Power, Legitimacy and the Economy

Chairman Mao declared that "power comes out of the barrel of a gun"; and over the millennia many regimes all over the world have gained and held power by the power of the sling, the arrow, the spear, the sword and the gun. The Bible tells how the pyramid-building rulers of Egypt consolidated their power over centuries by maintaining state granaries, in which crop surpluses were stored in fruitful years, which could then be doled-out to maintain the people when harvests were insufficient; whether that was due to crop failure [usually due to irregular weather] or to military intervention with the farming year [as when 'the peoples of the sea' invaded some provinces].

The comfortable delusion upon which the European Union was built is that the founder states were mature democracies, where the mass of the population acquiesced in the constitutional order and selected between political parties in regular, orderly elections; largely on the basis of their performance or promises in developing the economy. Since 1995 several states were admitted that had recently been 'democratised' after decades under the Communists gun-rule, and their dissent from the consensus established in Brussels [not least, on inward migration from outside Europe] has now become conspicuous. But [as has been pointed out before in this blog] the west European democracies were new when the Treaty of Rome was signed. Germany was fascist and brutal until mid-1945, Italy was in a similar state. France was still recovering from the hidden conflict between wartime collaborators and resistants. Smaller states with monarchies had been able more quickly after 1945 to establish a sort of normalcy, but all carried legacy issues from the war [except Sweden, which had the great luck to maintain its neutrality]. The EU had a mock-democratic parliament, which was subject to the farce of moving every month from Brussels to Strasbourg that was the proof of its impotence: if the assembly had an iota of real power the members would have opted for a fixed location.

The United Kingdom and Ireland joined the Common Market together, with the secret agenda [agreed in London and Dublin, but not shared with the broad electorate in either country] that a 'peace process' could follow in Ireland as the identities of the two states was subsumed in the European project. Before Mrs Thatcher won her infamous 'rebate', the UK was paying in massive amounts to  the Common Market funds that made similarly vast payments to Irish farmers and local authorities. A generation on, Mrs May and her pathetic cabinet seem not to know that, so they delude themselves that are avoiding the crunch on the Irish Question by putting up notions for a customs arrangement that is very much secondary to the political fudge. If the political fudge is ignored the whole Brexit project will end in violence. It is more than a coincidence that Gerry Adams has announced his intention to stand down: if there is to be a new civil war in Ireland [with inevitable excursions into the British mainland] it will necessarily be  conducted by a new, vigorous Republican high command.

If this interpretation of current events seems apocalyptic, be aware that if consent is withdrawn by a coherent component of the population in any country [or province] the men and women of violence will seek to develop that situation. Mercifully, there is no sign of such a thing happening in Catalonia; but Ireland has been a different case, for centuries.

If a regime is able to provide the mass of the people with palpable economic benefits, as the pyramid-builders did - and as the welfare state did in western Europe for the half-century after 1950 - revolt against the centralised state is rare: Northern Ireland, the Basque region and a few other cases were the exceptions that proved the rule because there were deep historical reasons for those special cases. It is significant that as the Irish Republic gained more of the advantages of a welfare economy, so the politicians in that state eschewed the IRA and their political allies more and more deeply.

Meanwhile, in Zimbabwe massive crowds have assembled to support the army and the ruling ZanuPF party in their attempt to replace Mugabe by his erstwhile deputy. 'The crocodile', as he is known, is a notorious enforcer; hitherto in Mugabe's interests. It was he who unleashed North Korean mercenaries to support his own thugs in killing at least 20,000 Matabele. It was he who organised such beatings of opposition voters in the last presidential election that the opposition withdrew from the second round and allowed Mugabe to reap his 'democratic' mandate. By all accounts he is less blatantly kleptocratic than Grace Mugabe, who was being set up as the next president. Optimists are hoping that the crocodile will metamorphose into a consensualist who can forge a truly 'national' government, but the odds are stacked against that. Once the dust settles on Mugabe's departure, Zimbabwe will revert to rule by fist and cane, supplemented - as judged necessary - by bullets: as in the case in most of Africa.

The chances of Zimbabwe approaching any credible standard of democracy within fifty years are very small.

