Paul posted recently on David Burchell’s column:
And so in 2007 Labor has had, as it were, two successive sets of mistakes from which to learn.
It has had to learn how not to take the bait from its opponents but also how not to become the captive of its erstwhile friends.
The “Not happy, John� crew in a sense unites both of these sets of errors, tied together into a neat little political bundle.
It’s interesting to see similar themes discussed by Gerard Henderson and Paul Kelly this week.
Henderson singles out John Pilger, Julian Burnside and Julianne Schultz, and wonders what approach these critics will take to a Rudd government:
A Rudd government is unlikely to place children in detention. However, it is likely to maintain a tough-minded border protection policy along with mandatory detention. Also, Labor is likely to reflect the Coalition in such areas as national security, the citizenship test and indigenous policy. After all, the former ALP national president Warren Mundine has played a key role in the development of what has become effectively a bipartisan approach to tackling the problems faced by Northern Territory Aborigines.
There will be changes if Labor wins the election. But they are not likely to be enough to satisfy the taste of Guardian and/or New Statesman readers. It will be worth watching which commentators maintain their (internationally focused) rage about Australia and which elect for accommodation and denial.
Kelly’s piece – in the Australian Literary Review of all places – is as you would expect, highly prolix and written in his usual pontificating pundit style. But the gist is summed up neatly by the tagline:
The moral vanity of Australia’s intellectual class has led it into a political dead end.
So what explains this coincidence?
I think these ruminations are defensive moves to spin a Rudd victory in advance of the event itself. No doubt the more extreme culture warriors among the punditariat would put it in a more hysterical fashion (when they can bring themselves to admit a Howard defeat is likely, that is). But I think we’re seeing the more “mainstream” in their ranks get in early to shape the spin about why Howard might lose. In doing so, it’s clear that they’re trying to bang a final nail in the coffin of the left liberal opposition to Howard, and to tell a story about Rudd’s hauling the Labor Party into the sort of political space they’re reasonably happy with – a focus on “pragmatic” outcomes and an authoritarian populism of the centre. The trouble, of course, is that they’re probably right.
On both counts – the reasons why a large number of voters have swung against the Coalition and the likely nature of a Rudd government. So, to some degree at least, this sort of commentary provides Rudd with a ready made story with which to innoculate his putative government against left liberalism.
This style of analysis is fairly useless as an actual contribution to teasing out the differences between the “political class” and the “intellectual class” (to adopt Kelly’s weird pseudo-New Left Blairesque jargon). Kelly himself recognises that at one point when he notes that Australian intellectual life is complex, but of course it doesn’t stop him generalising and pontificating. There’s a kernel of truth in it which is missed because the wrong frame (people v. elites) is applied to it – that the Deakinite liberal tradition is on its last legs in Australia and that Howard has more or less killed it off. And while Burchell implies that more than he says it, I think he gets closest to mapping why a lot of the “moral” critique of Howard has not been overly effective and also why there’s so much affect tied up in “Howard hating”.
There is simply no major current in Australian politics focussing on the left liberal agenda now that the small l Liberals are gone and the Democrats are teetering on the edge of the grave. (Though they shouldn’t be written off electorally, it’s fairly clear that as a vibrant party, they’re over.) Hence, I think, a lot of the emotion tied up in issues related to immigration, refugees, due process and so forth (interesting as well to observe the almost complete disappearance from debate of the two “Rs” aside from refugees – the Republic and reconciliation).
The lack of a party political focus explains the sense of betrayal and also the vehemence of the emotions wrapped up in the left liberal critique. To a large degree, they’re emotions born of frustration and a sense of political impotence.
None of that is to say that the issues concerned aren’t important, nor that the people pushing them aren’t acting in good faith.
But whether or not they can be placed on the agenda for a Rudd Labor government is dependent on three factors, I think.
The first is that I suspect that once the Howard demon is ritually slain, a lot of the oomph that gets people to do things like contribute to GetUp! ads will no longer be there. The number of people who are strongly invested in “Howard hating” is probably sufficiently higher than those who can be mobilised for interventions around left liberal issues. That’s going to be the case either because the link between the different campaigns is Howard and that link will be gone and/or because a Rudd government may play the traditional Labor role of co-opting dissent through making a few of the right noises. Obviously people who are Labor members or strong supporters may be particularly prone to downplaying criticism.
The second is the lack of a vehicle in party politics sufficiently strong to continue to keep these issues on the public agenda. I hope the Greens can play that role, but I’m not too confident. In Britain, the “New Labour” government has been fairly appalling on civil liberties, but the Liberal Democrats have had sufficient strength and impetus to mobilise a continuing constituency to keep the pressure on (and to be fair, some of the Tories have taken principled stands as well). Rudd has surfed the waves of public opinion because he’s tapped into the lived experience of lower middle income voters, and I’d expect his government won’t be too dissimilar to Blair/Brown – mildly redistributive but very much within the neoliberal paradigm where they’ll be more purist than the Howardians, but while they will do some good things, they won’t be seeking to implement either a social democratic or a left liberal agenda.
