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February 15, 2021 - 11:36am
Snapshots of Insecurity is a new report from the RSA — and the latest piece of research to divide up the UK population by ‘tribe’ rather than party preference (see here for another one).
In the RSA’s case the tribes are defined by economic security and their ‘values’ (on a ‘traditional’ to ‘progressive’ continuum). At the traditional end of the spectrum are two tribes — the economically secure ‘arch-traditionalists’ and the economically insecure ‘discontented right’.
At the ‘progressive’ end, there are four tribes. The ‘established liberals’ and ‘professional urbanites’ are both economically secure, but the latter is younger and more urban than the former. These two tribes have economically insecure counterparts — the ‘progressive working class’ and the ‘metropolitan precariat’ (again, the distinction is geographical and generational).
Finally, in the middle of everything, are the ‘squeezed moderates’.
One can quibble with these categorisations, but what these studies illustrate is just how difficult it is for a party like Labour — progressive in ideology and working class in origin — to assemble an election-winning coalition in the 21st century. If the Left focused on economic interests alone they might get somewhere, able to unite the insecure tribes, despite their widely varying social attitudes.
However, the contemporary Left is not content to do that. Only this weekend, Labour shadow minister Alex Sobel made headlines for advocating the official use of the gender-neutral title ‘Mx’ as an alternative to Mr/Mrs. As in the US, where progressives insist on the use of ‘Latinx’ as a alternative to Latino/Latina, the British Left seems keen on policing everyday language and making it unpronounceable.
This sort of thing doesn’t just anger the ‘arch traditionalists’ and ‘discontented right’. It also alienates people in other tribes who just want someone to fight for their economic interests instead of prosecuting a culture war.
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SubscribeWhy vote for labour when they can not stand what they see as wrong think in the working classes?
If only for once would they talk about law and order, creating technical colleges to train up the poor working class as bricklayers, plumbers etc
Immigration, national security but it’s labour and small minded concerns like that are unpalatable to them.
However, trans rights, Palestine, the EU, LGBTQ+ BLM and they salivate at them but they are niche concerns for most people and so labour are unelectable and long may it continue
Really? When was the last time a Shadow Cabinet MP came on the media salivating about EU, LGBTQ, Palestine or BLM? You think that’s what they are saying but that’s because the press you read tells you that’s what they’re saying.
There’s an example in the piece above. Add to that Starmer and co doing everything in their power to promote a ‘people’s vote’, Starmer and co ‘taking the knee’ during the BLM madness and on and on. You don’t have to be a fan of the media to realise they’re not making this stuff up…
The ‘example’ in the piece about ‘making headlines’ is a link to one Mail on Line article. Can’t find it making headlines anywhere else.
The People’s Vote was a campaign to give the public a vote on the terms of the UK leaving EU. Given the current objections from the pro-Brexit lobby to the deal Johnson signed (see Daily Telegraph) I think there could be general agreement that ‘Brexit means Brexit’ or ‘Taking Back Control’ didn’t really convey sufficient detail about what leaving the EU meant for people to make an informed choice.
Supporting the principles of BLM isn’t a minority thing.
Starmer lost my vote when he became a public knee bender.
So when he demonstrated that he is against racism? What does that make you then?
This is EXACTLY the problem – you are suggesting that someone doesn’t subscribe to ONE representation (BLM), then they are racist. It’s nonsensical.
It’s not that he ‘doesn’t subscribe to it’. It apparently positively repels him. And it is not exclusively about BLM as a ‘representation’ anyway.
For employment reasons I belong to a major UK union, the home website over the last 12 months has had lead stories from all that you mention – The most recent? “Defend our members working in care-homes from having to have a vaccine” Pathetic.
Hi there Phil. Tagging onto your comment of “pathetic”. I haven’t read the article, obvs, but going by the heading, I would support the motion for a vaccine choice rather than obligation.
I bear no political flags. Some people feel that is paramount to sitting on the fence. I like to think that I have the choice to assess the value of a concept without worrying about its affiliation.
Just a few months ago they were all on their knees to the Marxists of BLM. One of them was banging on about the EU the other day, I think. Dawn Butler never shuts up the fact that gender doesn’t exist, or that there are 50 Shades of Gender, something like that. And I have no doubt that one of them is sounding off about Palestine as we speak. They are as vile as they are nuts.
