Jeremy Corbyn – the savvy entrepreneur

Jeremy Corbyn makes an unlikely entrepreneur, says Bagehot. Yet the Labour leader is a prime exponent of one of the “most influential business ideas of recent years” – Clayton Christensen’s theory of “disruptive innovation”. Disruptive innovators start out on the margins and “succeed by spotting underserved markets and inventing ways of reaching them”. Often dismissed as cranks, they end up “revolutionising their markets” and humbling incumbents. Think of long-distance calls (Skype), record stores (itunes) and taxis (Uber). After 30 years on the political margins – treated at best as a harmless eccentric who made his own jam, and at worst as a terrorist sympathiser – Corbyn has “disrupted the business of politics”. He spotted the biggest underserved market (the young) and provided it with “a new kind of politics”, delivered with a “participatory” new model in which professional MPS play second fiddle to activists. Now the toast of Labour, Corbyn is enjoying the “revenge of all disruptive innovators”. Uncertainty is baked into the model – “for every Google there are several Netscapes”. But for now, momentum is with him.