Finally, I think that those who’ve been making the left liberal critiques have boxed themselves into a corner by largely not making the links between the consequences of a right wing economic agenda, war, and the attacks on liberties. That’s not true of everyone in that category, but it’s broadly right in my opinion. In some instances that’s because left liberals are also economic liberals, but we’re also suffering from the absence of a genuinely social democratic voice. It’s always interesting to me that some of those who most vehemently oppose Howard rarely mention WorkChoices or housing stress or poverty (or worse, accept the narrative that “we’ve never had it so good”).
Ps: I agree with Kelly to a certain degree about moralism and politics, and I’ve argued the toss on that with Julian Burnside himself, but that may be a story for another day.
Elsewhere: Andrew Norton on Paul Kelly, and more on Kelly from Mark Davis.
I have serious doubts whether History will see Howard cast in the ‘Rose coloured light’ of the writers in the Government Gazette stable. Their theories of the Masterclass budgets and brilliance of the Howard Government will be about as much relevance as the courier Mail’s cheering for the Bjelke Petersen Government during his rein.
More likely to be well recorded in history is the rise of sycophants in the Op/Ed pages of the Government Gazette and why they missed what was in front of their long wooden noses.
Yes, I agree, steve, but that’s not really my focus. It’s interesting that, as I say, the more “moderate” culture warriors have moved on.
In the case of Bjelke-Petersen, there was a strong civil liberties focus to the Goss government in many ways. It wasn’t ideal by any means but there was more articulation between the liberties-based opposition to Joh and major party politics (and it helped that there were wet Liberals around). That’s not the case, I think, with what’s happening right now.
More or less spot on call, I think, and I’ve ruminated on Kelly’s piece elsewhere. I recall reading something in the UK media somewhere a few years ago regretting how the left dropped the ball once Blair got into power. Important lessons there I reckon. It’s true, I think, that the Oz left has focussed on (important) symbolic/emotive issues at the expense of engaging broader (economic/family) questions that resonate among a wider proportion of the population, thus leaving itself open to caricature. I doubt a Rudd government will be interested in being seen to pander to that tendency. I’m expecting a softer version of authoritarian populism, edges sanded off, more equitably redistributive, but with the same paternalist core.
But I wouldn’t be surprised, too, if Rudd doesn’t have a bit more up his sleeve as well that no-one’s expecting. He’s been planning this a long time, and may well have an agenda to roll out, that while not on the scale of the early weeks of Whitlam, will nevertheless make people sit up and take notice.
Mark – what do you mean by left liberalism?
Mark, I’m not quite as pessimistic as you.
I think a lot of people who support the republic and reconciliation have decided that it simply wasn’t going to happen until Howard goes, because he represented an insurmountable barrier to either.
I think they might come out of the woodwork after he goes.
dk.au – Issues largely focussed around legal process, civil liberties and the rights of minorities – eg – refugees, terror laws, etc. in terms of the Howardian agenda. Opposition tends to be articulated in liberal terms (focussing on equal rights, the rule of law, etc) rather than in social democratic terms.
Rob, the republic is a good example. After the referendum, much of the impetus just disappeared as did the ARM effectively. Sure, people might get concerned about it again, but it requires major organisation (and money) for that concern to have a focus. It’s very difficult indeed to get issues onto the political and media agendas if the media and the major parties don’t want them there.
As to reconciliation, much to my regret, I think it’s been displaced by paternalism. A lot of the impetus for this came from within the ALP and fellow travellers – Hendo is right to cite Mundine and then there’s Pearson.
That’s an interesting thought, Mark D, and could well be on the money.
But I’ve noticed Rudd tends to be far more creative when it comes to foreign policy – reading through the Fin roundtable with him, Swan, Tanner and Gillard reinforced my impression that he’s largely talking about others’ ideas on economic and social policy. He’s surprised me twice on foreign policy – first with the opposition to the India nukes deal and now with the “charge Ahmenijad” thing. So I wonder whether the “surprise” might not come in that sphere. More generally, I’m sure there will be a real effort to set the tone and the agenda in the first month or so. Sure there’ll be some tokens – ie an apology for the stolen generation – but the substance I think will be coming from a different space.
I’m not sure that these issues can get a run while we have the airwaves and printmedia full of the stuff that has been the focus for the last eleven years. I think that next year will be far more important for debating all these important issues and prior to the election, it just won’t happen.
Yes, but as Paul noted in his post, the vacating of the space for opposing the government on these issues by Rudd Labor has important effects – it means that a lot of stuff goes through without any real attempt to educate or persuade public opinion, and then it’s harder to do that. The lack of an effort to persuade goes back to Beazley, but things haven’t been helped by the sort of attitude among many that “people should think these things are as important as I think they are”.
You do need either a strong focus for affect – ie “Howard hating” – or a good institutional position from which to push these issues to get salience for them without massive organisational effort – and I don’t think we’re going to see either under a Rudd government. I hope I’m wrong, but finding a different language to articulate these issues’ importance is very important, and I’m afraid it’s a task that hasn’t even begun in many instances.
Robert Manne also has a piece from September’s edition of The Monthly that is optimistic about a Rudd Government but also somewhat critical towards…well Rudd’s critics.
Yes, saw that, Oz. I think Manne is kidding himself to a degree. But I’ve never seen him as a particularly realistic or astute analyst of politics.
