The Banana Monarchy and Voodoo Economics - Part 8 of 9

The other aspects of the Brexitories strategy, however, are at variance with that of Maudling and the Tories of both the 1950's/60's, and later of the 70's under Heath. Those Tories were conservative social democrats. They understood the nature of capitalism as determined by large-scale, socialised industrial capital, its need for a large interventionist state, and an expanded single market, i.e. the EU. Their polices were geared to the interests of that large-scale capital, and its rationalisation, accumulation and centralisation. Concern for the small capitalist was kept purely for ideological cover to appease the concerns of the Tory membership, who were kept in the role of purely foot soldiers to raise money and canvas, much as Labour MP's have wanted to limit the role of Labour's membership.

From the 1980's, and particularly from the mid 1980's, the Tories became dominated by those foot soldiers, whose ranks had been significantly swelled by the stagnation of that time, and subsequent growth of the petty-bourgeoisie itself. That is the social base of Brexitoryism. So, when Boris Johnson was forced out by an unholy alliance of social-democratic opportunists, and the Tory Right, it was inevitable that what came next was worse. That ought to be a warning to all those same elements who are now latching on to any opposition to Putin, no matter how reactionary, as the means of satisfying their fantasies. It illustrates once more the truth that my enemy's enemy is most certainly not necessarily my friend, but may be, and often is, much worse!

In the 1980's, the Tories, as they began this transition from being conservative social democrats to being petty-bourgeois, reactionary, English nationalists, manifest that not only by the victory of the Eurosceptics in winning Thatcher to their ranks, but also in the overt shift away from the concerns of big business to those of small capital. One manifestation was their promotion of Enterprise Zones, as areas of anything goes, free market capitalism, in which all of the basic civilised standards established by social-democracy over the previous 100 year could be ditched. And, the coalition of Tories and Orange Book Liberals in 2010, resurrected the idea, only for it again to sink without trace, much as it did in the 1980's.

The motivation of the Brexitories in again promoting Enterprise Zones, Freeports and Charter Cities is clear. It is the inevitable consequence of Brexit, whose reactionary nationalist agenda is based precisely on promoting the interests of uniquely British capital, and the only uniquely British capital is that small, nationally based capital of the petty-bourgeoisie, the self-employed and so on. It is itself inherently antagonistic to the interests of large-scale, socialised capital, a fact that does not trouble the petty-bourgeois, opportunist social-democrats, and Lexiters, of course, because they too are dominated by the reactionary ideas of Sismondism, and economic romanticism, and an irrational hostility to large-scale monopoly capital (anti-capitalism), which is its most mature and progressive form, and foundation upon which Socialism will be built.

But, again, today is not the 1980's. The attempts to roll back history failed, then, despite all the efforts of Tories to do so. The petty-bourgeoisie increased in size and social weight, but that was more to do with the consequences of the long wave cycle, at that point, and of the deindustrialisation of many developed economies, and industrialisation of previously peasant economies, such as China, than any success of reactionary governments in bringing it about. It did not change the fundamental nature of capitalism, as being dominated by large-scale socialised capital, and the subordination of the petty-bourgeoisie to it. Nor did it change the fundamental nature of the state as a capitalist state serving the interests of the ruling class, a ruling class that now owns its wealth in the form of fictitious capital, and which itself depends upon the success of large-scale industrial capital for the creation of profits, from which are paid dividends and interest, and forms the basis of capital gains thereon.

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