The cult of Corbyn: “socialism is back”
The “cult of Jeremy Corbyn” was on full display at last week’s Labour conference, said Nick Cohen in The Observer. It was evident in the memorabilia, in the chants of “Oh, Jeremy Corbyn” that greeted the party leader’s every appearance, and in the delegates’ desire to “extend the sycophancy to Corbyn’s lieutenants, which died when the crowd realised ‘Oh, Rebecca Long-bailey’ didn’t quite work”. It was also evident in the submission of Corbyn’s critics. Deputy leader Tom Watson – widely known to be no great fan of Corbynism – told delegates that listening to crowds chanting his boss’s name at Glastonbury had brought home an important truth to him: “I realised it’s actually better to be loved than to be feared. And Jeremy has shown us that it’s possible. Thank you, Jeremy.” There’s no doubting it now: the Left is well and truly in charge of Labour.
And a good thing, too, said Owen Jones in The Guardian. For it’s the Corbynite, rather than the Blairite, wing of Labour that is in tune with our times. Just as Clement Attlee and Margaret Thatcher led “transformative governments that established a new political settlement”, so Corbyn is promising to shift Britain’s political centre of gravity. He wants to replace what he calls the “failed dogmas of neo-liberalism” – the endless calls for lower taxes on the rich, more privatisation and deregulation, and the erosion of trade union powers – with a fresh and radical approach that returns power to ordinary people. “Socialism is back. And that will be cheered far beyond the applauding activists in Brighton.”
There’s nothing new or bold about Corbyn’s vision, said Dominic Sandbrook in the Daily Mail. His proposals – rent controls, renationalising the railways and utilities, abolishing tuition fees, throwing more money at health and welfare – are just a package of discredited policies from the 1970s. There’s little evidence of “innovative policy thinking” here, agreed Nick Pearce in the FT. Corbyn’s supporters say his ideas have an irresistible resonance at a time of austerity, rising debt and high house prices, but they should remember that those same conditions also pertained at the start of the year, when Corbyn was at “rock bottom in the polls and Labour was being soundly defeated in by-elections and local government contests”. It was Theresa May’s botched election that gave Corbyn his opening, but there’s no guarantee his luck will last. Labour’s divisions over Europe, successfully papered over in last week’s conference, threaten to cause him a major headache. Corbyn has “passed political tests that most predicted he would fail. His biggest may be yet to come.”