UK Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell speaking on alternative models of ownership, February 2018. Yui Mok/Press Association. All rights reserved.
To start with what’s agreed, we all take the Hard Right for a threat to be resisted. We all think its rise is due in big part to flaws and failings of democratic liberalism. So far, so good. Things then slide out of tune. Zielonka wonders if there’s one Hard Right and whether calling for common resistance doesn’t anyway underplay how deeply liberals and left differ. Barnett and Ronchi imply that democratic liberalism – or to use the commoner name, liberal democracy – needs replacing, not repairing. Sandel thinks that a liberalism grown tepid and mechanical needs fresh “identity, meaning and purpose”. Cruddas, in like spirit, calls on progressives for renewed “moral purpose”. Surer about what liberalism is and what it offers, Tallis calls for less timid salesmanship.
Those differences can’t be blurred or denied, but I don’t sense they’re deep. They’re more to do with where we’re coming from and how we talk about the same set of facts. We’re close, or close enough, it seems to me on essentials: on what liberalism is and isn’t, on how liberalism is failing and on how much tougher liberals ought to be in their own defence. If I’m wrong, the disagreements will at least be clearer.