Alex Sobel a couple of days ago.
It’s mentioned in the article.
When did they last talk about law and order, mass immigration (and all that that causes), technical colleges, jobs for working-class and lower-middle-class citizens, the threat from China (economic and cyber-security)…?
Andrew, I note you edited your comment. Please could you tell me how to do this in the new post-disqus system?
Tap on the text of your comment and you’ll see a Settings cog appear next to the word reply.
tap that to get to Edit …
Not only niche, but actively unpalatable for many of the voters that Labour need to win over.
Listening to people and giving them what they want? Is there no end to the Tories perfidy…
It would be interesting to know the political affiliations of whoever it was who compiled this chart. For a start, he or she comes up with a category which – anecdotally – would appear to be pure fantasy: the “progressive” working class. Second, the underclass is completely ignored. The squeezed moderates, meanwhile, appear much too far away from the traditionalists. As “moderates” such people will no doubt say whatever is expected of them to pollsters, but their real opinions lurk somewhere to the right beneath deep waters of diplomacy. The established liberals, likewise, represent a flaky constituency, many of whom are now quite seriously disturbed by the authoritarian turn of their self-consciously “urban” offspring. Think of the recent ideological bullying at the despicable “New York Times”. Totting up the figures, the chart gives fifty-two percent of the vote to broadly left wing causes – in the wake of three Tory election victories, Brexit and widespread alarm in the face of hard left culture wars. Is it not just another case of “elitist” wishful thinking?
52% of broadly left wing causes is a pretty good summary of how people have voted recently. Lib Dem voters in 2010 didn’t vote for a Tory government. (Brexit voters being a mix of leftish and rightish aren’t part of the picture) – what you describe is an inadequacy of our electoral system and democracy to reflect voters’ views rather than elitist wishful thinking.
The ‘culture wars’ are played out in the pages of the Mail, Telegraph and Unherd. Pretty much every where else they are unheard of and an irrelevance.
Because of the voting problems(the number of votes do not reflect the makeup of parliament) Labour MPs are now writing in left-wing magazines about a change to PR.
The plan for discussion is:
1) Abolish the House of Lords and replace it with a small chamber of about 100 people elected by PR.
2) Reduce voting age to 16, following the Welsh Assembly, which is Labour controlled. Remove tuition fees for higher education and introduce a full grant system.
3) Have managed the public interest in PR, use this system for the main parliament.
The above can be found in magazines like Socialist Review and Chartist. Incidentally, Socialist Review in December asked the question of all of its writers and friends, “Can the PLP deliver Socialism or does it have to come in other ways?” Most respondents said that the PLP could not deliver but activists could probably bring it in separately.
What does this mean? It means by working on the population regarding LGBT+, electing younger and younger town councils and taking over by stealth.
This is spot on! I do not know how many on here have children of between 4 and 11 but you should investigate what is happening in schools as soon as we get back to normal, thanks to the LBGTQ brigade. It is appalling and is backed by the likes of stonewall advice for teachers and supported by dr Barnados. It is pure indoctrination and few are really aware of how it’s going to work. Teachers have been given advice/examples on how to bring their agenda into even lessons of music, history, geography and more. Many parents who are aware of this are furious, and they are NOT just Muslim families who are angry. What on earth is happening to our society……this could be even more dangerous than Coronavirus in the long term. The media are part of this so there is no way we can be heard!
Well said.
Yes, LGBT and ethnic minorities are often put in positions of power to carry out unpopular policies. It’s convenient, because any who speak out against such policies can be shut down by being accused of bigotry.
For an example of what I mean, think of that police squad that tried to quell the lockdown protestors in London. They put a tiny muslim girl at the very front hoping to use her as an ideological shield. Of course, the protestors were labeled racist for standing up to the police. Luckily video footage captured this incident and the protestors were vindicated, as it was quite clear that the police were at fault.
In the US, minorities are being used to instigate disruptive events such as BLM protests. Note how, now that the Democrat party has been voted into power, they are doing their best to distance themselves from the BLM movement, whereas before they were sending a message that there would be more of this to come if Trump were to be re-elected.
