Sunday 8 September 2019

Breaking up Britain's new right wing.

It is entirely possible that if Boris had managed to keep to his 'No Deal' ultimatum, then the EU might well have spawned a version of a deal that looked like more concessions to the UK. After all, the EU leadership has already 'proved', a hundred times over, to those considering the British route, what a fractious turmoil that exiting turns out to be! But Boris's 'deal', and especially his 'no deal', would both have amounted to a new austerity, another drastic attack on the British working class.

A political choice needed to be made.

Breaking down Boris's leadership is not 'clever politics'. It is not some tactical dance. It is a major, class issue. This is not because of his right-wing block of Tory and Farageist Brexiteers in the country, which barely count for 25 - 35% maximum of potential voters. It is not because of the potential lack of the Irish Backstop, which would inevitably have to involve Westminster control of Stormont - to the delight of the reactionary DUP by provoking the wreckage of the Good Friday Agreement, etc., etc. It is because Boris was beginning to win over the leadership of society.

Since the end of the 19th century the British Parliament has rarely played a decisive role in the real decisions regarding issues touching matters of wealth and power. It is therefore rare for Parliamentary figures to really lead society in the sense of creating a shared 'common sense' among the majority, even among those who may have had contrary ideas.

Such political leadership goes beyond a specific, minority bloc in society, and, as perhaps surprisingly, Lenin once wrote, beyond a single class. 'From the standpoint of Marxism the (working) class, so long as it renounces the idea of hegemony or fails to appreciate it, is not a class, or not yet a class, but a guild, or the sum total of guilds.' And while the British working class are not in a sea of peasants, the evolution of Britain's modern working class has yet to fully centre itself socially and politically, let alone fully regroup with its potential allies.

The point of Boris's potential across society was that he could take dramatic hold of a majority view at least inside the English working class on Brexit - as the starting point, the platform, for his defining leadership across all of decisive political matters. Most especially, as far as Boris is concerned, to hook a large section of the working class 'back', now semi-detached from the new radicalism of Corbyn's Labour Party via the predominant call 'to get Brexit done', into a renovated Thatcher/Trump/Tory scenario and existence.

Breaking this process up is part of a class struggle. The defeat of Boris and his remaining allies will begin to dissolve his leadership role and potentially reframe the content of an early General Election. A General Election before 31 October would be entirely framed by Boris's 'common sense' to get Brexit done - and that will be the overriding issue for the majority of English voters. Of course the ruling class will seek any avenue and be constantly searching to renew the cause of remaining in the EU. Although a National Government including the Corbyn part of the Labour Party is deeply unlikely. But the reality will grow; that some Brexits renew austerity. That really ending austerity means a soft Brexit at best. That Brexit, or not Brexit, is only a tiny part of the story of change that needs to come.

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