Of particular interest are her comments on the contrast made between Kevin Rudd’s allegedly autocratic style of governance, and Gillard’s putative consensus approach. This also goes to the question of the reaction to the overthrow of a first term PM, and the reasons why the manner of her installation is problematic for many.

There’s lots to talk about here, but I want to focus on the question of presidential style politics.

As I said in the comments thread at Hoyden, one interesting point in terms of tigtog’s argument about the quasi-presidential system is the way Julia Gillard has gone about distancing herself and the government from Kevin Rudd. Her manner of proceeding, and the way it’s been framed, has been precisely aimed to suggest that a new leader implies a new policy direction, and to gloss over the continuities with ALP policy under Rudd which tigtog identifies (although I do think it’s significant that the rhetoric has moved rightwards so quickly). The (quickly shattered) expectations among people that policy would shift in areas like same sex marriage and the net filter also fit neatly into the presidential box.

I also think the Timor kerfuffle demonstrates that “consultative” leadership is not the panacea that many claimed it was. We can see that from the fact that the decision was obviously taken quickly, the ground not prepared, and dominated by conceptions of political strategy and spin (as with her remarks about so-called political correctness). Waiting for a “consensus” to emerge on climate change is also a recipe for inaction in the short term and disaster in the long term.

We’re also witnessing a meme emerge that it’s difficult to judge Gillard’s actions on the basis of her rhetoric, given that she will have been PM for only a short period of time before we vote. This is to ignore the fact that governance, these days, largely proceeds in train with politics, and that the public articulation and framing of policy issues is absolutely key to what then occurs. This view has the effect of focusing our attention, as we decide how to vote, more on Gillard’s personality than what the actual record of the government in which she has been a crucial player for almost three years is, and thus reinforces both the presidential “new slate” and persona driven themes. It also tends to exempt Gillard from legitimate criticism.

I think there was an element of wishful thinking in the belief by some that the ascension of a PM from Labor’s left might see an about turn on precisely the issues that many have problems with in Labor’s policy record. Similarly, I think it’s unlikely that a re-elected Gillard government would suddenly reverse course on the key areas she’s identified as needing to be “fixed” – tax, asylum seekers and climate change. I think it’s much more likely that she would proceed as she’s begun.

This goes to the concentration on personality politics which bedevils a presidential style of governance. At a structural level, Guy Rundle is right to say that Labor’s left is effectively dead. Tigtog is also right to say that Kevin Rudd’s not being a traditional Labor figure was part of his strength, and one of the reasons we had a lot invested in him, as well as a large part of the ostensible reason for his political demise. Here we are not talking about ‘Saint Kevin’, as some would have it, but about the fact that late modern Labor is not fit for purpose, if the purpose is to advance a progressive politics.

By buying into fantasies about a revival of a progressive politics under a new leader working within the same old party structure, and advised by the same old focus group and poll obsessed apparat, we’re stuck in exactly the same paradigm where politics becomes all about individuals and not about much broader trends. That’s where, paradoxically, I think a broader form of democratic input into the selection of party leaders could shift things.

British Labour has seen 30 000 new party members join since the defeat of the Brown government. That’s remarkable for a party which was viewed as exhausted by a long term in power, and which was said to have run out of ideas and impetus. It’s by no means a perfect exemplar of participatory democracy, or public reasoning, but the Labour leadership contest has enabled a real refocusing on what the party stands for. That’s what we do not get in Australia with a change of leadership, or after election defeats. If we were to discuss, and deliberate on where progressive politics should go, and how to revive the progressive impulse, instead of projecting fantasies on leaders past and present, then I think we’d be better off.

But the third party’s surge has thrown the Labour and Tory camps, particularly the latter, into confusion, forced to turn their guns on the Lib Dems, rather than taking potshots at each other.

The Lib Dems have been channelling voter rage over bank bailouts and the political expenses scandal, and to their credit, are the only one of the three parties the premise of whose campaign isn’t based on lies about the fiscal challenges ahead in the post-GFC UK.

Britain’s election system delivered the Lib Dems 9.6% of parliamentary seats for their 22% of the vote in 2005. If the Lib Dems come first or second this time around, they’re likely to end up with somewhere around 100 seats, and Labour could be the largest party in the House of Commons despite coming third. In these circumstances, a shift to a fairer voting system would be irresistible, and the Tories, who’ve been sticking doggedly to first past the post, could find themselves staring down the barrel of a future where they would be most unlikely to ever form a majority administration again. It’s also becoming more likely that the next British Prime Minister will be Labour (although it may not be Gordon Brown), despite all the doom and gloom predictions of the last couple of years.

NB: Previous LP discussion of the British general election here.

Elsewhere: Guardian coverage of the election here.

Update: Interesting piece on the view of the Lib Dem surge from the Labour and Tory camps.

Update: New post.

Here’s an interesting tidbit:

In another sign of discontent about Mr Brown, 12 Labour MPs have written a joint article for the Blairite magazine Progress calling for “a convincing new narrative” which is more than just “a series of policy initiatives”.

Sound familiar?