On a more sinister note, I worry that these groups are being used as scapegoats by the powerful who are truly fearful of a popular uprising by the affluent middle classes. This is pretty much at the root of the antiracist belief system being taught in schools.which employs useful idiots to teach students how racist they are. People who believe bad things of themselves are less likely to struggle against the erosion of their freedoms and rights.
All sounds good to me. Ever since I was 15 I’ve supported giving the vote to 16 year olds – 40 years later I still feel that way.
If this is being openly written about in magazines it’s hardly a takeover by stealth.
I get educated about LGBT+ issues by my teenage kids (who don’t explicitly share my lefty politics and see it more as an issue about empathy, kindness and inclusion than about politics).
16 year olds voting? For the first time I glimpse an upside to the falling birth rate…
“No representation without taxation”. 16 year olds have no skin in the game. They are required by law to be in full time education or training, so it’s completely inappropriate for them to have a vote on how the Government should spend taxpaxers’ money. They are too young to serve in the Armed Forces, so it is completely inappropriate for them to have a vote for a government that could send our Forces to war. And so on.
I think you can make a case for votes at 16… or 18 or for putting it up to 21 again. Cards on the table my preference is 18 (the status quo) because that’s now the school leaving age as well. But really I would prefer the mish-mash of various ages for various licences, entitlements or rights to be harmonised. And age of majority below which you are a child and above which you are an adult.
What annoys me about the case for votes at 16 is not 16 year olds voting. It’s that some of the people advocating that will also tell us that 17 year olds are children when it suits them in different circumstances. Generally that adult rights should be granted early, but often excused adult responsibilities and outcomes.
So let’s have an age when you are treated as an adult. Have sex, get married, drive on the roads, fight in wars (not just be in the forces), drink in pubs, be treated by the police, courts and prison service as an adult, serve on juries, be sent to adult prisons and, of course, vote.
If you are happy with all of that for all 16 year olds then OK. I wouldn’t be so keen on some of that when my lads were 16 but it’s a logical case.
18 is a stronger one though. 21 seems a bit late for some of it.
Not true. I live in the US. The ‘culture wars’ are very much flung in our faces. We now have an insane political party in power, supported by a hypocritically pious media propaganda machine that tells us that men can now be women, people of European ancestry are white supremacists, and half the population voted wrong and needs to be ‘re-educated’.
Where are you living that this has gone past you undetected?
I think he might be in the U.K., but believe me it’s the same here.
I think Mark doesn’t see what he doesn’t want to. He’d stand in a snow blizzard and say “what snow”. And then demand that you provide him evidence that there is any snow at all
The culture wars are being waged every day in the pages of the Guardian.
A minority interest, admittedly.
I would say, rather, that it is there that it is made a thing – that attention is drawn to it.
But a culture war is going on, and is evident even when it is denied. For example when we are told that there is no such thing as political correctness, no such thing as cancel culture, etc.
the side that is most eagerly prosecuting the war denies that there is any such war going on – because everything it does and says is entirely reasonable, and only white supremacists, transphobes etc would disagree.
So it was in the pages of the Mail that the Colston statue was ripped down? It’s only in the Telegraph that people are “taking the knee”? Fascinating. It’s good to know that really alert people are ready to correct fallacies in this way.
On the other side of that war is the majority of the rest of the newspapers. The BBC Ch4 and the rest of the mainstream tv network. A large chunk of the education system. Most of the entertainment and publishing industry. The sort of places you expect to find those who create and at times inhabit worlds of fantasy.
Because of the voting problems (the number of votes do not reflect the makeup of parliament) Labour MPs are now writing in left-wing magazines about a change to PR.
The plan for discussion is:
1) Abolish House of Lords and replace it with a small chamber of about 100 people elected by PR.
2) Reduce voting age to 16, following the Welsh Assembly, which is Labour controlled. Remove tuition fees for higher education.
3) Having managed the public interest in PR, use this system for the main parliament.
The above can be found in magazines like Socialist Review and Chartist.
Incidentally, the Socialist Review in December asked the question of all of its writers and ‘friends’, “Can the PLP deliver Socialism or does it have to come in different ways.” Most respondents said that the PLP could not deliver but activists could probably bring it in separately.
