Conservative Socialism

Abstract

The ideology of the British Labour Party is both forward looking-seeking to overthrow British capitalism—and backward looking-being firmly rooted in the myths and memories of workers about their past and their struggles for socialism. Indeed, the forward-looking aspect of the party's ideology is only explicable as a project born of oppression and its memory. Some elements within the Labour Party see the party's attachment to its past as an encumbrance in its fights with the Conservatives. Others would like to freeze Labour's ideas at about 1945. Both views are exaggerations. The battleground between them is over the party's commitment to nationalize the means of "production, distribution, and exchange." The modernizers wish to water down this commitment; the neanderthals wish to reduce the party's ideology to this sole commit ment. The strength of the commitment arises from its genesis in the workers' struggles. The party cannot drop such an important commitment because the creation of that commitment is an important part of the party's view of its past-and it is only this sense of a common past which binds the party and the labour movement. On the other hand, the commitment originally pointed to the future and the party will remain healthy only if it continues to do so.