It may now be too late for the West, a corpse that cannot be galvanised

Elected governments no longer have the power or will to do what is needed to save our free societies

We are threatened by external and internal dangers. We see and feel them. Politicians, generals and diplomats sound the alarm. Our defences are weak. Our enemies are emboldened. Our streets are disorderly. What follows the stark warnings? Not much. Words do not announce action but cover inaction.

Rishi Sunak appeals for calm and urges the police to do their job: and they arrest an anti-terrorist demonstrator. Is the Prime Minister just a spectator? The Budget ignores national defence, which both parties say is inadequate. Does Jeremy Hunt disagree? Michael Gove seeks a new definition of extremism to enable the Government and the Civil Service to decide who are beyond the pale as partners and recipients of public money. Do they not know?

We could ascribe this to the tail end of an exhausted government, in office but not in power. But recent byelections show little confidence that Labour would do better. I keep remembering a well-known Foreign Office minister saying privately that the problem with British foreign policy was that those responsible for it did not think it mattered. We have relied on the Americans, but soon they may not be there. Perhaps our foreign policy will soon matter more than is comfortable.

If we look round the world we see the same failings, and worse. The German government promises to transform its own defences, and nothing happens. Emmanuel Macron jumps from appeasing Putin to threatening him – a pantomime for his domestic audience. Donald Trump blusters that he would tell the Russians to do “whatever the hell they want”. Frivolity and cynicism mark this low, dishonest decade. Is any politician willing to tell their voters honestly what needs to be done? Would they now be believed?

Mr Gove’s struggle to define extremism (something like “active opposition to fundamental British values”) is a sign that politicians have lost control of the public sector in all its ramifications. The “extremism” at issue is within organisations that are part of or have been co-opted as partners by the state itself, sponsored by officials and subsidised by the taxpayer.

For centuries, liberals feared the over-mighty state, and tried to restrain it by putting legal limitations on its actions, by protecting the autonomy and privileges of great institutions (universities, churches, museums, the BBC, professional associations, charities) and by decentralising power to “arms-length” bodies to regulate, take decisions and spend money on the government’s behalf.

This may be the ideal for a free country. But only if there is a broad consensus as to what is in the common interest and what is publicly acceptable. Such a consensus no longer exists. Many institutions have been taken over by activists who behave as if they are theirs to dispose of. Trustees wink at the pursuit of ideological goals without popular consent.

They have power without responsibility, while politicians have accountability without authority.

Genteel corruption is becoming rife, as in the shameful Post Office scandal.

So many little concessions have been made, so many seemingly innocuous acts of appeasement, so much paying of danegeld that the accumulated backlog is mountainous. Who would be bold enough to take power now if they truly wanted to change things? Where would they start? How many years would it take?

The shoplifting epidemic is a depressing metaphor for our wider condition. Once we were told there would be “zero tolerance” towards petty criminality and antisocial behaviour, on the principle that once ill-intentioned people find they can get away with small things, they will try bigger things. But that was too difficult. Instead we have a “total tolerance” policy, with a police force failing, courts overwhelmed and prisons full.

The underlying reasons go back decades, and apply far beyond Britain. The utopian years of globalisation saw politicians across the Western world eagerly handing over powers to quangos, multilateral bodies and both domestic and international law courts. Power was gone, and may never come back, even in fundamentals such as the protection of borders and the deportation of criminals.

Politicians were for a time shielded by being part of an international consensus of the enlightened. Voters everywhere reacted by losing interest in mainstream politics. Turnout at elections fell. Loyalty to parties melted away. Respect for politicians and even for democracy itself declined. Occasionally voters got their say when politicians were complacent enough to permit referendums. Australia and Ireland are the latest countries whose voters have spurned liberal orthodoxy. But when the vote goes the wrong way, it is often ignored or – as nearly happened with the Brexit vote, and may still – neutralised.

When voting to “take back control” has no effect on those in power, the consequence is evident: increasingly angry voters choose increasingly extreme options – in Germany, in Italy, in the Netherlands and almost certainly soon in France. We see it above all in America, where it endangers us all.

In the 18th century, scientists got excited by “galvanism”, stimulating bodily movements by electric shocks. But they failed to galvanise a corpse. Are we and most of the West so fragmented and leaderless that we remain inert in the face of danger, however many shocks we receive? George Orwell wrote of the 1930s that “like the mass of the people [the government] did not want to pay the price either of peace or of war”. Here we are again, hoping it will all go away.

But Orwell added that a universal bedrock of patriotism meant that in an emergency “the whole nation suddenly swings together … like a herd of cattle facing a wolf ”. We can no longer be confident of that. We have allowed a patriotic consensus to be undermined. We have encouraged distorted or fake accusations against ourselves under the pretext of “inclusion”, and rewarded the accusers. National institutions seem at best indifferent to the nation that sustains them.

How to reintegrate the country is what Conservatives should think about during their coming period in opposition. They should plan a radical reform of the state and public institutions to ensure that accountable politicians are really in charge. Their first step must be to bring their own party closer to its supporters, if it is not already too late. Mistakes in politics can be forgiven, but betrayal is fatal.

When voting to ‘take back control’ has no effect on those in power, angry voters choose increasingly extreme options