Big Ideas and Rhetoric

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Victoria Winckler’s post on the lack of big ideas in Welsh politics certainly provoked some responses in the coverage of it in the Western Mail.  I think she had a point, and that some of the responses are too defensive by far. 

I don’t accept that the ‘Big Society’ is a big idea, mind, which seemed to be the starting point for the discussion.  I’m not convinced that its supporters – or even its originator – really know what they mean by it; it’s always seemed to me more like an excuse for simply shrinking the public sector as rapidly as possible.  Insofar as it has any philosophy behind it, it’s thus more about cutting the public sector than about voluntary and community action, which is just presentational.

Back to Wales, however, and I tend to agree with her assertion that much of what the parties are saying really is more about managing things better rather than about any underlying philosophical differences.  Part of the reason for that is touched on in the comments by Professor Richard Wyn Jones in that there is a higher degree of consensus between the parties at a Welsh level than there is at a UK level. 

I’m not entirely convinced that it’s a ‘left of centre’ consensus and that the solution is to have ‘a more visible centre-right’ though.  I think I could equally suggest that the real problem is the lack of a credible left-wing alternative to centrist market-based policies.  It probably depends on where different people see the ‘centre’.

He’s right, though, to suggest that having our own law-making parliament is a big idea of sorts.  The problem with that is that what was once a ‘big idea’ espoused largely by one party has become a consensus supported by people in all parties (even if not by all the people in some parties); and the party which initially stood alone in pushing for full self-government has become increasingly unwilling to depart from the more recent consensus in favour of small incremental changes.  ‘Big idea’ it might be, but it’s not a ‘big idea’ which any longer differentiates meaningfully between parties.

As voters in the US discovered recently, there’s a difference between a ‘big idea’ and mere rhetoric; simply repeating words like ‘hope’, ‘change’, ‘radical’, and ‘transformation’ is really not the same thing as offering a substantive alternative.

I’m sure that all parties will be looking for striking policies to put in their manifestos for May’s election.  On the basis of past experience, I’d expect Plaid to come up with the most original ideas – the party has something of a track record on that score.  It isn’t the same thing as a ‘big idea’ though – it’s more about being imaginative and original within the confines of the current paradigm, when what we are really lacking is an alternative paradigm.

Hotelling’s Law goes some way towards explaining why a number of parties all seeking votes from the same people will tend to end up offering broadly similar policies, for fear of excluding some potential supporters.  It seriously limits the range within which product differentiation occurs unless one or more players is sufficiently brave to make a bold leap outside that range.

At the moment, I suspect that Victoria Winckler is right to doubt whether that will happen.