“The Coalition is following where New Labour led – just as New Labour followed where Thatcher led. And, like New Labour and Thatcher, it is doing so, not because its members are wicked people, but because it is hard to do anything else in a culture from which the language of the public good and [...]
Archive for December, 2010
Ethos: Why the right gets it wrong and the left don’t get it.
Posted in Civic Republicanism, Political Thought on December 20, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
Liberty, Equality, Fraternity
Posted in Political Thought on December 18, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
There are two interesting strands of thought which, although yet to be recognised by mainstream political parties in the UK, are beginning to reshape the academic and ideological debate. These are the “democratic republican tradition”, at present advocated most forcefully by David Marquand, and the “Red Tory / Blue Socialist” line of thought, emerging [...]
To thee, old cause: Regaining Milton’s Paradise
Posted in Constitutions on December 17, 2010 | Leave a Comment »
To thee old cause! Thou peerless, passionate, good cause, Thou stern, remorseless, sweet idea… (From Walt Whitman’s “Leaves of Grass”). It was John Milton, the puritan prophet, propagandist, political theorist and poet, who coined the term “Good Old Cause”. He did so in the last days of the great republican experiment (1649-1660). It was a [...]
