude and unmannered "populism" that was conveniently found on both the left and right flanks). These enemies have proved a disappointment, even the source of embarrassment (Canada's impeccably centrist political establishment applauding a former Waffen SS soldier is just the most recent mis-step). Russia is a broken reed and China too intermeshed with global capitalism to isolate. Despite the persistence of Trump, right-populism is politically marginal and the left excluded almost everywhere.

We are living at a time when centrism is not only dominant but hegemonic. While neoliberalism might appear diminished after 2008, the underlying assumptions about the role of capital and the state - those foundations of the postwar consensus - remain fundamentally unchallenged despite more recent reservations about the limits of globalisation and the need for greater governmental activism to address climate change. This hegemony can be seen in the lack of concern shown when displaying centrism's contradictions. Steve Richards is being disingenuous in imagining that these will alienate the electorate to the extent of jeopardising the system. If anything, there is a relish in the way that the operation of the cartel, and its trivial tactical squabbles, is now openly celebrated, from chummy podcasts to the court gossip of the BBC. It is also evident in the authoritarian turn of Keir Starmer's brutally dishonest leadership of the Labour Party: a muscular centrism directed exclusively at the left, smugly welcomed by the politico-media establishment. The problem is not the centre ground's lack of definition but its imperial ambition.