Leadership and the Labour Party
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PALGRAVE STUDIES IN POLITICAL LEADERSHIP SERIES Leadership and the Labour Party Narrative and Performance John Gaffney Palgrave Studies in Political Leadership Series Editors Ludger Helms Takashi Inoguchi Gillian Peele Bert Rockman Editorial Advisory Board Barbara Kellerman Anthony King R.A.W. Rhodes Palgrave Studies in Political Leadership seeks to gather some of the best work on political leadership broadly defined, stretching from classical areas such as executive, legislative and party leadership to understudied manifes- tations of political leadership beyond the state. Edited by an international board of distinguished leadership scholars from the United States, Europe and Asia, the series publishes cutting-edge Research that reaches out to a global readership. More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/14602 Leadership and the Labour Party Narrative and Performance John Gaffney Professor of Politics, Aston University, Birmingham, UK Palgrave Studies in Political Leadership ISBN 978-1-137-50497-5 ISBN 978-1-137-50498-2 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/978-1-137-50498-2 Library of Congress Control Number: 2016938712 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017 The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. 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The registered company address is: The Campus, 4 Crinan Street, London, N1 9XW, United Kingdom For Cressida and Luke CONTENTS Acknowledgements xi Abbreviations xv List of Figures xvii 1 Political Leadership, Rhetoric, and Culture: Aristotle Good, Max Weber Bad 1 Rationale of the Book 1 Performing the Party 4 The Conditions of Performance and Persona 6 The Centrality of Ethos 9 Reluctant Leaders, Bad Lessons 9 The Party’s Story 9 The Leader’s Story 10 Losing Both Voice and an Election 10 Narrative and the ‘Personalized Political’ 11 Theoretical Considerations 12 Institutions, Culture, and Performance 13 Drama and Memory 15 Aristotle 16 Charisma 17 Aristotle Again 19 Narrative and Performance 20 vii viii Contents 2 Leadership Lessons from the Past 23 Keir Hardie 1906–1908 26 Ramsay MacDonald 1922–1931 27 Arthur Henderson 1931–1932 29 George Lansbury 1932–1935 31 Clement Attlee 1935–1955 32 Hugh Gaitskell 1955–1963 35 Harold Wilson 1963–1976 38 Jim Callaghan 1976–1980 43 Michael Foot 1980–1983 45 Neil Kinnock 1983–1992 49 John Smith 1992–1994 55 Tony Blair 1994–2007 57 Gordon Brown 2007–2010 64 Not Wanting the Leadership 67 ‘Fatal Flaws’ and ‘Downfall’ 68 Responsibility When in Power 69 Circumscribing the Leader’s Power 70 Being ‘In or Out of Touch’ 72 Localism 73 Leading the Cabinet/Shadow Cabinet 74 Changing Communication Techniques 76 Leadership and Conference 77 Conclusion 77 3 The Arc of Rhetoric and the Leader as Author 81 How to Tell a Story 82 Story and Plot 85 Policy Review 89 The Policy Review’s Counter Narrative: Blue Labour 90 The Oxford London Seminars 93 One Nation, Two Authors 97 One Nation, One Author 101 Let the Word Go Forth 105 Analysis: Story and Plot 109 The Critics 113 Conclusion 115 Contents ix 4 Rhetoric and Performance: Miliband’s Finest Hour (Sixty-Four Minutes and Forty-Seven Seconds, in fact) 117 Theoretical Context: Rhetoric, Persona, and Celebrity 118 ‘Received Persona’: And Miliband’s 2012 Performance 124 Conference 2012 127 Arrival at Conference, 29 September 128 Conference Day 1, 30 September: Interview with Andrew Marr 128 Lecture by Professor Michael Sandel 130 Conference Day 2, 1 October: Miliband’s Presence at Fringe Events 131 Conference Day 3, 2 October: Keynote Speech 131 Keynote Speech: Opening Moments 132 Keynote Themes: One Nation Policies (Justice, Efficiency, and Emotion) 135 Conference Day 4, 3 October 138 Press Reaction 138 Q&A Session 139 Conclusion 141 5 Narrative Collapse and the Teller Without a Tale 145 Waiting for Narrative Lift-Off 147 One Nation-Averse: From Telling a Story to Ad-Libbing 150 The 2015 Election Campaign, 7–13 March 157 Miliband in Salmond’s Pocket 158 The Debates Debate 158 New Promises on Energy 159 ‘Two Kitchens’ Miliband 159 PMQs 161 I’m Ed Miliband, Ask Me Anything 162 The 2015 Election Campaign, 14–20 March 163 Labour’s Pledge Card 164 The Budget 165 The 2015 Election Campaign, 21–27 March 167 