Blue Labour Implodes

Blue Labour, much as with the Tories before, and, now, also with Reform, has imploded on the basis of its own contradictions. The Tories implosion went through a slow process of gestation starting with the ousting of Thatcher, who was the symbol of that transition, in the 1980's, from the dominance of social-democracy, to the rise of reactionary, petty-bourgeois nationalism. It went through a process of development, in the 90's, as John Major tried to cling to that social-democratic ideology, before he was ousted, and a series of Thatcherite, petty-bourgeois nationalist leaders took turns, after 1997, to mobilise an electoral majority.

As the global economy entered a new long-wave uptrend after 1999, social-democracy, itself gained a second wind. But, unlike the similar period, after 1949, when it was a progressive social-democracy, based on the needs of the accumulation of real industrial capital, that dominated, after 1997, it was the needs of a global ruling class that now obtained its wealth and power from the ownership of fictitious-capital, and was addicted to speculative capital gains on those assets that dominated. In the US under Clinton, with Greenspan as world's central banker, and in Britain, under Blair, it was the need to ensure that those speculative capital gains were protected that dictated policy, and as rapid real capital accumulation, increasingly, threatened those asset prices, by causing interest rates to rise, so such capital accumulation had to be secondary to that goal.

Globalisation was central to that. An increase in the mass of profits comes either from an increase in the mass of capital, and so an increase in the mass of productive labour, producing an increased mass of surplus value, or it comes from a rise in the rate of profit. An increase in the annual rate of profit requires either an increase in the mass of profit, coming from an increase in the mass of surplus value, or else, requires a fall in the value composition of capital (basically a fall in the value of constant capital), or, requires a rise in the rate of turnover of capital. 

The major rise in the rate of profit came in the 1980's. In response to the crisis of overproduction of capital in the 1970's/early 1980's, capital engaged in a technological revolution – the microchip revolution, which peaked in 1985 – which replaced labour, and created a relative surplus population, reducing wages, and so raising the rate of surplus value. It also cheapened constant capital. Not only was circulating constant capital, raw and auxiliary materials (energy etc.) reduced in value, as productivity rose sharply, but, in particular, fixed capital was reduced massively in value, and almost the entire global stock of existing fixed capital suffered a huge moral depreciation. In other words, it created the required slashing of the value composition of capital.

So, by the early 2000's, no such route towards a rise in the annual rate of profit was possible. The period of intensive accumulation, in which the existing stock of fixed capital was simply replaced by new, much more efficient technology was over, and a period of extensive accumulation lay ahead. The only way that the consequent rise in employment – especially in conditions where family planning, in developed economies, meant that workers no longer had large families – would not quickly lead to a rise in relative wages, again squeezing profits and causing an overproduction of capital, as happened in the 1960's/70s, was if developed economies could draw in labour from elsewhere, much as factories drew in labour from rural areas in the 19th century. The collapse of Stalinism in Eastern Europe, and entry of those economies into the EU facilitated that. The increasing industrial development of large parts of the globe, via globalisation, enhanced it. It led to a rise in the rate of turnover of capital, the other element of raising the annual rate of profit, and, thereby, the mass of profit.

But, it created all of the contradictions which led to the crisis of conservative social-democracy (neoliberalism), and the rise of reactionary petty-bourgeois nationalism, symbolised, in Britain, by the Tories, Reform and Blue Labour, not to mention the fringe elements such as the BNP. The Conservative Party, saw the growth of its Tory wing, as the size of its petty-bourgeois base grew by 50% from the 1980's onwards, until that burst out of its chest as Reform. The Conservative rump has no rationale for existence, separate from the conservative social-democrats of the Liberals, as presaged in the Lib-Con Coalition of 2010-15. Reform has no solutions either, and like all other such petty-bourgeois formations is already, being racked by its own contradictions. Blue Labour, financially supported from various tax havens and Israel, seized control of the party in a bloodless coup, and began ruthlessly removing any internal opposition, in the process gutting its own membership and support.