What does this mean? It means by working on the population regarding LGBQ+, electing younger and younger town councils and taking over by stealth.
For a laugh which is not funny, google ‘New Mayor of Bangor’ and you will see the representative of the city of Bangor for the next year commencing in May.
I know people in Bangor and they think it’s a bit of fun but if a foreign company, say Japanese or American, wants to invest in Bangor there will be a civic dinner in their honour hosted by the Mayor.
I thought that.
If there is such a thing as the “progressive working class” I have never ever met a member.
Unfortunately they do exist, though generally female in my experience. Single mothers with mixed race kids on council estates are often rabid left-wingers, blaming the stable, affluent, and prudent for their own appalling choices.
“For a start, he or she comes up with a category which – anecdotally – would appear to be pure fantasy: the “progressive” working class.”
It definitely exists here in Bristol, but I agree it’s probably a bit of a rarity in other parts of the country which aren’t in thrall to the Idiot Left.
The ‘Conservatives’ (who nowadays never conserve anything that matters) and ‘Labour’ (who never address the disappearance of proper full-time well-paid jobs and prospects from the lives of working and lower-middle-class people) are in Parliament because they are the legacy parties. They got to their pole position places long ago; and it is the laziness and cowardice of the electorate which keeps them there.
That laziness and cowardice are fraying. The success of first UKIP 2013-2014 in extracting a Referendum on UK membership of the EU, then of the Brexit Party (with many candidates of high calibre, unlike most MPs) unhorsing Treason May, are straws in the wind.
Year by year the degree in which the Tories and the Socialists actually represent people’s principles, feelings and aspirations dwindles and dwindles.
A day will come when any new party which talks that thing hitherto through 3 decades unknown in British (and Occidental) politics – Common Sense – will sweep the board.
The legacy parties (this includes the Nationalists and the LibDems to a certain extent) are like Adam and Eve in Milton’s “Paradise Lost”: ‘happy, but for so happy, ill secure’.
Agreed, the Labour and Tory parties are today nothing but hollow shams, but it is neither laziness nor cowardice which keep them in place; rather it is the natural inertia of an elderly or harassed electorate, deeply imbued with trust in the political system and heavily influenced by the legacy media. They are also well aware that the electoral system devalues a maverick or principled vote and they have a natural apprehension of new parties, given that crackpots and extremists traditionally set up and influence such organisations. To use the moralistic language of reproach will not endear you to the voters in any case, besides being a tad unfair. It is very easy to indulge the cold logic which results in controversial stances when safely installed at a keyboard. I myself have offered apologies for Mme Le Pen on these very threads. Would I be so confident of doing so in society? Quite frankly, I’m not sure. Cowardice? Or simple prudence? Having said all that, I am currently persuaded that the half-suppressed tension and unhappiness of the present day must resolve itself sooner or later in some sort of upheaval – that moment when the various motives for inertia – which I have attempted to sketch – lose their power and coherence. The left itself, by ripping up so many of the conventions which tied the right into a gently “progressivist” consensus, will bear heavy responsibility for the resulting “reaction”.
You might want to check out the new incarnation of the SDP.
By your theory they might well deserve to sweep the board, but I just don’t see it happening.
Don’t agree with this. The Labour Party is focussing on young people and doing it in a sneaky fashion.
It is concentrating on LGBT+ issues, teaching young people about how industry is bad because it destroys the planet, will reduce the voting age to 16 when it can (as has the Labour-controlled Welsh Assembly) and will remove tuition costs for higher education. How is this not listening to people?
These are hardly the majority, although you would think so!
I think what keeps people voting Conservative and Labour is First Past the Post. It means that, when it comes to the crunch, people vote for the one that they think is most likely to prevent a victory for the party that they’re most worried is going to win. So they vote Tory to keep Labour out, or vice-versa.
I love the concept of the “metropolitan precariat.” It is a huge cohort here in Boston under COVID, where all of the baristas who aspired to something in the arts or otherwise more meaningful appear to have scurried back home to their parents (can’t say “mums and dads” per order of Nancy Pelosi).
