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OPINION 27 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 24 NOVEMBER 2019 British politics is changing dramatically, and the left sees an opportunity Daniel Fitzpatrick Daniel Fitzpatrick is Lecturer in Politics, Aston University TheConversation.com RADICAL. Transformative. Path-breaking. These cliches are often trotted out in the pages of party manifestos. Manifestos are more than shopping lists of policy priori- ties and pledges. They repre- sent an opportunity for po- litical parties to put forward a narrative of reform and renew- al of the underpinning purpose of the state. Of course, they are always couched in the rhetoric of change and innova- tion, but rarely do they move far beyond the technocratic exercises of tweaking existing arrangements. Taken together, the Labour Party's manifesto for the 2019 UK election breaks with this convention and seeks to transform the British state. It advocates no less than a new social contract between the citizen and the state. This manifesto programme seeks to strengthen state capacity and develop the UK economy via a "national trans- formation fund" for critical infrastructure and low-carbon technology. The inspiration here is the developmental states of east Asia, such as Japan and South Korea. It is combined with the moral and political logic of the post-war Labour government led by Clement Attlee. There is to be a turbo- charged council housing building scheme led by the state and major investment in health and education. Then, the part-nationalisation of broadband is an interesting mix of old and new. It sees the return of public ownership, but on the radically new ter- rain of internet access. Here Labour is not only seeking to reverse some of the ravages of austerity but to fundamentally redefine what should be considered basic rights of citizenship in the 21st century. Access to the internet and digital services is being put in the same category of other essential utilities, such as water, energy, education and health – things that are too important to be left to the market. There is scepticism about whether such a radical, trans- formative agenda will resonate with voters enough to win the 2019 election. But even if it doesn't, this manifesto has a longer term purpose. It is designed to be preference- shaping rather than preference accommodating. Its goal is to reframe the political debate on the party's own terms, rather than dilute the radicalism of its proposals to appeal to an- ticipated affinities or the risk aversion of middle England. Under leader Jeremy Corbyn, Labour's objective is to shift the centre ground of British politics to the left. A surprising lesson from Brexit Labour appears to have been emboldened to push harder on these issues by changes to electoral politics in the UK. For a whole new generation of voters, the New Labour years of the 1990s and 2000s – never mind Thatcherism – is a foreign country. As an ideological project, Thatcher- ism was designed to empower the market and irrevocably "roll back the frontiers of the state" through policies of privatisation, deregulation and liberalisation. The policies of Conservative governments in the 1980s and 1990s, and to a lesser extent New Labour after 1997, were premised on the assumption that state involve- ment in the economy leads to perverse results – of which the poor performance of nation- alised industries in the 1970s was seen as indicative. Thus, the role of the state has gradu- ally been minimised. Younger voters know little more than the politics of austerity, as defined by public spending cuts and a shrinking state. Stark warnings about a return to the "bad old days of 1970s" when you had to "wait six months for the Post Office to put in a phone line" are hardly likely to mean much to a millennial employed in the gig economy whose working pattern is determined by an algorithm via an app on their mobile phone. While a glaring registra- tion gap between older and younger voters remains, a surge in the number of people under 25 registering to vote in recent weeks suggests a growing political engagement in this younger demographic and perhaps a more signifi- cant electoral impact this time round. The other dynamic at play here is Brexit. Not only in the emerging electoral map based on the politics of Leave and Remain, but the undeniable evidence post-referendum that dramatic shifts in public opin- ion and the political culture of the UK are still possible. In these volatile, unpredict- able times, the opportunity to reshape and remould the state and its relationship to the economy and the citizen is great. In 2010, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coali- tion government sought to fundamentally reduce the size and scope of the British state in the wake of the 2008 finan- cial crisis. That project was ultimately derailed by Brexit. Political scientist WH Green- leaf famously characterised British politics as an enduring cycle between the politics of libertarianism and collectiv- ism. While governing parties may change more or less each election, the prevailing ideo- logical view of the state and its role is generally more sticky. It shifts episodically over time. Whether Labour can con- found the polls and win an outright majority is yet to be seen. But in a period of shift- ing political allegiances and hung parliaments, the mani- festos of losing parties outside of government carry increas- ing weight and moral force. After four decades in which economic liberalism and market logic have presided over British party politics, the 2019 Labour Party manifesto may represent a decisive swing of the pendulum back towards collectivism and an interven- tionist state – whichever party or parties form a government after the December 12. There is scepticism about whether such a radical, transformative agenda will resonate with voters enough to win the 2019 election Under leader Jeremy Corbyn, Labour's objective is to shift the centre ground of British politics to the left