At the time, we almost invariably find something to argue about which seems, and may even be, a matter of life and death. In 1972, the worst year of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, 479 people, including 130 British soldiers, were killed. Ford and Goodwin haven’t just talked to everyone who counts and crunched all the data that’s out there. They’ve produced a really approachable book on a party which, by providing disoriented and disillusioned voters with the alternative they’ve been looking for, may well make a big impact at the next election and beyond." Tim Bale, Professor of Politics, Queen Mary University of London, author ofThe Conservative Party: From Thatcher to Cameron The vacuum left by the collapse of the trade unions has been filled, as Goodwin says, by university graduates who marry other university graduates, seldom talk to anyone outside their own class, and with insufferable self-righteousness try to impose their trendy opinions on the rest of us. More usefully, they provide copious evidence that rightwing populism has been a long time in the making. They organise this evidence into four Ds: distrust in elites, destruction of national culture, deprivation in the economic sphere and dealignment in political identification and voting behaviour. Their review of postwar political and economic history is informative and often compelling, providing clarity around a number of key debates within political science and political theory for the uninitiated. The EU is presented, not unreasonably, as a fundamentally elitist and undemocratic project, while neoliberal globalisation (implausibly described as “the most significant change in terms of its impact” to have afflicted capitalism in more than 400 years) is explored as a basis of rising resentment, not so much due to its material effects as its psychological ones. Rising inequality and immigration produce a feeling of relative deprivation, that one is getting unfairly overtaken by others. Le Pen hovers ambiguously in the middle of the national populist spectrum, fusing nationalism to social democracy and an aggressive defence of western values. Her brand-washing, gender and comparatively youthful support do important work in Eatwell and Goodwin’s narrative, providing a face of national populism that convincingly defies the prejudices of liberal elites. In their characterisation, Le Pen is a hybrid of cultural conservative and social liberal, and Muslims are unfortunate to fall foul on both counts.

Matthew Goodwin review — has the Values, Voice and Virtue by Matthew Goodwin review — has the

But if one does so, one sees that the New Elite is nothing like as new as Goodwin supposes it to be. It has existed in various insufferable forms for a long time, and it led Disraeli to develop a form of politics attractive to newly enfranchised members of the skilled working class:This is a canny and deceptive intellectual move. It would be strange to define socialism in terms of the hopes and fears of trade unionists, or liberalism in terms of the worldview of a free rights-holding individual. And yet national populism is only really distinguished from nationalism and racism by the fact that its supporters do not see themselves in these terms. Inversely, Eatwell and Goodwin’s insistence that Le Pen or Wilders are not racist politicians rests on the PR efforts these figures have made to detoxify their images as racists in the eyes of the public and media. Just as Rishi Sunak tries to calm things down, Goodwin wishes to persuade us that “British politics is coming apart”. He says a “New Elite” consisting of university graduates with “radically progressive values” has taken control of our institutions and looks down on “the morally inferior masses”, whom it dismisses as racists and xenophobes. Do not read Brexit - unless you want truth rather than propaganda, objectivity rather than bias and evidence rather than prejudice. Harold D. Clarke, Matthew Goodwin and Paul F. Whiteley have written a book that will still be standing when the post-truth claims of those on both sides of the referendum have rightly crumbled to dust.' Peter Kellner, former President of YouGov Goodwin reminds us that one consequence of this reform was the collapse of working-class representation in Parliament: National Populism is a self-styled myth-buster. In particular, it aims to disabuse hardcore liberals of any lingering hope that the last three years have been but a blip, after which transnational, elite-led politics will return to normal. This message is less iconoclastic than the authors appear to believe, as any glance at doom-laden Economist op-eds or the latest non-fiction book releases will attest. Remainers and Brussels technocrats are taking up the fight against Brexiters and “illiberal democrats”, precisely because they now recognise that they have a formidable opponent on their hands. Nevertheless, Eatwell and Goodwin hammer away at their prophecy of a populist future, as if they don’t trust the reader to grasp it at the first 18 attempts. National populism is only distinguished from nationalism and racism in that its supporters do not see themselves in these terms

Values, Voice and Virtue: The New British Politics

Ultimately, the category of national populism is stretched in so many directions that it obscures more distinctions than it illuminates. It starts with an eminently understandable desire to be listened to and recognised, but then extends to demagoguery, violent threats and wall-building. If the language of racism, nationalism and fascism is really not adequate to distinguish between the desire for stable community and Salvini’s vicious hatred of refugees, between alienation from unelected elites and Orbán’s dismantling of the rule of law, then find a language that will. The book’s timing (completed in summer 2018) rescues them from having to stretch national populism to accommodate Brazil’s new president-elect. Jim Callaghan, the in many ways admirable successor to Wilson, was brought low by the unions in the Winter of Discontent, and in April 1979 defeated by the Conservatives under Thatcher, the country’s first woman Prime Minister. Although one cannot know what disasters are about to occur, the hysteria provoked by Boris Johnson does not seem any greater than the hysteria provoked, in their different ways, by Enoch Powell, Edward Heath, Harold Wilson or Margaret Thatcher.

But Matthew Goodwin contends that “the new British politics” of the last decade “is far more volatile, chaotic, divisive, and unpredictable”. has taken full control of the political institutions, the think tanks, the civil service, the public bodies, the universities, the creative industries, the cultural institutions and much of the media.” a clearly visible section of the New Elite [my capitals] believe Western nations such as Britain are institutionally racist, see their British identity and history as a source of shame, feel much less pride than others in the nation, and feel much less attached to their national identity and the wider national group.” Revolt on the Rightis a rich and insightful dissection of Britain's first new major political force in a generation. Ford and Goodwin combine rigorous yet accessible statistical analysis of UKIP's supporters with unprecedented access to party activists and leaders. They paint a detailed portrait of the social forces driving UKIP's emergence and how the party itself has developed to mobilise a new mass electorate. This book is essential reading for anyone looking to understand this fascinating, and potentially disruptive, new force in British politics." Anthony Heath, University of Oxford and University of Manchester. The duty of the Opposition is to oppose, and within each party is found an awkward squad which scorns the path taken by the leadership and campaigns for a change of direction.