The meaning of radicalism BOOKS

ROBERT BLAKE

'Radical' has become an almost universal term of praise nowadays. At the last two elections all three parties competed with one another for the claim to the authentic cachet. 'Moderni- sation' was merely a synonym for it. Much more truly than Harcourt on socialism, it might seem, one could say today, 'We are all Radicals now'—or if that is too much, 'We would all like to be Radicals now.' Yet a moment's reflection brings home the absurdity of the idea. If Radical means what the dictionary says it means—'one who holds the most advanced views of political reform on democratic lines' —clearly most people are not and never have been Radicals. The truth is that the last three years have seen one of those moods of vague impatience with existing institutions, which at intervals, often for no very obvious reason, seem to agitate the great British public. There is a desire for some changes and, although there is seldom a desire for sweeping change, it suits those who wish to woo the electorate, or merely to be in the swim, to talk the lan- guage of radicalism, perhaps even to believe in it. When the flurry has died away—and it is showing signs of doing so now—we shall find that changes have indeed occurred, but they will not be very great or very sensational. It is this contraSt of performance with promise or threat—whichever way one looks at it—that prompted the remark after the Great Reform Bill, 'Nothing has changed because in England nothing ever does.' It was an exaggeration, but a pardonable one.

What is new today is the chameleon-like atti- tude of the right. Yet the Conservative Central Office may have been wise. True, the party lost. If the nation is in a mood for change it will vote for the party which has been advocat- ing change all along, and not for seemingly belated converts. But the Conservatives have at least limited their losses. In 1832, 1906 and 1945 when they faced the Radical charge with Tory colours flying they went down with a far worse crash than in 1966.

However that may be, Dr John W. Derry does well to remind us in his excellent new book, The Radical Tradition (Macmillan, 50s), that for most of its history radicalism has been anything but a consensus word. On the con- trary, the Radicals were, and expected to be, the subject of furious controversy and bitter dispute. The concept of 'Tory Radicalism' would have seemed for most of the nineteenth century a contradiction in terms—and quite rightly too. Even Lord Randolph Churchill did not himself use it, though the words have often been applied to his attitude in retrospect. His own expression was 'Tory Democracy,' which is not the same thing at all. One of Dr Derry's best chapters is an excellent analysis of the basic confusion which underlay Lord Ran- dolph's political outlook : `His career exposes the inherent contradic- tion within Tory Radicalism. If a Tory sees change primarily as the means by which new forces and new classes are contained within or reconciled with a traditional government or social structure he cannot be called a Radical. If a Radical insists that change must be based

uporfa thorough and searching analysis of con- temporary needs, regardless of traditional pat- terns of thought and behaviour, he cannot be a Tory . .

What is the Radical tradition? Apart from Lord Randolph, introduced precisely because he is a-typical, Dr Derry illustrates it with nine characters, plus a chapter on the Chartists. The nine are: Paine, Cobbett, Bentham, Owen, Cobden, Bright, J. S. Mill, Joseph Chamber- lain, Lloyd George. It is something of a puzzle at first sight to see what they had in common. Radicalism has had various explanations. None quite fits these names. Dissent against the Church of England? Cobbett and Cobden were Angli- cans. Democracy against oligarchy? Mill came to be profoundly worried about .`the 'tyranny of the majority.' Naive utopians against worldly politicians? Who could be a smarter operator than Lloyd George? The industrial middle class against the aristocracy? No one could have detested the manufacturers more than the average Chartist and no one could have been more hostile to industrialisation than Cobbett, 'the Goldwater of the nineteenth century, the tireless champion of an old way of life, engaged in ceaseless combat with the forces of dark- ness.'

At times one is tempted to wonder whether sheer crankiness is their only bond. Certainly some of them had their quota of it. Cobbett believed that tea drinking was the greatest evil of the day, particularly for its pernicious effects on the young. It was bad for boys, even more fatal for girls, `to whom the gossip of the tea-table is no bad preparatory school for the brothel.' Robert Owen believed that a child's health varied directly with the vigour which had gone into its procreation, and based a whole code of matrimonial conduct upon this interesting theory—to the scandal of the respect- able. But although some were cranks and some rode hobby-horses, others showed no particu- lar eccentricity. There was nothing cranky about Cobden or Chamberlain or Lloyd George.

