But New Labour's single-minded promotion of a highly deregulated, short-termist and lightly taxed financial sector at the expense of the rest of the economy - manufacturing has taken the greatest strain - on the back of a consumer borrowing binge has left Britain especially vulnerable both to the global downturn and to the credit contagion in particular.
And while the middle ground can sometimes be bland and over-consensually weak, it still represents the aims of democracy. It is about society as a whole, not about classes or groups or heirarchies.
But the word Socialism brings a lot of baggage, just as Labour brings all that baggage of us against them.
What I'd like to see is a party based on cooperation, not competition. A sharing party. 'Cooperative' also has its own baggage as a historical movement, but it is by no means crippled by its past. Far from it, as several ETers will testify.
I again post a link to the principles of cooperation, as defined by the International Cooperative Alliance. The principles imho that could define a new political party as well as a way of doing business together. You can't be me, I'm taken
Co-operative Party
has been around for a long time, and its roots go back to the 1880's
Cooperative Party - Wikipedia
It has quite a bit of representation, moreover
In 2005 there were 29 MPs in the Co-operative Parliamentary Group, 9 Members of the Scottish Parliament, 4 Members of the Welsh Assembly and 11 Members of the House of Lords, as well as over 700 local councillors. There is also an informal Co-operative Party group in the European Parliament.
There is also an informal Co-operative Party group in the European Parliament.
The MP's include Gordon Brown's right hand man, Ed Balls, and John McFall, the Chairman of the Treasury Select Committee.
Unfortunately, for historical reasons it's got the Labour Party like a constitutional albatross around its neck and allows no other affiliations.
Even our friend "Dave" Cameron was talking about "Cooperative Conservatism" a while back, and I really don't see why the Party should not support any MP or councillor in calling him/herself a "Co-operative Liberal", "Co-operative Green" or whatever, provided they go along with the ICA principles....
So, in principle you are right, Sven, but in practice, don't expect any change this Century.
Surprising though it may seem, some of the most entrenched opposition to the inherently "mutual" and "cooperative" partnership models I advocate has come from people who call themselves Co-operative, but who are doing quite nicely out of the existing stultified organisations and hierarchical bureaucracies still prevalent in the Sector.