“housing stress” – FFS – the Feds, whether Libs or ALP, are not responsible for this. It is the State (ALP) governemnts and local governments that are responsible for this – not enabling enough new land releases. And it is State Governments, not Federal, who are responsible for low-income housing support. Jesus H. Christ in a hand basket – I suppose you think GW Bush held up a plastic turkey and said nelson Mandela is dead, too.
Spare me the Liberal talking points, Razor. The origins of housing stress are complex and it certainly is in part driven by fed gov’t decisions. Partly by state gov’t decisions too. It should be obvious that I’m not a Labor partisan from the post. Anyway, side issue, dude.
I still remain confident that once the Government is changed from the Anti union, anti UN, Anti Human rights, anti reconciliation, anti Kyoto, anti consumer Protection, pro Nuclear Power mindset that this Government thrives on that change will begin to happen. To what extent is anybody’s guess at this stage but no progress will be possible while this gaggle of turkeys has been soundly thumped at an election and replaced.
oops. ‘while’ should read ‘until’
All I want is the little twerp to call the election at this rate it will be next December (I would not put anything past him,he loves the white car as much as the next polly),I wish he would just get it over.
I,m agin Howard and his Govt their policies and every man jack of them not one of the twits is worth drawing breath,a lower form of life I think its hard to find,I know Rudd can be a bit of a control freak,but to my mind (small as it is) cant be any worse that the present bunch.
If they lose how many rats will bail out shortly after,numbers please
After the revolution comes reform.
Nothing will be possible while the turkeys are there, but the very fact that the geese have to act turkey-like in order to get to a position to rule the roost means that their geeseness is in question. I suspect that they’ll decide that if talking turkey helped them rule the roost, then talking turkey is the way to go.
I would say this, wouldn’t I: you’re wrong, Mark.
Yes, I read the two paragrahs following (“There is simply … a sense of political impotence.”), and it’s hard to disagree. But for a political constituency to be declared dead, it doesn’t just lie dormant like centrist liberalism does – it gives up altogether and gets swallowed by other political forces, as happened to Poujadism or Social Credit.
The fact that it has not completely died under such a barrage is testament to its resilience. People who are unsettled by attacks on civil liberties, and unconvinced by both alarmism (such as you get from not only rightwing commentators the Howard government, and in State politics concerning Laura Norder) and jowl-wobbling outrage about Our Most Noble & Ancient Systeme of Lawes (see Burnside, J. and his mini-me, Barns, G.), are a people waiting to be mobilised. No, I don’t know by what or whom.
The Rudd Government will have a term-and-a-half of momentum in which it will achieve most of whatever it is destined to achieve. The nature of the ALP caucus is such that two main forces will assert themselves, provoking centrist liberals into action: the activist left, led by Gillard, and the reactionary right, led by Joe de Bruyn (whose followers already number in double figures within the likely caucus next year).
Centrist liberals are starting from scratch. Amongst minor parties – the Greens, the big-man-in-a-small-town rural independents, even the clumsy Pauline Hanson – all start from well ahead of the centrist liberals. Moderates from within the Liberal Party would bring experience but for a generation they have been pissweak and stupid to the point where they offer more hindrance than help. Fragmented? Definitely. Dead? No.
It is true to say that they are underneath the radar. Their preferences might be worth bugger-all in 2007 and not much more in 2010. But there really is a constituency there, and just because something is fragmented is not to say that it doesn’t exist, or can’t reassert itself in future.
I should hope so. The whole idea of a Kulturkrieg was pretty much exhausted by 2005. Extreme rightwingers and extreme leftists knocking down “brigades” of straw men and calling it a “culture war”? It’s hard to keep up a “culture war” fought by philistines.
That and the fact that ten years of both opposition and bullshit from Howard has confronted proponents with the question: when you talk about these things, what do you mean? It was never good enough for the ARM to keep it vague and hope everyone would get on board. One issue that was not raised in the 1990s, but which has now become urgent in this debate: an Australian republic must make it impossible for us to have a Bush-Cheney-style head of state. It was never good enough to place any more significance on Cathy Freeman’s gold medal than as a sporting triumph. Yeah, you need money, but while Turnbull wasn’t short of that it was never enough.
“So what explains this coincidence?”
What about the influence of the steady and unchanging poll results? Rudd is a mirror image and the small target policy means the opposition isn’t forced into unpopular positions.
Commentators would see this as clever politics ( and who was famous for that description being applied to them?) and the centralisation the the ALP’s policies deprives the liberal left agenda of sustenance.
“The lack of a party political focus explains the sense of betrayal and also the vehemence of the emotions wrapped up in the left liberal critique.”
Winners are grinners though.
Having subverted the influence of caucus in ministerial appointments Rudd’s New Labor is just one election result away.
Ross Gittens wrote a thoughtful bit on the weekend about the conversion of politicians into materialism providers and this complements the absence of any issues based on non material ideas.
1. What is the substance of the ‘left-liberal’ agenda
and
2. How does the structure of ALP policies subvert/destroy it?
The basis of all good legal advice is shut up and say nothing. This leaves people better able to be represented during a formal process where they can be heard.
Similarly the best way to shut off attacks from losing teams during sporting games is to just point to the scoreboard.
In this situation it is best to point to the polling for the conservatives and tell them that if they really want to know how to govern successfully, they can send their 50 reps to Canberra next year and learn all about it.