PMQs, 25 March 167 The First (Non-)Debate, 26 March 168 x Contents The 2015 Election Campaign, 27 March–3 April 173 The Campaign Launch 173 The 2015 Election Campaign, 4–10 April 174 Ratings Rising 174 Personal Attacks 177 The 2015 Election Campaign, 11–17 April 179 Labour Manifesto Launch 179 BBC Challengers’ Debate 181 The 2015 Election Campaign, 18–24 April 185 Health Week 185 ‘Milifandom’ 186 The Evan Davis Interview 187 Miliband Turns to Foreign Policy 189 The 2015 Election Campaign, 25 April–1 May 191 Milibrand 191 Question Time, Election Leaders’ Special 194 Conclusion 197 6 Conclusion: Narrative, Rhetoric, and the ‘Personalized Political’ 199 Rhetoric and Its Effects 201 The Party’s Narrative 203 The Leader’s Narrative 207 Two Authors, One Protagonist 210 The Narrative Limits and Rhetorical Challenges of One Nation Rhetoric 214 Cultural Constraints 215 Performative Issues 216 The Ideational Challenges to One Nation, and All Its Opportunities Missed 217 Narrative, Performance, and Defeat 226 The Two Brothers Issue 233 Desert Island Discoveries: Frightfully Potent Cheap Music 237 Conclusion 240 Bibliography 247 Index 261 AcKNOWLEDGEMENTS In previous publications, I have thanked two or three colleagues and the editorial team. Here the list of people to thank is long and doubt- less incomplete. Academic colleagues, politicians and press secretaries, journalists and political cartoonists, think tankers, party workers, people not interested in politics, and many others have taken an interest in my research in a range of ways and have commented, criticized, granted inter- views, attended and contributed at various presentations of my work at seminars and conferences, and given me critical encouragement. I want to thank them all. I also wish to thank the Leverhulme Trust for the grant that funded this research. It enabled me to employ a research assistant and have a 2-year teaching buy-out. Those two busy research years (August 2012–August 2014) gave me an enormous sense of privilege. The two individuals I owe most to are Amarjit Lahel who over the Leverhulme grant period was my research assistant, and Marley Morris who helped me with background research in the spring and summer of 2015. Their input and advice have been outstanding, and my debt of gratitude equally so. Stewart Wood and Marc Stears, close advisers to Ed Miliband, were very helpful, even though I must have got them (and Peter Hain and Jonathan Rutherford) into trouble with the boss with unhelpful and deliberate misreporting of my press releases and interviews. Their integrity and understanding in this was exemplary, especially given that the election campaign was about to begin. This and several other media distortions taught me how dangerous and difficult to negotiate the media can be – near-impossible if you are a central political actor like Ed Miliband, espe- cially given the violence of the rightist media, but equally some of the xi xii Acknowledgements media within the Labour Party itself which quite took me aback; so there are several journalists I will not be thanking here. But I really would like to thank other journalists, politicians, observers, and many others whose interest and support has made writing this book so enjoyable. Here they are; thank you to all: Richard Angell, Judi Atkins, Gavin Audley, Philip Ball, Kate Bandeira, Gary Barker, Mark Bennister, Phillip Blond, James Bloodworth, Peter Brookes, Patrick Burns, Philip Collins, Jon Craig, Andrew Crines, Jon Cruddas, Mark D’Arcy, Eva Descause, Anneliese Dodds, Katherine Dommett, Robert Elgie, David Farrow, Mark Ferguson, Catherine Fieschi, Alan Finlayson, Mark Fuller, Cressida Gaffney, Mark Garnett, Gary Gibbon, Maurice Glasman, David Goodhart, Simon Griffiths, Peter Hain, David Harley, Ludger Helms, Laura Hood, Sue Jamieson, Simon Jenkins, Peter Kellner, Julia King, Neil Kinnock, James Landale, Mathew Lawrence, Neil Lawson, Kayte Lawton, Quentin Letts, Jonathan Lewis, Simon Mares, James Martin, David Moon, Rick Muir, John Newbegin, Jackie Newbury, Reema Patel, Nick Pearce, Arlen Pettitt, Sally Puzey, Emma Reynolds, Rachael Richards, Emily Robinson, Martin Rowson, Jonathan Rutherford, Hopi Sen, Hélène Stafford, Joel Suss, Paul Taggart, Paul t’Hart, Louise Thompson, Polly Toynbee, Caroline Wheeler, Michael White, and Ben Worthy.