The chances of the beneficent Brussels fantasy lasting for another fifty years are diminishing: as Mrs Merkel's struggle to build a coalition well illustrates.

Britain-in-Europe Survived as a 'Service Economy'

Yesterday, I hinted at the crucial fact that in 1948 the British people generally accepted that the country needed to rebuild its balance of payments; but their interests as consumes came to predominate over the recognised priority for productive investment in the economy. Following the collapse of neo-Keynesianism, the entry of the UK into the EEC was a vital step in the next major development. Within the cocoon of the EEC, then the EU, Britain was brought within a vast shelter that [it was hoped] could save any member country from economic catastrophe.

After Mrs Thatcher had eviscerated the economy, her successors were obliged to express admiration for her achievement in 'rebuilding' it. So, as the balance of payments worsened and the material economy continued to decay, it became imperative for the European shelter to be toughened. Mrs Thatcher herself huffed and puffed about Europe's exactions - and she gained an unprecedented rebate when other member states admitted that Britain was, indeed, being screwed under the prevailing formula - then she signed up to integrationist agreements. John Major, a hugely under-estimated figure, won a general election and proceeded to lead the country into the 'inevitable' process of political association of the EEC states with the passage of the Maastricht Treaty. A significant number of Conservative MPs, who he apparently classed as 'the Bastards', recognised that a political price was being paid for an economic shelter; and several of them did not like it. Thus they sought to oppose the surrender of ultimate sovereignty to the European Union: and though Britain went fully into the Union, there were many who resented it, in both major political parties.

Tony Blair's contempt for any history but his own, and for any political principle more profound that his convenience, led him to pack the House of Lords with donors who spared him the need to mollycoddle the trade union leaders whose predecessors has dominated the Labour Party through their control of the purse strings. His cavalier attempt to abolish the ancient office of Lord Chancellor showed how superficial he was; and the scandal of the Gulf War has rightly become the basis for an ineradicable contempt for his unconcern with truth; and apparently for the lives of British forces and Iraqui civilians. He allowed the drift towards further integration of EU institutions to continue, while considering himself a 'bridge' between the USA and the EU. Gordon Brown's brief period in office was dominated by the economic crisis, to which he and his Chancellor, Alastair Darling, responded well.

The came the Cameron-Clegg coalition. The LibDems were fanatically pro-'European', so for the five years of the coalition government the subjection of the UK to the EU was welcomed: the economic protection that it gave to the UK was recognised, and as the major financial centre to have survived well when the dust settled after the great crash of 2007-8 London was proven to be an asset to the whole of the EU. Of course, French and German bankers resented this situation; but their banks had to build up their London operations to remain globally competitive. Thus in the period 2010-15 a sub-set of the service sector, the financial services, became central to the economic offering that the EU made to the rest of the world. After five years of coalition the LibDems were adamant that they needed to stand [and to crash] as an independent party in the 2015 general election; while David Cameron [with an arrogant insouciance reminiscent of Tony Blair] promised a referendum on membership of the Union hoping, once and for all, to show that the 'Bastards' were a declining and impotent minority within the British state. Cameron was surprised to win the election, and he decided to call the referendum on the basis that a simple majority was required, with no limiting conditions. He apparently expected something over 70% of those who voted to favour continued membership of the Union. He had not foreseen that the referendum could be opened up as an avenue for the pent-up resentment of large swathes of the nation against his austerity policies, against deindustrialisation, against alien immigration, and simply against authority. The more the odious apostle of austerity, George Osborne, predicted doom and disaster, so the more people were tempted to vote against the government.

Thus came about Brexit. Cameron stood down, shocked at the consequences of his actions. The largely unknown Theresa May became the surprise premier, and she immediately grasped the wrong end of the stick on Brexit. Without comprehension of the importance of the economic cocoon, she set in train a process which - if it were continued to the end - would be calamitous. On her minsters' first presentation of major Brexit legislation - yesterday - it immediately became clear that she would not get away with it. The nation is about to descend into faction, debate and disagreement that will be reflected in both houses of parliament and in all the devolved assemblies. Things are getting interesting: and the only certainty is that Brexit as Mrs May has misconstrued it has gone into protracted death throes,