Arguing and fighting with Tories at this stage will just give the trolls in possession of the latest talking points room to derail every progressive move. Best to keep the ammunition dry, I’d say.
Actually, I think the interesting thing about Paul Kelly’s article is that it is, essentially, just a critique based on three people: David Marr’s hysterical Quarterly Essay (which even I made fun of), the philosopher Raimond Gaita (who can hardly be considered a political commentator), and Julian Burnside.
Which brings us to two conclusions:
Kelly is selective with his evidence, choosing only the bits of the intellectual left who the rest of us cringe at.
Or there are ONLY three members of the liberal left left, with no other figure worthy of comment.
I’m stuck for choice.
He is still suffering a bit of post traumatic stress with him only recently deciding that the Brave new world of politics he has drooled over for eleven years has almost finished. Still hasn’t quite come to terms with the change but he might get there eventually.
I don’t think Howard will be remembered as PM who ushered in or cemented a Classical Liberal agenda, all his economic liberalist reforms have done is cemented in big government because the liberalist reforms have meant we can afford big government now (as mentioned in a Cattalaxy thread today).
Howard will be mostly remembered for his recasting of the culture wars, I suspect. I think that is where he has had the most tangible impact over the last ~12 years, and I suspect that is what is mostly driving Kelly’s intellectual class batty.
Enough people are living with the impact of one or all of these stressors for these issues to live beyond polling day.
Eleven long years of deepening comparative poverty for many.
If Labor does form government, I doubt it will be given a honeymoon period.
From a personal perspective, immediate action will be expected across the board.
If what I hear around my area reflects a truth, the Howard years have sapped the tolerance of the lower tier of the Australian electorate.
Another reason that conservative columnists are starting to push these themes maybe as simple as survival. If the polls hold true some of these cultural warriors will become largely irrelevant unless they can reinvent themselves as not too far removed from a Rudd Government. In that sense they can then continue their ‘debates’ with the ‘warriors’ of the left by maintaining they are more closely aligned with a Rudd government than their opponents.
Even some of the most extreme cultural warriors such as Blot are starting to say a Rudd government will not be far removed from a Howard government.
Some of their points about a Rudd government not satisfying some on the left is a valid argument to make. That is inevitable give the conservatism being displayed at the moment but to suggest that some commentators will maintain the rage while others will settle for ‘accommodation and denial’ is just a pathetic guise by Henderson to try a position himself closer to Rudd to justify his continued war with the elites if there is a change in government.
You can almost write the post election pieces now. “Howard may have lost but Rudd is just a mini-me conservative.” Hence we are still relevant and will continue to fight the good fight for the conservative agenda.
It’s pathetic.
What does “affect” mean in this context, as a noun?
That’s because there are no links. No strong ones, anyway. Take some of the “attacks on liberties”, like the Haneef affair or Tampa or anti-terrorist legislation. Then tell me what connections they have to any “right wing economic agenda”.
If I posted this challenge at leftwrites, I’m sure I’d get an avalanche of gobbledegook about the IMF pulling Howard’s puppet strings and so forth.
But staying within the realm of sanity and evidence, there isn’t really much connection between the economic field of policy and social liberty.
… there’s so much affect tied up in “Howard hating�.
What does “affect� mean in this context, as a noun?
It means emotional energy.
I agree with Paulus. I always get the feeling that most political leaders are really only passionate about their economic theories. OTOH their attacks on civil liberties seem to be more about personal political advantage than about any heartfelt desire to stop gays marrying. I think its because most people really don’t care about restricting other people, and have become less inclined to do so over the past 10 years. Which I guess says that Howard, no matter how many conservative shock troops he got employed by the OpEd editors of the nation, has lost the Culture Wars. Indeed he probably never even had a chance.
Pedant’s corner: ‘erstwhile’ simply means ‘former’. Burchell and half the population seem to think it means something between ‘fair-weather’ and
On topic, the problem with efforts like ‘Not Happy John’ (who I helped, with research/quotes for Margo’s book, and a donation) is not its motivations, but its tactical expression. For two reasons, public or over the top middle-class Howard-Hating is counter-productive. First because Howard’s fairly well liked/respected. Second, because for all his ability to screw civil liberties or due process for political gain, he does it ad hoc, it’s not his core agenda. Screwing collective values is.
Whats poor old Piers going to write about if we get a Labour Govt,suppose he will have to give up on the great non event Heiner
Agreed, Graeme.
And that goes to this as well:
In response to Paulus (and I know I’m buying myself pages of loud and incoherent denunciations at Catallaxy, if any of that mob still read this here blog) – the links between war, the assault on liberties and right wing economics are clear. Neo-liberal economics is in fact not “democratic”, but a form of individualisation which depoliticises decisions by transferring them from politics to markets. But because markets aren’t “natural”, and require huge amounts of intervention (cf WorkChoices) to construct, political authoritarianism is necessary to put in place both the structural frameworks and to inculcate the desired dispositions in individuals. This authoritarianism – the unfettered and dominating state – also expresses itself in a disdain for traditional liberties and minority rights helped along by the creation of a climate of fear and a permanent “state of exception” which can be justified by various “emergencies” including wars, real and symbolic of various kinds.
Modern conservative populism is anything but liberal.
There you have it! All true libertarians (as well as all true social democrats) should denounce Howard and all his works! But they should make the links. Perhaps not at that rather academic level – but hey, I agree that we need to think about a new language to articulate the importance of some of these issues.