Having sought to simply mimic the reactionary, petty-bourgeois narrative of Reform, it inevitably limited its own prospects, because the chance of winning those Reform voters, the vast majority of whom were never attracted to Labour, was slight, when they already could opt for the real thing in Farage, whilst, at the same time, drove away far more of its traditional, working-class support, which either sat on its hands, or migrated to superficially more progressive alternatives such as the Liberals, or more particularly the Greens, Plaid, SNP, and, now Your Party.

The fact that Blue Labour won a parliamentary landslide in 2024, only exacerbated, and accelerated the inevitable implosion. The landslide only happened, because the reactionary, petty-bourgeois nationalist vote continued to be split between the dying Tories and the emerging Reform. Blue Labour's vote was the lowest on record, as its core support stayed home or went to the Liberals, Greens, Plaid, SNP, and Independents like Corbyn. Appearance and reality would inevitably come into line via a crisis. The 2024 local elections made that clear, and as I wrote at the time would be the basis of the Blair-Right challenge to Starmer. They know, as does the trades union bureaucracy, that if Starmer and Blue Labour continue, it will spell electoral disaster. So, the challenge to Blue Labour, and its figurehead, the robot driver of the train, Starmer, has begun.

No sooner than it has broken out, but Blue Labour itself implodes. Barry Gardiner, on Newsnight, described it as a circular firing squad. On the same programme, the ideological poisoned well of Blue Labour, Maurice Glasman, at least was open in admitting that he did not want Labour to be a progressive party. Like all of the reactionary, petty-bourgeois nationalists that backed Brexit, he can only continue to dig a bigger hole, denying the reality that Brexit has been a disaster that the large majority of the population itself recognises, but, as with Farage, and the Tories, seeking to extend it further, by demanding exit from the European Convention on Human Rights and so on, so as to implement even more egregious and racist scapegoating of migrants. He talks about solidarity, but the solidarity he seeks is not working-class solidarity, but reactionary nationalist, patriotic solidarity, rallying around the flag.

That is a dead-end, even for its genuine representatives in Reform, let alone for their pale imitation within Blue Labour. Starmer has trod that path over the last year, and it has been disastrous, including his sycophantic arse-licking of the global fountainhead of those reactionary ideas – Trump. As the polls show Labour rapidly undergoing the same process of decomposition that has already taken place with the Conservative Party, and which, inevitably leads to a sudden collapse, with the Greens emerging as the main beneficiaries, as Your Party suffers the usual bout of sectarianism that has plagued the left for a century, the Blair-Rights have clearly decided that they must ditch Starmer, before they get wiped out at next year's local and regional elections.

But, as Gardiner noted, a debate between Starmer and Streeting is like a discussion between Narcissus and his reflection. However, anyone who knows the history of such situations, as with the removal of Thatcher, understands that “he who wields the knife never gets to wear the crown.” Heseltine mortally wounded Thatcher, but only to open the door for Major. Streeting has, already, mortally wounded Starmer, even without a contest, and opened the door for a Burnham, in the months ahead, already front-run by his proxy, Powell, in the Deputy Leader elections. The problem for any such new Leader, as with the period of the 90's inside the Conservatives, is that the PLP has been so bureaucratically stuffed by Blue Labour with mindless, careerist drones that it will continue to be riven with division.

Maybe a Burnham leadership would see many of those elements, including Glassman, do the decent thing, and head off to their natural home in Reform, just as his associates and proteges from Spiked headed off to join Farage at the time of Brexit, but it would be likely to be preceded by months of internecine conflict. Come next year's local elections, many Conservatives will have gone over to the Liberals, but, especially if Your Party fails to get its act together, many Labour voters will have gone over to the Greens. The contradictions facing Labour will intensify. Either the Blair-Rights, backed by the union bureaucrats undertake a counter-coup against Blue Labour, or Labour will be decimated in those elections, making it difficult to come back.