why on earth are “the rights of the individual, the emphasis on equality, inclusion, multi-culturalism, diversity, respect for all backgrounds, the drive to end poverty” somehow contradictory to “privatisation, outsourcing, downsizing, the emergence of huge corporate enterprises, the commercialisation of the public sector”?

I wasn’t aware that diversity was aided by having a nationalized telecommunications industry, but I live and learn. Nor that “outsourcing” trampled on the rights of the individual.

before you type things like: “the emergence of huge corporate enterprises” did you check whether the distribution of firm sizes has changed during the “era” of New Labour, or did you pull that one out of your backside?

and where do you get off writing things like: “the profit motive [is] one of the most exalted ethos within society” – whilst you may think many organizations are motivated by profit (and you may have thought the same in 1910 or 1810), how is the profit motive “exalted”? Everywhere I look, being motivated by money is spoken of in negative terms, and altruism etc. is exalted.

Interesting article but I’d suggest that in future you avoid borrowing terms from psychiatry without having a clue what they mean. You put ‘having two completely different ideas, two completely different opinions, attitudes or nature’ in quotes but I’m damned if I know where you’re quoting from. It might conceivably be a description of multiple personality disorder but certainly bears no resemblance to bipolar disorder.

Many New Labour policy ideas were made up on the hoof by spin-doctors or as “eye-catching initiatives”. They haven’t been thought through. Thus there are almost always contradictions.

With Labour supposedly in its leadership election debating future policies – their voices greatly muffled by the fact all of them are still talking from within the bubble of the bizarre reality of the last government – it might be worth while noting that their opposition seem to be moving rapidly to the left, leaving Labour stranded on the Thatcherite shores of individual rights and individual greed.

According to this article-

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/jun/16/mansion-house-speech-george-osborne-bank-of-england

George Osbourne of all people – yes, George Osbourne – seems to be offering some fairly solid reforms of the City. A banking mechanism to prevent housing and other consumer bubbles, a tax on bank profits, and a reform of and tightening of City regulations.

What did the previous Labour government offer in this field? Er, nothing. What are our present candidates offering in this field? As far as I’m aware, nothing.

Come on Labour, wake up. Its actually all right to be critical of the City. Bankers are really not popular with the British public any more. Come out of your bankers and taste the soup.

That last sentence should have read “bunkers”, but “bankers” does just as well.

I don’t see how “increasing surveillance and the loss of civic freedoms” fit in with the set of economic activities – they surely fall under the social and cultural header. Similarly, for all its faults, New Labour did a lot for the poorer end of society, whilst simultaneously courting and acquiescing to big business. Contradictions yes, but within spheres, not across.

Alex, where the feck did you get that definition of bi-polar. It’s plain wrong. Furthermore using psychiatric terms as a tag-line for your analysis is both inappropriate and potentially offensive, worsened by the fact that you plainly don’t understand the term.

Alex,

The rights of the individual … has co-existed with … increasing surveillance and the loss of civic freedoms.

Have you considered that they might have merely paid lip service to “the rights of the individual” while remaining satisfied to to trample all over our “civic freedoms”? A government that wants to, for example, give politicians the power to indefinitely imprison people without trial is not a government that is truly supportive of rights or freedoms.

There was no contradiction at all, in the sense that you mean it: rather, the policy was to lie about support for freedom while actively getting rid of it.

That era has been characterised by the attempt to systematically advance policies promoting social liberalism and economic conservatism simultaneously.

I think your sentence should have read

“imposing social authoritarianism and economic state corporatism”

And manic depressive was a much better term and a more meaningful description of the mental illness than is bi-polar (which more accurately describes semi-gay penguins).

New Labour also brought us language fascism.

‘That era has been characterised by the attempt to systematically advance policies promoting social liberalism and economic conservatism simultaneously.’

Social liberalism?

‘And manic depressive was a much better term and a more meaningful description of the mental illness than is bi-polar (which more accurately describes semi-gay penguins).’

No, it doesn’t. I’m bipolar II and it’s a very different condition than bipolar I. And penguins live at the South Pole.

2 & 7
Agreed, pschiatry should be left out of discussions which aren’t about psychiatry and mental illness.
But as the original op suggests, nulabour did attempt to implement two separate and contradictory ideologies.
Can it be done – actually yes, @6 suggests, but not in a random mix, both need to be separated into the public and private, which wasn’t achieved, and the net result appeared like a chaotic, contradictory mess.

Actually, I’d say that Labour spoke about implementing what were two essentially different ideologies but then abandoned but in practice just did whatever seemed best to get good headlines in the tabloids. Not that it worked that well of course.

Well, if we are going to casually transplant terms from one context to another, may I suggest ‘cognitive dissonance’? D Miliband provided a classic example last night, boasting about how Labour passed the Human Rights Act, yet ignoring the repeated way it tried to circumvent or undermine it via the extension of anti-terrorism legislation.

‘Cognitive dissonance’ is bang on, particularly the way New Labour tried to ‘rationalize’ their undermining of civil liberties.

‘Bipolar’ suggests killing invisible chickens with an easel.

For a short time, Blair was able to get away with presenting two contradictory ideas at the same time. His spin-doctors were able to frame issues in a way that reduced the visibility of the contradictions. Some Labour Party members are looking for a new Blair to play the same trick. The problem is that it is difficult to repeat the same trick: the public are more aware now of the spin-doctors’ tricks.

