Chartist, October 1999
Continental social democrats are deeply ambivalent about
Britain’s Labour government – though their reasons vary widely. Paul Anderson
reports
When Labour won the 1997 general election, there was barely
concealed rejoicing throughout the continental European political
establishment. Tony Blair was an unknown quantity the other side of the
Channel. But few mainstream continental politicians doubted that he was an
out-and-out pro-European whose accession to power meant the end of a decade of
Tory obstructionism in Europe.
Today, the picture is rather different. The sense of relief
that the Tories are gone is still just about palpable. But Blair is no longer
an unknown quantity. And although he is still much admired on the continent,
doubts about new Labour are now widespread, particularly among left-leaning
social democrats.
There are several things new Labour is generally seen to
have done well. Most important, Britain is now firmly established as a
co-operative member of the European family, not its black sheep. The Blair
government has signed Britain up to the social chapter of the Maastricht
treaty, has given substantial impetus to west European defence policy
integration and has played a constructive role in the gruelling process of
reforming the Common Agricultural Policy in preparation for EU enlargement.
The most common cause for continental grumbling about
Britain under Blair is the apparent cooling of new Labour's enthusiasm for
participation in the single European currency. In 1997, hopes were high among
other EU governments of all political colours that Blair would take advantage
of his extraordinary popularity among British voters and his giant
parliamentary majority to call a snap referendum on Britain joining the euro in
the first wave. That didn't happen – and the British government subsequently
decided to rule out a referendum during the current parliament.
In the wake of this June's European elections, the Labour
leadership has wavered again on the euro. Blair has agreed to front the
pro-European Britain in Europe campaign – but only on condition that it drops
its focus on arguing for British participation in the single currency and
instead emphasises the benefits of Britain remaining in the EU. Blair has
continued to argue for British membership of EMU when the time is right, but
sources close to Gordon Brown have indicated that the chancellor is no longer
as favourable towards sterling joining the euro as he once was. With the
opinion polls showing strong public opposition to Britain joining EMU, it would
not be surprising if Labour decides not to hold a referendum even in the next
parliament.
Euro-zone politicians who want Britain in are not impressed
– and they are right to detect a failure of new Labour nerve. Yet the truth is
that Britain's dithering on the euro, however damaging it is to the political
credibility of new Labour, does not make a great deal of difference to them. The
euro "ins" have to make the single currency work regardless of what Britain
decides to do. If disappointment with the British stance is widespread, it is
not intense.
By contrast, there is deep hostility among some continental
social democrats to new Labour's enthusiasm for deregulation and flexible
labour markets, which they see as part of an attempt to replace the European
model of workers' rights and welfare provision with something akin to what
prevails in the United States.
Since becoming prime minister, Blair has consistently
proselytised for policies to encourage competitiveness, doing his utmost to
persuade his fellow social democratic leaders – and some moderate conservatives
– to sign up to the "Third Way" represented by new Labour in Britain and the
Clinton administration in the United States.
There is something about the 'Third Way' initiative that
gives it the air of a desperate attempt by Blair to secure influence over
euro-zone economic policy that British non-participation in the single currency
has denied him. And so far, the results have not been spectacular: a few
seminars and conferences and a pamphlet launched jointly by Blair and German
chancellor Gerhard Schröder just before the European election, Europe: The Third Way — Die Neue Mitte.
But enough social democratic party leaders have become
involved in the 'Third Way' initiative to give it momentum – and this in turn
has set alarm bells ringing, particularly in the French Socialist Party, on the
left of Schröder's SPD and among German trade unionists.
'We are different, unique,' French prime minister Lionel
Jospin declared when asked why he had not signed up to the Blair-Schröder
pamphlet. "We are less free-market, less attached to transatlantic ties. We
favour global economic regulation." In Germany, the SPD has spent much of the
summer arguing about whether the Blair-Schröder pamphlet played a part in its
miserable result in the European elections, with the left and prominent trade
unionists attacking its free-market thrust.
Not all the hostility to the Blair-Schröder pamphlet should
be taken at face value. It is a moot point whether Jospin's differences with
Blair and Schröder are much more than rhetorical. With the exception of its
introduction of the 35-hour week, his government has been notably
deregulationist, and his distancing himself from Blair and Schröder has more to
do with his need to retain Communist Party support for his government than with
anything else. Similarly, SPD left criticisms of the Blair-Schröder document
have a lot to do with continuing resentment at the ejection of Oskar Lafontaine
from the government in March and opposition to the austere budget package put
forward by his successor as finance minister, Hans Eichel. The reality is that
all the social democratic governments in the EU enthusiastically embrace the
market even if they spurn the rhetoric of the "Third Way".
Nevertheless, worries that the Blair government is a Trojan
horse for American-style labour-market and welfare practices are real enough,
and they are unlikely to go away if it continues on its current course. If new
Labour seriously wants to keep in with its social democratic sister parties in
continental Europe — and they are in power in 13 out of 15 EU countries — it
would do it no harm over the next few months to make it clear that it thinks
trade unions, workers' rights and comprehensive welfare states are good things
rather than impediments to enterprise. Come to think of it, that might even
boost morale in Labour's own ranks.