Are we then reduced to saying that their only uniting feature is that they thought of themselves and were thought by others as `Radicals,' and that the word is merely a blank cheque for anyone who on any grounds wishes to change drastically the existing state of society? The answer is no. Despite the difficulty of extracting a coherent doctrine from the opinions of nineteenth century Radicals; they did hold distinctive beliefs which differed not only from Whiggism and of course Toryism, but from socialism too. Admittedly Robert Owen favoured socialism, which, he said, `rightly understood, means truth, unity, pro- gressive and unceasing prosperity, universal charity and kindness, and the happiness of all, knowing no exceptions.' But, however useful this might be to Transport House as an elec- tion cry, it is not much help to the student of political thought.

In any case, radicalism and socialism were often to be found in conflict—at any rate by the time that socialism bad come to have a more precise meaning. The typical Radical of the nineteenth century believed in free trade,

Treasury economy, the minimum of govern- mental interference, the rights of property (other than large landed estates), thrift, pri- vate enterprise and self-help--not beliefs which have much in -common with socialism. To most Radicals, America was the utopia where these ideals came nearest to practical realisation. It is true that Radicals believed, too, in democ.

racy, education, the abolition of privilege, aristocratic and clerical, internationalism, and morality rather than expediency in politics; they also believed in `improvement'—a con- venient portmanteau word covering various means of raising the standard of living, first in their own country and then overseas.

Many in this second category of beliefs have been taken over by the Labour party, and, for all their adherence to a controlled economy and their scepticism about profits and free enterprise, a big element of nineteenth century radicalism still animates Labour supporters even today. Cobden and Bright would have supported the UN and denounced Suez in 1956 as vigorously as any Socialist did. Moreover, radicalism itself changed as time went on. Joseph Chamberlain was accused of being a Socialist when he asked what ransom property paid for the security which it enjoyed. He did not deny the charge. 'Every kindly act of legis- lation by which the community has sought to discharge its responsibilities and obligations to the poor is Socialism; but it is none the worse for that.' Yet Chamberlain was deeply hostile to any attack on the principles of a capitalist economy, and he would have regarded the common ownership of the means of produc- tion, distribution and exchange as an imprac- ticable absurdity.

The truth is that radicalism combined two quite separate elements. In a perceptive essay in his book on Victorian poll books, re- cently reviewed in these columns, Dr J. R. Vincent advances the theory that 'the people' can be divided into two types of social group- ing, 'those who are institutionalised and given society by their work,' e.g. miners, dockers, fac- tory workers, and 'those whose work creates for them only an exiguous system of personal relations,' e.g. shopkeepers, smallholders, arti- sans and craftsmen. The first category find much of their 'emotional interest available for politics' absorbed in local institutionalised con- flicts with employers about- wages etc. They have clear-cut material interests and such feel- ings as are left over for national politics tend to be expressed in specific welfare or material issues—bread-and-butter politics, as it is some- times called. This is the background to socialism.

The second group is in the reverse position. Its political emotions are not absorbed even partially in matters connected with daily life. and its material interests are vague and uncer- tain, or at any rate not such as would be helped by the welfare state. The frustrations of the individualist 'little man' of modest means `contemplating the successful and the holders of power' were expressed in a national policy concerned above all with who should rule, in fact the politics of power rather than bread and. butter, summed up by Humpty-DumotY.s famous words, 'which is to be master—thats all.' This is the background to radicalism. Dr Derry is touching on the same point when he emphasises the extent to which radicalism was an expression of resentment in the midlands and the north, where the new wealth was being produced, against the rule of a southern and home counties landed oligarchy. It was nour- ished, too, by the Celtic fringe for similar reasons. Much of British nineteenth centur!

hi.tory could be written in terms of nationalistic rebellion against English domination, and within England of provincial revolt against the centre. What the Radicals wanted was to rule. What they did when they ruled was a secondary matter.

These resentments, class and provincial, are with us still. Labour certainly owed some of its success in 1964 and 1966 to a sense of neglect in Scotland, Wales and the north, and to the hostility felt by elements of 'the new middle class' towards the grouse moor image so ably exploited by Labour. The great ques- tion for Mr Wilson is whether he can retain the support of those social forces along with the traditional support of organised labour. The great question for the Conserva- tives is which group to try to woo over to their own side. Perhaps that is what 'Tory Radi- calism' is really about.