IMAGINING A FUTURE A Response to Timothy Snyder’s The Road to Unfreedom.

The battle over Brexit is over, however this battle, which is really a battle over Britain’s place in the world, represents only the first battle in a long struggle. It is a struggle over whether we remain a Liberal democracy or take a much darker route into intolerance, nationalism, and xenophobia.

I.

I have often thought the categories optimist or pessimist as a typology suspect, certainly in my own case what mood predominates is dependent on a whole range of factors, not least being the subject at hand. I suspect this is true of a great many people. One of the primary factors being trends, the direction of travel. In politics over the last few years for anyone of a progressive disposition there has been little to inspire optimism. From Brexit to the 2019 election result the cause of progressive left of centre politics has received setback after setback. Reasons to be cheerful have been thin on the ground, pessimism seems an appropriate response. Though in such circumstance’s pessimism can itself lead to a defeatist mentality which saps the will to resist.

So, the question looms, is it possible to think about the future without conjuring up dystopia? The question is an important one, since without an ability to think about the future we become paralysed by the present and fall prey what Timothy Snyder calls the politics of eternity. A sort of reactionary stasis in which progress, democracy, the law, and privacy are increasingly devalued or even, cease to have any meaning. This is the Putin endgame.

The two towering events of the past five years, certainly in the anglophone world have been Brexit and the election of Donald Trump. Putin had a hand, possibly decisive, in both. Both events corrupted the body politic and political discourse. We have sleepwalked into an age when fascistic ideas, tactics and politics have returned, married to the internet, and social platforms like Twitter and Facebook. This coming November Russian bots, dark money and every conceivable unethical and criminal tactic will be thrown at the Biden campaign.  Whilst here Johnson and the Brexit fanatics enjoy a huge majority in the Commons, whilst the EU looks unlikely to tackle the Poles or Hungarians any time soon on their populist rejection of democratic values. It looks, and it is, very bleak.

II

However, I think there are elements in the current political climate to suggest that the forces seeking to shape the world, Putinism, Koch Brothers, Europhobes, the forces Timothy Snyder has characterised, in a rather clunky phrase, as not even fascist, may have overreached themselves. In the US Trump’s polling numbers are catastrophic and the Republicans who have endorsed, supported, and enabled him to subvert the US constitution, have cause to be concerned about keeping their own seats.

Here in the UK the situation looks less promising, despite the Tory collapse in the polls and the public’s growing concern at the mishandling of the Covid crisis. Johnson has nearly four years before he has to face the electorate. He can, in theory, relax, in the knowledge that time is on his side.

Time however is a strange substance, of the variety of qualities it possesses perhaps the primary one is the capacity to mislead, to expand or contract. More often than not it is later than you think. For Johnson has less time than he thinks. As the fallout from the Covid debacle will dominate the politics of the coming year, not least in its economic impact, he has created the added problem of Brexit. This will undoubtably create further economic, political, constitutional, and social problems, some of immense proportions. These problems would tax the most able man or woman but are beyond the capacity of someone of Johnson’s limited ability. And these difficulties will dominate the next couple of years.

None of this .is cheery stuff, the catastrophe we face will moreover leave the Boris Johnson’s, Jacob Rees Mogg’s of this world unscathed, the full weight will fall upon the citizens, both working and middle class of these islands. However, we are witnessing the death throes of a certain brand of simplistic politics, the politics that sold Brexit. For the populist sloganeering, dog whistles, and outright lies will be of limited use in dealing with coming debacle.

III

Britain, let alone England, has never been a modern nation state. When we joined the Common Market in 1973 it was as a United Kingdom that was crawling from the wreckage of Empire. Being a world power obscured England’s dominance of the home islands, Brexit has lifted the curtain and England has been exposed for the arrogant bullying country that it is. It seems to me unlikely that the union can survive Brexit.

Why does all this seem a cause for optimism? Well the break-up of the UK and the coming economic catastrophe can hardly be considered cause for cheer. The challenge they create are however the basis for a return to realism, the end of fantasy politics, of a return to an imagined past glory or the ‘we hold all the cards’ relationship with the EU. Real politics begins when people face hard, sometimes unpleasant facts. Seeing things as they really are here and now is the only basis on which to construct a future.

Of course, hitting hard reality is only the beginning, the real battle over what kind of future we want begins at that point, though it is as well to start thinking about that now. One the most striking things about Brexit supporters is that when you ask them to describe their vision of the future, and few have given much thought to this, what they invariably describe is the past. For those intent on a future which is not some absurd poverty-stricken tax haven/theme park we must deal with several hard realities.

We will be outside the EU, the economy will be in a bad shape, the US weakened, or worse hostile, China ascendant and Putin increasingly active undermining social democracy and international rules and norms.

First step will be a victory for Biden in November.  This is, of course, a matter for American progressives, however we must offer our solidarity and whatever support we can. In particular help on the cyber warfare front, and assistance in identifying streams of dark money and any illegal activity.

In the UK we have already taken one step forward in having Keir Starmer as leader of the opposition. But whilst vigorous opposition to this government is essential it is not enough. We need to start framing a viable future.  I suggest closer cooperation with the EU in a whole range of issues from cyber warfare to closing tax loopholes, money laundering, the abuses of the financial market that enable Putin to inflict so much damage. At home electoral reform a tightening of electoral law and the plugging of anomalies that allow for foreign nationals to fund politics here. In particular reform of charity law, that enables agencies like the IEA, The Adam Smith Institute, and The Taxpayers Alliance to masquerade as charities and independent impartial organisations. In short whatever else that must be done, and there is much, we must first protect the process of democracy and the democratic infrastructure essential for a free and open society. Then it will become possible to think about progressive solutions to the economic mess that we will all face.

I can already envisage what some of these solutions might look like. Less workplace tyranny and more employee input, a fairer and much more progressive tax system, but this requires a whole new post. The first stage outlined here is to start imagining a future.