The whole “latte left” thing does has its reality, and it sure is poor politics.
Kim, your response is theological boilerplate.
The correct starting-point to categorise politics is the two-axis Nolan Chart.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nolan_Chart
Note that a government can occupy any point on the chart. You can be economically “right-wing”/”neo-liberal” and be socially conservative — or socially liberal. It’s your choice.
Howard has chosen to occupy a conservative social and (mildly) right-wing economic position. But that was his choice. There is no necessary nexus between “neo-liberal” and social conservatism.
Righteo, Paulus. Forget any deep analysis, then.
How often in practice would you find a government occupying any possible point on the chart? Why are there broad commonalities between right wing governments and political strategies across different countries, and among centre-left governments as well?
Have a think about that. Seriously.
Perhaps not in the strong sense. But there’s a coherence.
With respect, Kim, blogs are not exactly the ideal environment for “deep analysis” of anything very much.
Where does your argument leave libertarians? As you would be well aware, libertarians fully share the “neo-liberal” preference for markets rather than governmentally-imposed or collective economic arrangements.
Now, since there is apparently a “coherence” between the neo-liberal and the social conservative, one implication of your argument is that libertarians are social conservatives in denial.
That seems rather weird, frankly.
To put what I’m saying another way, libertarians love markets to pieces, yet they feel no need for “political authoritarianism” of any sort, or for inculcating “desired dispositions” in anyone.
Authoritarianism and market economics are not necessary bed-fellows, which was the point of my original objection to Mark.
Do “free” markets spring up from the ground like mushrooms, Paulus?
There are some exception, but if you took the Australian blogging libertarians as examples, a lot appear to be social conservatives in disguise! Not all. There are a number who are consistent in their politics. There are also a lot who seem to think the essence of libertarianism lies in constant whinging about taxes. Very few in practice ever deal with issues of abuse of power or the rights of minorities. Some would much prefer arcane arguments over “Austrians” vs. whoever, but in general you’d be very disappointed indeed if you scrutinised libertarian blogs for any sign of constant watchfulness for the rights of citizens.
But let’s face it, libertarians are mostly irrelevant to politics as it’s practiced in Australia. A small sect. They don’t grapple with issues of power.
And like most economic “liberals”, they’re completely blind to the very high degree of coercion and state intervention needed to construct and maintain “free” markets.
But, honestly, I think this argument is straying a bit from the key bits of the post. Anyway, it’s bloody late dude!
Indeed not, Kim. And that’s why I’m not a libertarian myself. Though I have quite a bit of sympathy for them, I think their project is ultimately utopian. (I would call myself a classical liberal instead.)
Things
mushroomsmarkets need: property rights, protection from fraud, transparency, etc. [Incidentally, that's why I agree with the ALP's scheme to get the ACCC to publicise supermarket prices to help the public make informed choices.]Things markets do not need and do not want: refugee internment camps, counter-terrorism laws, legislation that discriminates against gays, Federal Police cockups.
Another view here
Another view of Howard’s legacy
Would the ‘etc’ here refer at all to violence, properly licenced of course, in the liberal, sovereign democratic way? Or is it just a handy signifier for the all those externalities, that constantly get in the way of exuberant spirits striving to express their inner logic?
Some “markets” or rather tenderers make considerable money out of kids in detention, and then there’s the private security industry… But anyway, I’d suggest that the relationship between authoritarianism and right wing economics in a country like this is tendential rather than necessary. However, the installation of markets and property rights, etc. or perhaps a more neoliberal regime in some countries is accompanied by extreme violence (and I don’t just mean Iraq – consider Mexico). And historically it was so in “the West” as well. I can’t think, off the top of my head, of any governing right wing party that consistently does “free markets” and a very liberal social policy.
Andrew E, I’m not so confident as you that small l liberals can maintain a presence absent of a vehicle for expressing these ideas politically within the party system. Deakinite Liberalism seems to me to have some redoubts in the legal system, and maybe corners of academia and the Fairfax press. But many of the “Howard hating” practitioners of it – and here, I think, though he’s a lovely guy and very principled indeed, Burnside is to the point. He’s politically naive. QED, I fear. But I hope I’m wrong and you’re right.
Anyone’s entitled to criticise the Not Happy John! ‘crew’ in any way they like, including the allegations of counter-productivity, which by the way we’ve copped in spades since 2004. In many ways the stuff that’s been directed our way from sections of the supposedly Howard-opposing community has been more disdainful than that from the pro-Howard side.
But none of you who make these assertions have yet to produce one shred of hard evidence to support the claim that one single voter who was seriously considering voting against Howard last time was moved, by either the content or style of NHJ (book or Valder campaign) to do otherwise. The only ‘evidence’ to support this abstract idea has come in the form of contrived narratives of the kind Burchell produces here. Very often in my view if you scratch the veneer of those who make these claims you will find one of two things:
a) a Howard supporter masquerading as a ‘moderate’ – or a ’swinger’, a ‘liberal’, or whatever – attempting the usual agent provocateur work, or maybe just trying to salve their conscience a bit ;
b) a hand-wringing Howard opponent who has become so spooked by his electoral success and sucker-punched by the whole ‘Howard battler v. inner-city elitists’ b/s con with which he has progressively knackered the ALP, and of which the ‘NHJ-is-counter productive’ line is just a subset, that they’re paralysing themselves by analysis. (Or worse, are just opportunistically spoiling for anti-Howard dirt-pissing rights…no, I’m not claiming any LP-ers are, Mark.)
