Futures of Socialism: The Pandemic and the Post-Corbyn Era - edited by Grace Blakeley

Published in 2020 by Verso Books, London, UK and Brooklyn, NY

272 pages

ISBN: 978-1-83976-133-1

In the autumn of 2019, there was a unique sense of hope among Leftists in Britain and the United States. Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour party had turned the party sharply leftward, winning Labour 40% of the vote in the 2017 general election, a staggering 9.6% increase from 2015 and the highest voting share since 2001. Across the pond in the United States, Bernie Sanders, riding the momentum from his wildly successful grassroots campaign in 2016, seemed to be leading the pack of the Democratic candidates for President (indeed, a sentiment that was validated when Sanders would go on to win the plurality of votes at the start 2020, racking up wins in Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada primaries). For Leftists, the atmosphere was electric, as it seemed that there was finally a chance to organize and employ progressive policies after decades of neoliberal crisis. 

Yet, we all know how these campaigns turned out. Corbyn was soundly defeated by Boris Johnson and the Conservative Party in a landslide election. Promising to “Get Brexit Done,” Johnson made significant inroads in the Labour Party’s “Red Wall'' (Northern England, the Midlands, and North East Wales), and his victory was a deathblow to Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party, as he resigned and was replaced with Keir Starmer. In the US, fearing the strength of the Sanders campaign after his string of victories in the early primaries, the Democratic establishment rallied around Joe Biden, as candidates such as Buttigieg, Klobuchar, O’Rourke, Booker, and Harris quickly dropped out and endorsed Biden following his strong showing in the South Carolina primary, securing his position as the Democratic nominee once Sanders dropped out in April. 

For Leftists in both countries, these defeats were soul-crushing. In addition, following the devastation of the COVID-19 pandemic, the return to a neoliberal consensus in mainstream politics, the resurgence of far-right, ethno-nationalist forces in the American Right, and an ever-looming climate crisis that threatens to destroy the lives of the most vulnerable and destitute in our society while billionaires use their inordinate amount of hoarded wealth to launch themselves into space, it is easy for those of us on the Left to fall into a kind of nihilistic despair (aka. become “black-pilled”). At times, it seems like there is little reason for hope, and to wish for anything better than our current crisis-riddled world can seem like little more than a naive, fanciful pipe-dream.

Yet, despite these seemingly insurmountable challenges, there are those of us on the Left who are still working towards a better future for us all. While the Corbyn and Sanders campaigns may have dashed any hope for change through executive power at the top, Leftists have always been at their best when organizing for change from below. To be effective in our next steps, however, we must also analyze what went wrong in 2019 and 2020, and what these lessons can teach us as we move forward. In Futures of Socialism: The Pandemic and the Post-Corbyn Era, twenty-eight UK scholars, political organizers, and Labour party members offer their perspectives on Labour’s defeat in 2019 and how socialists should strategize to effectively communicate their beliefs and policies in the wake of the coronavirus crisis. Edited by English economist, commentator, and journalist Grace Blakeley, this work brings together a wide range of voices from the Left as they discuss both what went wrong and where we should go from here, offering various paths forward for socialists in the UK and abroad. 

Overview:

Divided into two sections --namely “Foundations” and “Futures”-- the book focuses on 1) the various reasons for the defeat of Labour in 2019 and 2) how to effectively organize and effect substantial change in the wake of the government’s ineffectual response to COVID-19. Through this collection of twenty-seven essays (each only a handful of pages), the authors not only provide us with sober reflections on the realities of Labour’s defeat, but they also remind us that Leftist politics are still just as relevant and necessary as ever before. While primarily focused on Leftist perspectives within the UK, several chapters compare their socialist movement with various groups overseas, such as the United States and Spain. 

While I can’t give a detailed account of every essay, a few were particularly of note. First, Tom Hazeldine describes the fall of the Red Wall in northern England, and why a traditionally Labour-leaning region didn’t vote that way in 2019 (a topic explored in more detail in his book, The Northern Question: A History of a Divided Country). Andrew Murray gives a passionate defense of the Lexit project, which are Brexit-supporting Leftists who criticize the EU’s neoliberal tendency to stifle socialist thought and place a bulk of the blame of Labour’s loss on Corbyn's blunder regarding a potential second referendum on Brexit. Tom Mills describes the difficulty of socialism having a fair shake in the slanted, anti-democratic media landscape (newspapers, television, etc), while Owen Hatherly -- via The Smiths and Morrisey’s subsequent, controversial career -- writes an intriguing and unique essay on English culture’s obsession with nostalgia, guilt, repression, and misery. In contrast to these more analytical pieces, Lola Seaton writes a personal account of her time as a campaigner for Labour, emphasizing the electricity, momentum, and frustrations that she felt while knocking on doors and canvassing during the election season. 

