As the autumn conference season draws to a close, it is clear that 1981 will be remembered, one way or another, as a watershed in British politics. The slow-burning fuse of Britain's political crisis has flared into open warfare in the traditional parties of government and sparked a process of re-alignment of the so-called political 'centre'. Each party has of course conducted its own kind of battle — from Labour's trench warfare in Brighton, through the carefully camouflaged manouevres of the Tories in Blackpool, to the stage-managed debates at the launch of the Liberal-Social Democratic Alliance.
Labour Party
For Labour, the position remains deadlocked with neither the left or right wing willing to concede stalemate, but searching desperately for a winning gambit as the clock ticks away to the general election, The emergence of Benn from a 'no-hoper' in the race for the Deputy Leadership to a hair's breadth from victory has demonstrated more clearly than a thousand editorials the need to fight for socialist policies, and democratic structures to ensure they are implemented, right through the base of the labour movement. But the Labour conference also showed that the left had underestimated the continued strength of the right wing inside the unions, especially among the union leaders. It was these people who engineered the defeat of the left on the NEC elections and on NEC control of the manifesto, aided and abetted by the Kinnock 'soft left' defections. While important policy advances were made at the conference the left still has a long way to travel in building a real class struggle current in the Labour Party and the unions, and in developing popular socialist policies for a working class solution to the British crisis in the 1980s.
Social Democrats
The autumn's most interesting developments have taken place in the centre ground of British politics. For despite its consultative status, the rolling conference of the SDP has provided many pointers to the future evolution of the party. First there are the clues provided by those who attended. According to a poll carried out for Newsnight, some 48 per cent were senior managers or from the 'established' professions, a further 18 per cent came from the 'junior' professions — teachers, civil servants etc. Men outnumbered women by 2 to 1; ex-Labour Party members outnumbered ex-Tories and ex-Liberals by 30 per cent to 7 per cent and 7½ per cent respectively, while the remaining 55½ per cent had not previously belonged to any party. But there were other clues, too, as to the direction of the SDP. To many peoples' surprise, Roy Jenkins has emerged the most likely candidate for party leader whatever method of election is eventually adopted. His main competitor, Shirley Williams, meanwhile looks more and more likely to be relegated to the role of media figurehead, This is not simply a matter of personalities. The SDP comprises three quite distinct strands: those who, with some stretching of definitions, can be defined as 'radical' and 'visionary' reformists: this group is best exemplified by Williams; the other two groups are made up of those who have completely broken not only the umbilical cord connecting them to the labour movement, but every connection with even Fabian visions of social change: of these strands the time-servers and machine politicians are politically insignificant (although, as discussed below, they pose serious problems for any alliance with the Liberal Party); it is the new 'one nation' Tories — the Roy Jenkinses and David Marquands and Christopher Brocklebank-Fowlers — who have made all the running in setting the political agenda for the SDP. Of course, in politics above all it is foolish to mistake the start of a process for its consummation; a trend for an established reality, But the evidence points strongly towards the SDP evolving into an openly bourgeois party, with no pretensions to splitting the labour movement, And this tendency will be reinforced by every month that passes without the Tories returning to a more classical 'one-nation' course.
The Tories
It has been argued, and with some justification, that the Tory Party in conference resembles nothing more than one of the rather more liberal of the Eastern European Communist Parties, Ritual speeches adulating the leader's positions are cheered; those erring on the side of criticism are given a very rough ride and the vote at the end of the day (which is never counted) decides nothing. Despite giving every appearance of a non-event (apart perhaps from the opening salvo of Michael Heseltine's bid for the party leadership) the relatively polite tone of debate compared to the Labour conference masked an unprecedented loss of confidence in the leadership.