I have neither interest in nor desire to get involved in slanging matches with those who are on the same basic side. There may be something in what many of say. The point is no-one can ever know. It’s just not possible to tailor any political message so laser-acutely that you will only win votes with it. And sometimes, Mark & Co, trying to do just that is what up-fucks you more than anything. This election is far from won by Rudd. Sometimes the simplest way towards a destination is straight at it, balls to the wall, buger the ‘nuance’, you know. But the real point is that it’s simply not possible for any of us to second-guess the ‘punters” (spew) more layered and nuanced responses to our messages, and so ‘tweak them’ to avoid stampeding the poor passive dears, as much as you all might think anyone fighting an election can (and should). To me that’s the worst elitist condescension of all. I’d rather trust them to see the merit in the force and sustance of my unambiguous stated case. Don’t forget, too, that the ‘affect’ you put on display for the voter is a huge and legitimate part of your pitch. ‘Representatives’ aren’t ‘just’ intellectuals or policy makers. They are supposed to represent the full measure of us as human beings. Rudd leaches himself of ‘affect’ at his peril. You too, Mark.
Me, I don’t know whether or not we Howard Hating NHJ-ers are ‘counter-productive’ in the broad electoral sense. I don’t really caree about someething over which I have no control. What other can I do but stand where I stand? (It must mean something that we HH-ers stand for a proper noun now, though?) Like I say, if anyone can psephsologically parse what we gain for the anti-JH vote from what we lose to get a net meaningful HH balance sheet in terms of votes this time around, I’ll be amazed (and you ought to contact a major party, because they’ll snap you up in a flash). Here’s what I can say with certainty:
In 2004 MK and a few of us Webdiarists wrote an anti-JH book book which sold 30, 000 odd copies, which is good for that kind of book. (And it’s hard, hard work to get a political book up at all, you know, whoever wrote that patronising ‘affect’ line…). That book helped inspire a campaign against the PM in his own then safe run by a former colleage and senior Liberal, John Valder. That non-candidate specific campaign won a swing against JH of 3.4 % in Bennelong, against a national swing to him. How much NHJ! as such – book or campaign – can be credited or not (including not at all, or even negattively) is again impossible to say. But for Christ’s sake…can we at least conssider the not-unreasonable possibility that our book was a net anti-Howard ‘good’, even mereely in those basic hard-headed votes gained/lost terms? Why are you all so determined to look for the worse possible spin on our efforts?
Margo and I have updated the book for this year. Again we’ve worked hard. We ask for nothing from anyone but a fair consideration of what the actual book says – not ‘grand narrative’ explicatory stuff from our political opposition, not even well-meaning second and third guessing by sites like LP at what impact it may or may not have on the electorate and all who sail singularly in her. By all means fel free attack us and disagree with that content vehemently. Ridicule our style, any errors you ping, our analysis, our cover photos even. But don’t dismiss it on the basis of your own invented narratives about how others will/may/could respond to it – unless you have some hard numbers to back you up. Remember: we are NOT ‘counter-productive’ unless our efforts help win only 1.0 votes to the anti-JH camp for every 1.1 vote we help drive away…if anyone can show that we do that, fine, then threads like this might have a substance. Happy to discuss how we can improve our performance in 2010.
The new edition, entitled – with all the flair and lyrical elan I know you’ve come to expect from us – ‘Still not happy, John!’ is out now. It’ll cost you $26.95. MK will launch it on Monday in Canberra. Website’s here.
Sory about the typos, I’ve got a baby all over the keyboaard. Thanks for the space, MB. It’s a terrriffic site, I like the way you run it, I like the discussions, I like the contributors. I don’t wish any fellow anti-Jh er any ill-will or malice. I understand why some of you tend to dismiss us, and me parrticuarly. I know we’ve always beeen a bit naff at Margo-central. It would just be nice if from time to time if those of us in the NHJ! ‘crew’ could get an occasional nod of solidarity from the more sophisticated HH-ers among you. Good luck to those LP-ers who are involved in campaigning.
Jack, I think your comment is mis-addressed. I haven’t been criticising the “Not Happy John” mob. David Burchell has. I’m just trying to analyse why these themes don’t resonate well among the community as a whole, and where the emotion behind them is coming from.
Ps – I’m sure Maxine McKew’s campaign is drowning in poll numbers and focus groups. The NHJ push may well have accounted for a large part of the swing against JHo last time. But I suspect that it’s a different sort of voter who has to be persuaded this time because that swing wasn’t enough.
In this regard it would be productive to analyse movements over time in responses to questions in the Australian Election Study and the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes. I don’t have time to do that today (6 straight tutorials from noon to 6pm before the 1 hour 45 minute commute home!), but when I did that in relation to attitudes to gender issues and abortion I found that there was a strong trend over time away from conservative positions. Of course those questions involve issues and considerations which don’t necessarily apply to other questions which have moved the NHJ constituency.
While Jack’s sense that Mark was criticizing NHJ! is wrong, I think its a fair enough response to those on the left who think NHJ! did more harm than good.