In the second section, the focus of the essays shifts towards the crises we’re facing globally, and how socialists can mobilize to address these issues head-on. Sam Gindin, James Meadway, Chris Saltmarsh, and Cat Hobbs all write essays addressing the coronavirus crises, each from a different perspective on how it has shaped and disrupted different sectors (healthcare/electoral power/the state, debt/finance, ecology/Green New Deal, and public ownership, respectively) and the opportunities therein. The issues within Labour are connected to Leftist movements around the world, as Cristina Flesher Fominaya writes about the Podemos party in Spain while Joe Guinan and Sarah McKinley look to the United States for comparisons between Corbyn and Bernie Sanders. Social issues, such as anti-racist movements, BLM, and the need for socialist feminism to combat centrist, corporatized feminism, are also addressed by Johsua Virasami, Simukai Chigudu, and Amelia Horgan. Finally, in an essay close to my heart, Daniel Gerke analyzes critical thinkers of the Left, arguing that Mark Fisher’s notion of “capitalist realism” is perhaps just as applicable today as it was over a decade ago. 

Commendations:

First of all, for someone deeply familiar with American politics, but only moderately informed of the political scene in the UK, I found this collection to be incredibly accessible and informing. Despite the wide range of topics covered and the specificity of the subject matter, I found this volume to be surprisingly fun and light. Each essay is only a few pages long, which keeps the pace of reading rather quick. Even if one essay is weaker or doesn’t resonate with you as much, since another essay is just around the corner, you never feel like you’re dragging through the book. Even as an American (albeit a politically-informed, way-to-online one) with a vague, generalized conception of British politics, this book gave me a much clearer insight into the divisions and discussions occurring within the British Labour movement, and how these struggles connect with socialist movements elsewhere in the world. 

Several of the essays struck a particularly salient note with me, such as Owen Hatherly’s contribution focusing on nostalgia and misery within English culture. The utilization of Morrisey as a kind of reflection of the British public and its “nostalgia for misery, a longing for boredom, a relocation of poverty from economics to aesthetics” was unique and, while limited, insightful. As such, while you won’t agree with every essay in this collection (indeed, the authors are at times at odds with one another), the essays are largely well-written and will often challenge you to think about your presuppositions with a more critical eye. Additionally, this book gives you the chance to be introduced to a wide array of scholars, activists, and commentators on the British Left.  

Perhaps more than anything, this book gives hope for the Leftist movement, especially when it is easy to be black-pilled. While most of the authors are realistic regarding the defeats faced and the challenges ahead, they also almost universally hold onto hope for a socialist movement to make real, lasting changes in our world. The wide scope of the essays -- taking into account everything from the financial sector, to the influence of media, to global food distribution -- connects the individual struggles into a more universal project of emancipatory politics. While the authors disagree with one another at times, the wide array of voices in this volume allows the reader to sift through and think about these issues for themselves. 

Critique: 

On the other hand, as to be expected in an anthology of essays, some of the pieces were more well-written and persuasive than others, leading to an occasionally uneven reading experience. This is also exacerbated by the brief length of the essays. While it made for a quick and digestible read, changing topics every few pages resulted in a fast-paced, whirlwind experience. Most of the essays only scratch the surface of the topics they’re addressing, sacrificing depth and rigor for the sake of brevity. As a result, while most of the essays have remained with me and keep me thinking about them, others left little impression in the long run. To be fair, one of the benefits of this format is that, upon reading an essay that deeply resonates or connects, the reader can look up the author’s larger corpus of work to read further. As such, although the essays are not incredibly deep, this collection could be a great introduction to a wide array of new and exciting authors. 

Finally, while there are occasional attempts to connect this work to events in the United States, Spain, and other parts of the world, the bulk of the essays almost exclusively focus on the contemporary state of UK politics. For someone who has absolutely no background or familiarity with the political scene in the UK, some of the finer details of these debates will probably be lost on them. Yet, if you want to get a snapshot of the current state of Leftist politics in the UK (including disagreements, points of contention, and areas of common interest and action), then this book can get the job done admirably. 

Conclusion:

Overall, Futures of Socialism provides a whirlwind tour of current Leftist politics in the UK. Though some of the essays are uneven at times, the wide array of voices in this collection urge the reader to reflect on the mistakes that we made, analyze the challenges we face, and think and act in innovative ways to work for a better future. Perhaps more importantly, it introduces the reader to a wide scope of scholars, activists, and commentators within the Labour movement as they give various perspectives on the state of the party in today’s world.

Leftists, both in the US and the UK, have many challenges before us that often seem to be overwhelming. Yet, there are small signs of hope. Here in the US, those of us in the Millennial and Gen Z generations --saddled with student debt and facing steadily increasing costs of living despite stagnating wages, few long-term career prospects comparable to our parents in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, and the constant demands of participating in the “gig economy”-- are questioning the merits of capitalism. As witnesses to several of capitalism’s various crises within the past two decades, including the most recent coronavirus crisis, many of us have begun to consider alternative ways of structuring our economy and society. Some of us have been reading theory and actively organizing to make real, tangible changes in the material conditions of the working class. 

While the fervor of the Corbyn and Sanders campaigns have long since faded, the Left is still on the ground in the United States and Britain, fighting for economic and social freedom for the majority. Despite all the challenges we face, there is still room for optimism. For those on the Left who need a little boost of confidence and hope after the tough defeat of Labour in 2019 and the even tougher year of 2020, this book is essential reading. It is important to both recognize our missteps and faults as well as what we can do to remedy them. This book is a vitally helpful first step in doing so.