The Tory conference is packed with representatives of the constituency parties in the bastions of county and shire Torydom, reinforced since Thatcher's accession by a newer suburbanite fringe. Their lack of influence in the party is so institutionalised that they are not even called delegates. The important decisions are taken behind closed doors between conferences by a self-selecting group of national party officers, ministers and elder statespersons. And the signs of dissatisfaction in their ranks were plain to see in the critical speeches by important ministers (Heseltine, Pym) and ex-ministers (Gilmour, St John Stevas) and the urgency and outspokenness of the assault by Heath.
More significant, however, were the moves in the background. Edward du Cann — arguably the most influential of the party's 'kingmakers' in his capacity as chairman of the 1922 committee of Conservative backbenchers and ex-party chairmen — on television gave an extremely lukewarm condemnation of Heath's disloyalty in speaking out in which he almost, and without prompting, announced his agreement with Heath's policies. And the hand of elder statesman Harold Macmillan in the subterranean revolt was not hard to discern in the publication by his family firm of the Tory wets' manifesto. Whether this all adds up to sufficient pressure to persuade Margaret Thatcher to change course, or, failing this, to encourage an attempt at deposition, it is too early to say. But these are not normal circumstances — without a change of course the Tory party is threatened not just with losing an election but with relegation by the SDP and Liberals to a marginal role in British politics as the Liberals were once relegated by the rise of Labour. And the Tories have always placed the interests of their party, that great governing machine, above any ideology or policy.
Liberals
While the Liberal conference with its overwhelming support for David Steel's regroupment project appeared the least marked by internal strife, it could be argued that 1981 saw the muted opening of a struggle for the soul of the party that will wrench it apart every bit as much as — the Tories and Labour. For within the party there are essentially two liberalisms: on the one hand, there is the Welsh Nonconformist Presbyterian rural liberalism exemplified by the Grimond years and, with the new confidence generated by a whiff of power, today by Steel. This is a liberalism of expedience for which no principle is more important than respectability which aspires to no more than winning the confidence of the bourgeoisie. The other liberalism is a new urban radicalism born in the youth radicalisation of the late sixties and early seventies, the lack of strength, unity and direction of the far left and the corrupt machine politics of the Labour Party in many inner city areas. If it is on the Steel current that the Liberal Party's new refreshed PR image rests, it is the radicals who have re-built the party at the grass roots as its traditional constituency has declined; they are behind the Liberals' victories in local politics and are to be found in strength in the Association of Liberal Councillors and the Young Liberals. While some of their number will temper their radicalism for a share of power (the evolution of David Alton since his election as an MP shows some signs of this), the idea of standing down after years of patient work and campaigning for an ex-Labour machine boss now standing under SDP colours, whom they have been trying to topple for years, has little appeal.
Conclusions
As we pointed out in the last issue of International these shifts point to a very rapidly deepening politicisation of the economic and social crisis — one which is long overdue. The very depth of the crisis makes 'radical' solutions of the left and the right more attractive, draws new people into political activity and tests out the various political alternatives. It seems already too late for the Tories to prevent the most crushing electoral defeat at the general election. The question is whether they will be replaced by Labour or the SDP-Liberal coalition. This will depend in part on the course of the struggle inside the Labour Party; if the right wing re-asserts its dominance and there is little to choose between the electoral programmes of Labour and the SDP, then Labour's chances will decline. A left programme, alternatively, can provide the basis for the kind of 'national crusade' that we saw in 1945, with the Tories marginalised. But the outcome also depends greatly on the working class response to the economic crisis and anti-working class moves of the Tory government. Defeat and demoralisation will boost the chances of the SDP, whereas a vigorous fight-back will favour Labour. The outcome of the BL dispute, the struggles over the 4 per cent pay limit and the workers' occupations at Laurence Scott's and Staffa will decisively affect the development of such a fightback. All this highlights the need for revolutionaries to simultaneously take forward the struggle inside the Labour Party — both promoting the fight against the right, while grappling with the errors and evasions of the Bennite programme — and deepening the fight against the right wing bureaucracy inside the unions. Defeating the Tories and the SDP-Liberal bloc means also defeating the right-wing saboteurs in both wings of the labour movement.