I don’t think the campaign made the best use of the money it had, but its hard to argue with the conclusion that it knocked a point or two off Howard’s margin. That turned out to be an exceptionally valuable achievement. If Bennelong was on another 2% (or perhaps even 1%) the media would not be taking McKew’s campaign seriously at all – in fact she probably wouldn’t be running.
The national figures would be much the same perhaps, but that extra edge of hysteria in the Lib’s voices wouldn’t be there if they didn’t think there was such a high danger Howard could lose (and to such a latte sipping ABC based feminist). That panic certainly is one of the major obstacles to them constructing something which can dig them out of the hole
“I’m just trying to analyse why these themes don’t resonate well among the community as a whole, and where the emotion behind them is coming from.”
Fair enough MB, I didn’t intentionally aim my counter-criticisms exclusively your way (‘Mark & Co’). Sorry. I think you’re being a bit disingenuous, though. You’re assuming that ‘these themes’ really don’t resonate among the ‘community as a whole’. Yet that assumption is the contentious essence of the Burchell-type criticism of the NHJ! type approach. You’re taking as a ‘Look! Why?‘ what should IMHO be an ‘Oh, really?‘ I’m not picking a nit. Unexamined and too-easily-received ‘truths’ like this IMHO underpin much of Howard’s success. I know I’m biased and of course I would say this, but I truly see Burchell’s thesis as just another part-product/part-producer of the echo-chamber accumulation of assumptions that have ended up as lofty Howardian ‘grand narratives’. Their mournful effect, whether in good faith or bad, has been to deliver and lodge deep within the current political classes cluster bomblets of contentious but vaguely-plausible ‘realpolitik truisms’, that are actually just self-reinforcing opinions. ‘Let’s analyse why NHJ! themes don’t resonate with the community as a whole‘. ‘Ordinary Australians are sick of ’symbolic gesture politics‘, so why doesn’t the ALP dump its call for an apology?‘ ‘How will Rudd straddle the blue collar battler v. inner-city elitist divide?’ ‘What’s to be done about the bias at the ABC?‘…sleight-of-handed bullshit in bold, the rest just diversionary rhetorical fodder.
It’s fucking horseshit either way: weasel word conmanship or brain-dead (TM) duped acquiescence (from Burchell et al, not you!). Politics as usual, but it’s all on a grand narrative scale, nowadays. It’s the Info Age: today’s speculative Op Ed is tomorrow’s waved House Speech prop, is that night’s News Report soundbite, is the following day’s editorial, is that afternoon’s ‘policy comment/shift/announcement’, is the next day’s hasty opinion poll results, is the next day’s accepted ‘truth’…is next week’s bedded-in ‘electoral truism’ about what/how Ornry Strayuns believe/think/act. Such is exactly how the whole ‘Howard’s Battlers’ nonsense took hold. It’s a process that’s made Howard our second most successful PM ever, on very little of substance. It’s one that Rudd looks to have swallowed whole in one gulp, ther better to regurgitate on cue. Unfortunately to challenge it takes sustained energy, space, time and a reasonably unlikeable, pedantic, verbose hicksville dislike of being hustled by the glib. I don’t mean to go on and on, but there’s not really any other way to unpack this stuff. And I don’t mean to hijack your site/thread for our purposes, but it is relevant, and it does matter to us a lot with this latest update of NHJ! Already there’s been a disproportionate, preemptive dismissal of our latest efforts. It’s not the criticism, it’s the condescension. Burchell’s title alone is desinged to consign us to the history bin without even a dusting of hands. Well, both of us having worked through the night for the last six weeks to get it up – I’m daddy day-care, Margo’s back is still giving her hell – I’m not thrilled to see our efforts so summarily dismissed by his ilk without a fight. And so I dispute his fundamental claim – and also the assumption you made about NHJ!’s (relative) lack of resonance.
Our experience with the first book’s sales arguably suggests the opposite. Now fine, 30,000-odd copies ain’t in Da Vinci Code territory but it’s pretty good for a political book (more, I think, than the latest ‘hot’ Howard bio sold, for example). Anecdotally we were mailing thousands – tens of thousands – of NHJ! stickers to all parts of Australia: leftists, rightists, centrists, whatever, who cared. Did Paul Kelly follow our NHJ blogsite? Did Burchell ever check out the book reviews we got from a wide range of amateur readers, of very obviously wide demographic and political backgrounds? Whatever Hendo thought of them, the book’s reportage and argument – ideas, passions, (hates), rants, polemic, abuse, biased bile…whatever you want to call it – did resonate with a lot of readers. You can’t sell that many copies unless it does. And despite near-zero contents-review support from ACP and News – in all their coverage of the subsequent campaign the actual book, much less what it contained, was barely mentioned – it still helped spark a grass roots political campaign which that same mainstream media could not ignore. Valder’s (necessarily) more personalised, less substantial, more sloganistic NHJ! was widely covered. It had to be. It WAS resonating. It was covered (I bet often reluctantly) by Sunday, Meet the Press, the ABC, the Bully, all the broadsheets, many of the tabloids, radio of all stripes…surely all these are (admittedly second-hand) measures of what the newsmakers/breakers assessed was resonating with the ‘community’? And again, and above all, in the only seat where the NHJ! ‘crew’ was able to make a serious practical effort to articulate ‘these themes’ to a very representational part of the ‘community as a whole’…surely the attempt DID resonate?
