Labour, risk and the inexplicable crisis

First, a pop quiz: who said the following, and when?

"For three long years I have been going up and down this country preaching that Government costs too much. I shall not stop that preaching. As an immediate program of action we must abolish useless offices. We must eliminate unnecessary functions of Government–functions, in fact, that are not definitely essential to the continuance of Government. We must merge, we must consolidate subdivisions of Government, and, like the private citizen, give up luxuries which we can no longer afford… …I propose to you, my friends, and through you, that Government of all kinds, big and little, be made solvent"

We'll come back to that.

The politics of the Eurozone crisis appear to be turning into an inexplicable crisis.

It's inexplicable in the sense that we can see the crisis, and why, more or less, it developed the brobdignagian proportions it currently posesses, it's actual functioning; where it may strike, whether it will abate, what causes it's peaks and troughs? It seems no-one can explain that, least of all the brigade of grey men in glasses who now rule Southern Europe, a band of men who appear to be competing for the coveted title "World's Dullest National Saviour". 

Actually, that a coveted honour, or should be . Interesting National Saviours generally come with giant triumphal arches and fields of gravestones. Boring ones don't. The "Dullest National Saviour" undefeated world champ is Seretse Khama, and I reckon you can't do much better than that. Maybe what we need to transform global governance is a global "World's Most Boring Leader pageant, with the winner getting a golden cuccoo clock and ten billion dollars in IMF funding for worthy, if dull, projects.

Sorry, got distracted there. Where was I again?

Ah yes, the inexplicability of the current crisis.

It's my theory that fearsome, confusing, barely understandable waves of economic distress tend to benefit those least likely to posess the solution to that distress. It times of uncertainty, the conventional, the standard, the uniform becomes attractive.  Sadly, the conventional, and the standard are often manifestly ill-suited to answer the crisis.

Steve Van Riel, previously of the Labour Policy Unit, and now of capitalist greed limited centreground communications, sets out some of the polling data to support this "Turn to Nurse" view of the electorate here. I can't improve on it, so I won't try. To summarise, it's about the risk associated with taking an electoral decision. 

I'd add to Steve's point the thought that in dangerous times, certainty becomes a prized good, and a desire for certainty might explain why people favour a conservative, if _possibly_ sub-optimal strategy over a more radical but _possibly_ more successful one. The cost of radical failure becomes exagerrated and the potential gain of success is viewed more sceptically. However, I'm just making this up. I've no proof for it.)

What might this mean for Labour? That apparent certainty and convention might be a valuable political commodity in times of inexplicable crisis.

Why did FDR appear such a powerful leader, even if his actual policies were vacilating, confusing, sometimes ineffective and frequently contradictory? Because he took great pains to present himself as a man who knew what he was doing, was unafraid (yes, yes), and confident in the outcome of his actions.

I was struck, given the recent Labour focus on ethics and social justice, by this passage in FDR's inaugaral address:

""Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This Nation asks for action, and action now."

Much of what followed that passage is piffle (FDRs plan to redistribute people from cities to the land garners little contemporary attention!), but it has the great merit of being certain piffle. It's interesting to compare Roosevelt as President to Roosevelt as candidate. The President appears to know all the answers, speaks of action now, lines of discplined attack, and programmes of action. He is consciously rhetorically military, plan based, imperative.

A year earlier, FDR the candidate for nomination wanted "Bold, persistent experimentation" which might fail, and then be supplanted by something else. Little trace of such risk survives his ascent to the Presidency. I suspect the candidate was the real FDR, the President the careful facade. His  politics may have been radical, but his response is couched in terms of action, not of choice.

During his nomination address, that facade was even more conventional. Yes, he talks boldly about action, but his proposals themselves are couched as being conventional, practical, businesslike, or as FDR even says, a path between "a proper protection against blind reaction on the one hand and an improvised, hit-or-miss, irresponsible opportunism on the other"

and Yes, The quote above is from FDRs nomination speech.

George Osborne wants to communicate a similar certainty, but unfortunately for him and us, the results of his version of determined, practical action, keep on undermining the jut of his jaw. thats becasue his short term prescription is wrong. Things will not stay bad forever, of course, thanks to the magic of capitalism. Perhaps George just needs to keep on jutting until things he cannot screw up turn things around for him.

The implication for Labour is that making the crisis appear manageable and explicable might be as important as the proffered solution.