Interesting comments about the article. A lot of emphasis on the use of the term bipolar and its applicability outwith psychiatry as in my notion of “bi-polar society”.
3 points: 1) There is no intention of downplaying, denigrating or making fun of anyone suffering from any psychiatric condition least of all, bipolar disorder
2) Our language is suffused with terms and expressions borrowed from other disciplines including psychiatry such as schizoprehenic and psychotic.
3) Bipolar clearly refers to a condition expressing alternate phases of mania and depression, two very contrasting emotional states, occuring in rapid succession in some cases almost concurrently or simultaenously.
My contention is that the last government, possibly in an attempt to to be all things to all people, sought to maximise, in different spheres admittedly, a range of polices whose totality didn’t add up and mutually contradicted each other. Labour government ministers, sometimes the same minister, would avidly support equality and social inclusion while in virtually the next breath enthusisatically endorse free market capitalism and a financial free-for-all which has left a debt legacy that will chronically affect the most vulnerable in society.
This doesn’t and never will add up and is analagous to the rapid mood swings and huge shifts in emotion experienced (albeit involuntarily) by a person suffering from bipolar disorder.
The analogy and the expression bipolar society, may or may not be relevant, but it shouldn’t deflect from the point, which no commentator has seriously contested, that the last Labour did pursue contradictory policies concurrently and assiduously.

Sorry, Alex, but despite your wriggle, you’re still wrong. All it would have taken was sounding out either someone who uses/has used MH services or someone who works in them. Your definition of bipolar is off-beam, in taking relation to holding two contradictory ideas at the same time.
If you were to use an MH term, and really you shouldn’t, it would (as redpesto points out) be cognitive dissonance, and a more tenable diagnosis would be one of the personality disorders.If a person holds the belief “I am a good person” they may experience cognitive dissonance whenever presented with evidence that their words or actions have hurt others.They then have to make an uncomfortable choice:
1. to hold to their belief and disregard the data they have been presented with or
2. to modify their beliefs and risk having to re-evaluate their world view, their choices and their character.
It’s not an easy situation for anyone to handle, but those with a PD often find it hardest. They may adopt a pattern of denial, diversion and defensiveness or they may alternate between denial and periods of self shame when they try to compensate, or make amends.
Bipolar it isn’t.

“That era has been characterised by the attempt to systematically advance policies promoting social liberalism and economic conservatism simultaneously. ”

Really? I can think of fewer more authoritarian UK governments than the New Labour bunch. Even Maggie and the Criminal Justice Act pale by their standards.

17
We know that that many terms are used from different disciplines to describe phenomonon/events in others, but using terms from mental health usually means describing something which is perceived as negative (as in your op),
Bi-polar is associated with emotional disturbances and affects how we feel about events, so, from being optimistic about something, quite quickly this can change to being pessimistic about the same event, but these bi-polar opposites do not happen simultaneously as in holding contradictory ideas.

“Our language is suffused with terms and expressions borrowed from other disciplines including psychiatry such as schizoprehenic and psychotic.”

True. Political rhetoric is an equal-opportunity stigmatiser of mental health conditions it knows very little about. (I don’t think I’ve ever seen either schizophrenia or psychosis used as an analogy in politics in a way where the analogy makes sense with what the condition is rather than some popular misconception of it)

If we apply the same quality of borrowing words to food, we can term the Conservatives a Strawberry party (because strawberries are red with a green top, and the Conservatives aren’t) but at least in that case the analogy doesn’t rely for its effect on the idea that people with mental health conditions are inferior.

Having been a socialist all my life and a carer and campaigner for the NHS for many years the present perception of who is saying what and why is bewildering.Polly Toynbee (this week’s Guardian)made an astonishing attack on on what she called “dirty little populist tricks”with reference to the decision to stop the proposed £1/2 billion closures to vital NHS services in north London.The proposals-which it took many hours to source-came fron NHS North Central London-NOT a primary care trust but a loose association of six pcts acting without authority-to (they hoped)earn brownie points for themselves and for their managers to keep their jobs in a likely reconfiguration of services! I prophesied that Andy Burnham would have to issue an Executive order stopping the closures-which he did- but not before £2.3million was spent on planning the project.Rachel Tyndall,Islington PCT’ Chief Executive was/is the Director of NHS North Central London.In view of this huge waste of public money,why is she still in post?10,000 people marched to SAVE THE WHITTINGTON.Ms Toynbee accuses -who exactly is unclear-Burnham/Lansley/the marchers? of “DIRTY POPULIST TRICKS”in stopping the closures.Clearly Ms Toynbee thinks she knows better than the public who rely on those services.As well as being bigoted and ill-informed Ms Toynbee’s article lacked the normal smooth flow a journalist would produce,suggesting it was really written for her-probably by Michael White-deputy political editor of the Guardian and weekly columnist of the Health Service Journal,the manager’s mouthpiece for top NHS brass.HOW DARE MS TOYNBEE SMASH INTO THE DESPERATE CRIES FOR HELP OF THOSE WHO MARCHED?NHS services grow out of need-not whim-and the first rule for a journalist is to investigate.Ms Toynbee has attacked everyone apart from slippery overpaid managers on wages of £120k plus target performance bonuses/expenses and god-knows-what else.For once politicoes listened to the voice of the people and Toynbee has shown she is not to be trusted,nor is the Guardian,which is why I now subscibe to the Indy.

“Having been a socialist all my life ”

What kind of socialist?

Oop in Yorkshire, I used to overhear wonderful lunchtime conversations:

“Of course, I’m a real socialist.”

“Well, I’m a practical socialist.”

Third person: “I consider myself a radical socialist.”

In the absence of any visible benchmarks, there was no knowing what any of that meant.