Wouldn’t it at least make more analytical sense to wield Occam’s Razor (at least when it comes to Bennelong) and set yourself THIS task: ‘…to analyse why these themes
don’tDID resonate well among the community as a whole, and where the emotion behind them is coming from…’? (Or rather, resonated better with the community as a whole relative to the more ‘moderate’ themes/style of the general ALP/anti-JH campaign, since a) no, we didn’t actually win Bennelong, but b) what we’re addressing here are the different approaches to anti-JH campaigning.) And what if the ALP had run a similar campaign to NHJ/Valder’s in a dozen key marginals in 2004? What if – instead of mocking us and distancing themselves at every opportunity – every single ALP candidate had brandished MK’s striking book cover and made a unified virtue of uncompromising anti-JH campaigning ‘affect’, Latham-style, NHJ!-style, GLW-style, Burnside-style, anyone-willing-to-fight-style? Laugh away, but if we Valder-Wilkie-Margolians could get a chunky swing away from the popular PM/Coalition in the context of a Latham-led ALP, why not other ALP candidates in actual then-winnable seats (ie where the 2004 ALP campaign team actually gave enough of a shit to chuck in some money and back their own candidate)?Analysing what’s really going on in a piece like Burchell’s – Kelly’s, Hendo’s, this thread – does still matter, MB, because the approach Rudd is generally taking is to distance himself from ‘ours’ even more than Latham did. Well, OK, the polls are looking very good so far. But Rudd hasn’t won a single actual vote yet, let alone (another) 3.4 percent swing in Bennelong. I’m not arguing that McKew should run her campaign our way – I take your excellent point about different extra voters to be had this time. I’m just very interested in why the response among the ‘political sophisticates and hard-heads’ to our (at least arguable) modest success in 2004 has been to run like hell in the opposite direction. What really scares all these ‘political professionals’ about the way the Margo Kingstons, the Julian Burnsideses, the David Marrs…tackle public life and politics? Why is it that so many self-described ALP ‘moderates’ want to wish us NHJ!-ers into the realm of the kooky and/or the ‘pure and impotent’ with as much venom as (and usually less wit than) the Tim Blairs and Andrew Bolts? When (or is it because?) the only available relative evidence – from 2004 – suggests we’ve got a better recent track record on nicking votes from JH than they have?
Just askin’, MB. Surely it’s a fruitful avenue for at least analysing?
feral sparrowhawk: Thanks, that’s a generous gesture. OK, so all the above notwithstanding, I think we all know that it’s going to be impossible to figure out exactly why that 3.4 swing occurred in 2004. Wilkie’s profile was doubtless a big part. Demographic shifts, doctor’s wives, local issues, use-by dates…who knows. To be honest I’m happy to concede in theory that ‘we’ HH-ers might equally well have prevented an even bigger swing. More than happy to listen with an open mind (have been, on this thread). It just seems unfair to start any analysis of the impact of our sort of approach assuming that it doesn’t resonate with the community as a whole…when the only available election empirical evidence at least suggests otherwise, at least relative to any other anti-JH approach.
Thanks for the space, LP. I am very sorry for the long, self-advertising post (the thread was winding down anyway, I think). Scrambling to finish a book about politics with an election looming is nerve-wracking and exhausting, utterly hostage to timing and events beyond your control. Having got over the line it’s a bit heartbreaking to see it being undermined unseen and unread, however well-meaningly, on an instantaneously 24-7 publishable blogsite which has broadly sympathetic aims to yours. That the title ‘Not Happy John!’ has been turned into a kind of shorthand for a whole range of anti-Howard types and tropes and themes has meant that the book itself (and all the sweat we’ve put into both issues of it now, for not all that much personal reward, y’know)…has got a bit lost. At least give this update a read before you uncritically accept even elements of the Burchell (et al) thesis. He can’t have read the update when he wrote this, but I imagine he would have known it was due. It’s like being hit with the MSM stick before you’re even born.
Anyway, I’ll shut up now. Thanks again, Mark. I really appreciate your time and space.
Good luck with it, Jack.
Did anybody catch Kelly and Manne on Lateline last night?
Best insomnia cure I’ve seen (or half-seen, more to the point) for a while…
“Good luck with it, Jack.”
Thanks, Robert, very much.
Last plug, I promise. For LP-ers and Ozblogospherians generally who may be interested, Webdiary is hosting an interactive sNHJ! book site similar to the one Penguin ran during the original issue/marketing campaign. Webdiary itself is smaller and lower-key than it was at its Fairfax height (or depth, for the critics among you), but David Roffey, Fiona Reynolds, Richard Tonkin & Co have kept it chugging through some pretty lean times, and thus among much else have helped keep MK’s extensive back-catalogue of linked Pandora/Webdiary archives easily accessible, with her eternal gratitude. (LP-ers will perhaps understand how we Margolians felt when the SMH started deleting easy access-links to, and substantial parts of, the five years’ worth of ‘wider community resonance’ the old Fairfax Webdiary arguably represented. Down the MSM memory hole it went…to be replaced by Sam & the City, and Jack Marx getting the vapours over Russ…)