Many have celebrated Emmanuel Macron’s election to the French presidency as the moment the populist march across the west was halted. Right-wing populism finally flunked an electoral test—so the narrative runs—after a string of successes in 2016 encompassing Brexit, Trump and a rejection of Italy’s constitutional reforms.
But was Brexit really a populist moment like Trump’s victory? Vote Leave’s rhetoric certainly featured some of the same dominant themes: cultural anxiety about uncontrolled immigration; dissatisfaction with the behaviour of political and corporate elites; and a feeling of insecurity because of globalisation.
But also running through the campaign were more conventional narratives, like traditional British Euroscepticism, which draws on the failures of the eurozone and unpopular judgements from the European Court of Justice, a return to national sovereignty, and increased spending on the NHS.
Theresa May’s interpretation of the Brexit mandate has also fallen short of full-blooded populism. She has instead sought to occupy a middle ground between populism and globalism, championing the economic and security successes of globalisation, but seeking to assuage people’s economic and cultural concerns, particularly in relation to immigration.
In a speech to a room of globalists at Davos in January, she declared herself one of them, a supporter of free trade, free markets, and globalisation. But she also set them a challenge: “Too often today, the responsibilities we have to one another have been forgotten as the cult of individualism has taken hold, and globalisation and the democratisation of communications has encouraged people to look beyond their own communities and immediate networks in the name of joining a broader global community.”
Through her manifesto published last week and her speeches since becoming prime minister, she has artfully gestured towards both the populist and the globalist poles. She has shown her sympathy with some populist anxieties, with her high-profile swipe at “citizens of nowhere,” her insistence on ending free movement of people regardless of the implications for trade with the European Union, her proposed price cap on retail energy prices, her new rights for workers in the gig economy, and her adherence to the net migration target. Add to this the manifesto’s scorn for the political priorities of the “elites in Westminster.”
A smattering of globalist policies
So far, so populist. But Mayism is more nuanced than it first appears, and contains a smattering of globalist policies too: the commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of gross national income on international development; the establishment of a new department for international trade and the ambition to be the global champion for free trade; the continued reductions to the rate of corporation tax; new legislation to reduce the use of stop and search by police forces; international leadership on climate change; and the steadfast defence of NATO.UKIP’s dismal performance in this month’s local elections proves the effectiveness of May’s triangulation. She is successfully adding to her coalition socially conservative Labour and UKIP voters, while retaining liberal conservatives.
Some commentators have greeted UKIP’s failure to win more than a single council seat as proof that the Conservative Party has adopted its rivals’ policy platform. But aside from the fact her party now supports Brexit, which Labour also does, this charge lacks much substance. Rather, by signalling that she hears their concerns about immigration and identity, Theresa May wins populist voters’ support for a more internationalist and liberal platform than UKIP has and would ever offer, while depriving Britain’s principal populist party of electoral support.
This isn’t to say the balance between the two poles and the precise policy prescription are completely correct. Instead of an irrational and undeliverable net migration target, readopted in the manifesto, she should set gross targets on particular categories of migrants. And, while she’s right to insist on migrants contributing more to the public purse, such as through the doubling of the skills levy, she should be more nuanced in her rhetoric around the benefits of immigration, particularly in relation to migrants whom the majority of the public vigorously support like international students.
She should also urgently provide more substance to her ambition to raise the living standards of those families that are “just about managing.” She could, for instance, raise the threshold at which workers start paying national insurance and add new contributory elements to universal credit and statutory maternity pay. These measures would help rectify the unjust targeting of her predecessor’s welfare cuts on the working poor.
In attempting to straddle the divide between populism and liberalism, the scale, and ambition, of Theresa May’s vision for modern conservatism is impressive. We will soon be able to gauge its electoral potency. If she pulls it off, Britain will yet again have avoided a populist uprising by opting instead for evolutionary, incremental change. But to truly deliver this new third way and ensure Britain is not captured by a harsher and uglier populism, she must support her rhetoric with bolder policy solutions.
If she pulls it off, Britain will yet again have avoided a populist uprising by opting instead for evolutionary, incremental change. But to truly deliver this new third way and ensure Britain is not captured by a harsher and uglier populism, she must support her rhetoric with bolder policy solutions.