The political and media classes operate inside their own bubble which has nothing to do with real people in the real world. These differences are compounded by academic authorities (schools, colleges, universities) which are grooming the young in Orwellian double-speak. Their power is quite disproportionate to their numbers which makes current developments so terrifying. A determined, counter-cultural fight-back is required. It will take years to reverse the rot but we have to start somewhere.
Trans people appear to be labouring under a delusion – I personally do not give a flying f**k what they call themselves – third sheep from the left or whatever. Where I have an issue is when they transgress on MY rights as a born woman to call MYSELF what I like – Mrs in my case as I have been married (to a man, for clarity) for more than 30 years! Any organisation that starts calling me Mx is going to lose my custom quick sharp! Why on earth are we pandering to this tiny minority of a minority?
Can you present any evidence that anyone is likely to refuse to refer to you in the way you would prefer? But would you refer to someone as Mx if that was what THEY preferred?
It’s not trans people. It’s trans activists. There is a big difference.
“So why doesn’t this fractured political landscape also prevent the Conservatives from assembling an election winning coalition?”
It seems to have escaped the author’s notice that they won an 80 seat majority the December before last.
But they had the advantage of saying they would “Get Brexit Done”, they would never have won such a majority were it not for that factor. I wonder if they will again in future.
So what is the definition of “progressive” here? Why not just use the word left-wing, or socialist?
That list of tribes is garbage.
It refers to at least one group that does not exists – the “progressive working class”.
It leaves out two of the biggest – the “Thatcherite” working class and the underclass
And it doesn’t include any group that I belong to.
Underclass skew leftist/apolitical, too dumb to matter anyway (“Gissa sum muney! Me dorta iz pregz agin an’ Callum aint left ‘er wit nuttin!”
Thatcherite working class…. not so sure about that. Successful working class people (competent tradesmen, self-made businessmen) tend not to trumpet their free-market credentials as a political outlook.
We can spend the rest of our lives arguing about this political conundrum, as long as we restrict ourselves to electoral politics. Other things can also be political – for example large-scale strikes.
The last major strike in Britain was the miners’ strike of 1984-5. Whatever one thinks about the issues involved in that strike, it is in some ways an interesting take on alleged British “tribalism”.
Throughout the strike, the newspaper of choice among striking miners was not the Socialist Worker or the Morning Star, but the Sun, which attacked the strike every day, as well as purveying its usual fare of racism, sexism and all the other isms.
Anecdotal evidence suggests that the inhabitants of what are now described as “former mining areas” had very much the same opinions about hanging, immigration, etc., when they were forty years younger as they do now, when they are all proud to be part of Johnson’s Red Wall. But these allegedly heartfelt opinions did not stop them participating in and/or supporting a strike which majority opinion believed to be a violent attempt at Communist revolution..
Test
Test.
Just noticed they have done away with Disqus.
Now you can’t see if people reply to you?
Yes-this new format, pardon me…stinks.
hi Andrea
if you click on your avatar in Comments under Your account in your profile it still links across to Disqus, but now it doesn’t seem to be recording any new comments there …. maybe that’s temporary.
Horrible echoes of 1930s Spain in that chart. A modernising left at odds with working classes, and voices harking to traditionalism and entrenchment on the right. The right emerging as a reaction to the undemanded progressivism of the new left.
And, to make it worse, yesterday Vox – the Spanish hard right – got 11 seats in Catalonia’s election, more than the combination of the two mainstream moderate rightwing alternatives combined. If they can get seats in Catalonia, think of where they are in the rest of Spain…
‘the Tories … have the capacity to face more directions at the same time. Whether or not you think this betrays a lack of principle, the fact remains that it works.’
They have the capacity to lie and the power of the right-leaning press to back up their lies. Of course there is no principle, beyond the interests of their donors and cronies.
It only works because democracy has been undermined by an unaccountable press owned by those very donors and cronies, and by an outdated electoral system that allows the clueless or utterly selfish 40% of the electorate to put the Tories in power more often than not.
“No principle beyond the interests of their donors and cronies” and you think this is only applicable to the Tories…..
I’m sure it also applies to whatever ego-propelled vehicle Farage is currently driving, but that is unlikely to get a sniff of office.