The Caught In The Act Column from the May 1991 issue of the Socialist Standard
A Matter of Timing
As if he has not got enough on his mind already, with all those unkind press comments about him being a vacillating nonentity, John Major has the additional pressing worry of when to call the next general election. From all sides he will be advised that the timing can be crucial in deciding who wins; a month or two either way can mean defeat snatched from the jaws of victory.
Warning stories are told about Harold Wilson's mistake in 1970 and Jim Callaghan in 1979. Wilson assumed that Labour's position was impregnable and treated the election as a blip on the unruffled business of running British capitalism. If he had waited we might never have had Ted Heath as prime minister. Callaghan, on the other hand, should not have waited; he gambled that things were getting better for his government and would continue to do so. Instead they went on getting worse and the winter of discontent sealed Labour's fate. If Callaghan had not waited we would not have had Thatcher and life would have been a lot less interesting for the people who produce programmes like Spitting Image.
After Thatcher's victory the timing was, apparently, a lot simpler. According to Cecil Parkinson, who was Conservative Party chairman at the time, in 1983 it was so simple as to be a matter of common sense. All the opinion samples indicated that a sweeping Tory victory was in prospect. They had ridden over their crisis of unpopularity and had picked up a lot of support from the more seriously deluded workers over the Falklands War. To help them on their way the Labour Party had elected Michael Foot as their leader and then ran a campaign notable for the ineptitude of their attempts to mislead workers into voting for them. In 1987 the Labour Party ran a much craftier campaign but they had too much ground to make up. The local election results that year persuaded Thatcher that the Tory vote was holding so the time was ripe to allow the great British people to make their democratic choice — which actually means to have Saatchi and Saatchi unleashed upon them.
Mr Nice Guy
For John Major it is not so simple. He is in trouble. One Tory supporter recently wrote to the Daily Telegraph to complain about the prime minister abusing the sartorial standards of all British gentlemen by buttoning up his jacket as he steps out of the official limousine — and you can't get much deeper into trouble than that: Major's image as Mr Nice Guy, unbuttoned jacket and all, is all very well except when your party is hungry for a parliamentary Rambo. It is all very well except when it seems to paralyse your decision-making and reduces your party to a rabble of squabbling back benchers and rivals for your job. It is all very well except when it encourages your supporters to question whether they did the right thing when they got rid of your predecessor.
These things must weigh heavily with Major as he toys with his calendar, his slide rule and his crystal ball. If he decides on an election this summer — which probably means June — and the Tories do badly their conference in October is likely to be historic for the ferocity of the fighting behind the desperately played down smoke screens. It will be the Conservative Party in its element — scheming and intriguing about how to win, or hold onto, power. All gentlemen in attendance are advised to keep their jackets buttoned firmly into place.
One thing which is never mentioned is the presumption at the base of all the calculations about the best date for the election, that workers are particularly susceptible to political deception. In the ease of Callaghan, for example, it is argued that he should have gone to the poll in late 1978 because at that time the voters thought, in spite of all they had experienced, that Labour could control capitalism into a docile, caring and progressive system. After the strikes and disruptions of that winter they were not so sure — and the Labour leadership were not able to offer any bribes attractive enough to cover up their woeful failure. Callaghan is criticised, not because he deceived the working class but because he miscalculated about the best time to exploit their political naiveté.
Gruesome Reality
Workers swing from one discredited party to another, under the unblinking observation of the opinion pollsters, because they lack a sound understanding of how this social system works and why. So they are deceived into giving a major importance to issues which are in fact trivial or irrelevant and it is on that basis that votes change from one side to another. Issues such as the poll tax or the level of state benefits or whether John Major is an irresolute wimp have no real effect on how capitalism operates or what the system does to its people. Subtle advertising campaigns — which is what elections really are — persuade millions of voters that such matters are history-forming and they go to the polls arguing about them, to emerge convinced that with their cross on the ballot paper they have changed things. It takes a little time for the truth — that nothing has changed — to sink in and so set the votes swinging again, to the excitement of the political experts.
In gruesome reality what the workers have done is to surrender their power to make a real change in society. They have made themselves vulnerable to the schemes and calculations of the politicians and they have encouraged the tricksters of the advertising world in the belief that the workers are pliable to the point of ignorance. If this is degrading and insulting to millions of people — well that is a fair description of capitalism and its cynical propaganda.
Questions
Meanwhile the people at the sharp end of all this — the voters — should ponder a few vital questions. Are they satisfied to have their votes, through which they could fashion a free and humane social system, treated with such cynicism? Are they content to put themselves at the disposal of a bunch of ruthless manipulators whose only object is political power? Are they really impressed by the succession of bribes dangled before them by parties who are desperate for their votes? Are they worried whether John Major got any O levels, treats his family well and does his jacket up properly? Are they happy as the world reels under the disasters of that "successful" war in the Gulf, that this should be the limit of their political involvement? And are they going to do anything to change it?
Ivan
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