I pretty much agree as well.

See http://www.pickledpolitics.com/archives/2103

Ideally for open primaries to work, all 3 major parties would have them on the same day.

Otherwise there is a danger that people vote more than once.

I wouldn’t dispute the desire to generate more involvement in UK politics, but the call for primaries as the method of achieving this seems to misrepresent their real effect in the US.

Historically, they were introduced with the explicit aim of undermining the party organisations by removing their control over candidates. Indeed some scholars argue the Progressives introduced them with the direct intention of marginalising immigrant and working class votes (Burnham) and so re-establishing elite control over the polity. To the extent that US parties have remained much weaker than their Euro equivalents this seems to have been the result. This weakness has resulted in much lower levels of participation among those on the lower socio-economic rungs, and a democracy in which the two parties hug close on the centre right of the political spectrum, prizing personalty over policy innovation.

I’m not seeking to rubbish attempts at reform (it’s needed), but it’s worth giving serious consideration to the longer term effects of the US system – a significant part of Obama’s appeal is that he emerged from a system usually so devoid progressive candidates.

@yellowsammy

Some interesting points, and since I’m not really conversant in the origins of the US primary system, I shall take your word for it. There was one part of your response that stuck out, though:

“Historically, they were introduced with the explicit aim of undermining the party organisations by removing their control over candidates. Indeed some scholars argue the Progressives introduced them with the direct intention of marginalising immigrant and working class votes (Burnham) and so re-establishing elite control over the polity.”

Perhaps this was the aim in the past, but I don’t think it’s the reality now. In the run-up to the 06 mid-terms, local party organisations exerted much greater influence by utilising the internet for grassroots organising & fundraising. For example, the idea of removing Joe Lieberman from the Democratic ticket in CT would’ve seemed impossible just five years ago, and we might never have seen the election of Senators like Jim Webb and Barack Obama – who ran long-shot campaigns against candidates supported by the establishment. The campaign methods developed in the US over the past 3 years have encouraged greater involvement in the democratic process, and that’s something I’d love to see over here.

Let’s look at British politics for a minute. I really take issue with the tendency of parties to parachute candidates into constituencies they have little in common with. For example, why on earth is David Miliband the MP for South Shields? Why is Shaun Woodward the MP for St Helens? Weren’t there any candidates who actually live in these constituencies who’d suitable to become MPs? Of course there were, but the Labour establishment decided that having its own candidates in place was more important than having local support. I’d like to see this change, and I think the primary system is a way of doing this.

I’ve babbled on long enough, but my general point is that the way US Democrats are currently electing candidates is considerably more open, democratic and inclusive than anything we have to offer, and I’d be interested to see whether a primary in London might change that.

@Shariq,

Considering I read Pickled Politics every day, I have no idea why I’ve never read that post before. It’s really good though, particularly when you talk about the potential a primary system has to remove the need for shortlists on the basis of race or gender. Let the best person win, etc etc.

Neil, Thanks for the interesting response post. I think you alight on the crucial point – that this discussion of what we can learn from US movement politics will remain rather vague until we can find some specific steps to advocate and bring about.

I imagine that those practical steps may well belong to different projects, with different or shifting coalitions behind them.

(1) As a Labour member, I am interested in how to change the culture and organisation of the Labour Party itself. This depends on pressure being built inside the Labour party by those who share these goals. (If this were to be successful it could open Labour up to being able to cooperate in different ways on issues and campaigns with non-party progressives and others – which could take the form of a series of shifting coalitions/alliances).

This that won’t be relevant to some non-Labour people. (And there may be those in other parties seeking to bring about change in a similar way in their own parties).

(2) The issue of broader left-liberal ‘movement politics’ on the left seems to me a different and broader project. That wouldn’t work in the UK as a party political project, or as a non-party project which was closely aligned/affilated to a particular party. (If this was successful, it could have an impact on a range of organisations – such as the Labour party, the trade unions, the Liberal Democrats, the Green Party and other non-party NGOs, civil society campaigns, etc).

A London Primary for the Labour Party is one suggestion of internal organisational/cultural change which would also offer one route to participation with Labour to those in the second group who are interested in that. This makes sense for a political party, not least because the Mayoral candidate will need to win non-Labour votes to be elected. The test of whether/how far it generates genuine engagement from outside the party would depend on how it is done, and what else it is part of.

These are different ‘tracks’. But my own view is that Labour will remain a necessary – but not sufficient – part of any future governing project from the centre-left, and that we need a more pluralist approach.

Others may disagree. I respect that. But my sense is that this view is more often tends to be based on not wanting a part of a governing project, (or feeling that no sufficently progressive governing project is on offer), and so pursuing other forms/spaces of social/political pressure or change. I am less clear that there are serious attempts to construct an alternative progressive governing project.

Sunder, I agree with the view that those who don’t want to be part of a governing project would criticise any attempts by a political party to reach out to build a broader liberal left movement.

On the one hand, we’re talking about a party that doesn’t listen anymore to its own activists, so it’s unlikely non-members would trust it to change for them. On the other hand, in London, the recent past (up until May!) shows that we can develop coalition-based politics on the left which is both meaningful for everyone and successful.

My experience in France of working on open primaries is that the “hard left” (Besancenot et al) and the “radical centre” (ex-UDF/now Modem) refused the invitation to the participative policy making process that Desirs d’Avenir developed, but that the groups & organisations that were involved in social movements were keen to participate (especially the organisers at local level who were used to developing local coalitions and therefore working with socialist activists on the ground), even though Desirs d’Avenir was clearly of the left. The key was for local party officials (who were also invited) to stop seeing themselves as first amongst equals, but as equal as any other local community organiser. This is why we need to involve both the party activists and the non-party activists. They have much more in common with each other than the people who lead their organisations!