TALKING POLITICS

Helen and David talk about what four years of Trump - and of talking (and talking) about Trump - have meant for their thinking about America and about democratic politics. Is it possible to give a balanced picture of Trump's presidency? Have the last four years followed a pattern or has it just been chaos? What is the likely legacy of Trump's extraordinary level of global fame? Plus we discuss whether 2020 marks the beginning of the 'short' twenty-first century and what that means for Trump's place in it.

Talking Points:

Will historians see 2020 as the start of the ‘short’ 21st century?

• If so, Trump belongs to the interregnum. He’s not a dramatic break.
• Certainly there are continuities, for example, in the Middle East. But there are also discontinuities with China and Iran.
• Is the pandemic a fundamental watershed?

Is American power in decline?

• In some ways, the US is more powerful this decade than it was the decade before.
• The US has a strong domestic energy supply again.
• The Fed is still an international lender of last resort.
• One of the consequences of the pandemic was that in March the Fed effectively extended an indirect dollar credit line in principle to China.
• The story about rising Chinese power is not straightforwardly at American expense.
• The domestic political turmoil in the US is going to be consequential to the American-Chinese strategic competition.

The Republican party got what they wanted out of a Trump presidency, the courts.

• In that sense, 2020 could be another watershed year: pre-Barrett and post-Barrett.
• Although history of the court suggests that partisan affiliations don’t always predict outcomes.
• Since the late 1960s/early 1970s, American politics has become judicialized.
• The crucial point is the intense politicization of these decisions.

Trump invokes huge depths of revulsion in many Americans. Trying to stand back and look at his presidency historically can seem like moral indifference.

• The narrative about Trump as a singular evil is the lens through which many people have lived their lives in the past four years.
• This narrative takes a pretty distorted view of the American past as well as the state of the republic before Trump.
• Trump seems incapable of understanding the distinction between the president as head of state and the president as head of government.
• Geopolitically, the Trump presidency has made a difference, especially in relation to China.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Our post-election episode from 2016
• Our last episode with Gary Gerstle
• Our last episode with Sarah Churchwell
• Our most recent crossover with 538
• David’s review of David Cameron’s memoirs

Further Learning:

• Hobsbawm’s Age of Extremes: The Short 20th Century

We talk to Peter Geoghegan of openDemocracy and Jennifer Cobbe of the Trust and Technology Initiative about Cambridge Analytica, money, power and what is and isn't corrupting our democracy. How easy is it to buy influence in British politics? Did Cambridge Analytica break the rules or show just how little difference the rules make anyway? Who has the power to take on Facebook? Plus we discuss why the British government's failure to handle the pandemic tells us a lot about the corrosive effects of cronyism. https://www.petergeoghegan.com/books/

Talking Points:

The ICO report on Cambridge Analytica largely concluded that their tactics were not unusual.

• Of course, we can take issue with the fact these practices are so widespread.
• One of the reasons Cambridge Analytica was such a scandal was that people didn’t realise they could be targeted in this way.
• Cambridge Analytica and organizations like it can do is seed misinformation into a wider ecosystem. They take advantage of the lack of regulation.
• Sowing misinformation doesn’t require sophisticated skills; it’s easy.

The conversation about micro-targeting often centers on Cambridge Analytica, but we need to look at the structures that make these practices so easy and so potent.

• Facebook makes all of this really easy to do. Why were we so complacent?
• When we think about the influence of money in politics, it’s easy to imagine nefarious people throwing around big sums, but at least in the UK a small amount can go a long way when people have the right connections. This is cronyism.

The pandemic has made the tech giants unthinkably wealthy.

• At the same time, they’ve changed the way that money affects politics.
• Could Trump have won without Facebook and Twitter?
• The tech companies do not need to lobby politicians in the traditional sense because they are simply that powerful.

Governments are dependent on these technologies, as we all are.

• Can we think about the tech companies as the technical infrastructure of society?
• Right now, these companies have a huge amount of discretion.

Cronyism has been a prominent feature of the UK Government’s COVID response.

• There is a strain in a certain school of political thought that the state isn’t good for much. When politicians who believe that are in charge, it can be self-fulfilling.
• A hollowed out state creates space for more cronyism.
• The civil service has become a punching bag. This could have a long tail.

Does the system that needs reform have the capacity to generate the necessary reforms?

• When it comes to tech, the biggest problem is ideological.
• It’s hard to get politicians to agree that changing micro-targeting is necessary because they all use it.
• Politicians do not want to change a system that has benefitted them even if they can recognize its flaws.
• Can you build a coalition that would force them to do so?

Mentioned in this Episode:

• The UK Information Commissioner's Office report on Cambridge Analytica
• Peter’s book, Democracy for Sale
• Jennifer’s recent piece in the Guardian

This week we come back to Brexit and ask whether Boris Johnson has a good way out of the current negotiations with the EU over a trade deal. First we talk with Kenneth Armstrong, Professor of European Law, about the thinking and the reality behind the government's Internal Market Bill. Then David, Helen and Chris Brooke explore the politics of success and failure in the negotiations. Can the Union survive? Does the government have a coherent strategy? And how much trouble is Johnson really in?

Talking Points:

Is the Internal Market Bill just a negotiating tactic, or is it a genuine safeguard for a future world in which there is no trade deal?

• The government is worried that the wording of the Northern Ireland Protocol risks the possibility of the EU overreaching in its interpretation in ways that would make it more difficult for the UK to pursue its own state aid policy, for example.
• The government is now saying that it would only invoke these provisions if the EU acts in ‘bad faith.’
• The problem with that argument is that the agreements already have their own safeguard mechanisms. Why do you need a domestic legal mechanism?
• The substance of the Internal Market Bill is also getting serious pushback from the devolved authorities.

The EU has launched infringement proceedings against the UK.

• It’s a structured process with different phases.
• The imperative is to try to seek a resolution without needing to take the action before the Court of Justice.
• The Commission’s argument is that the UK is acting on bad faith.
• In the transition period, the UK is effectively treated as a member state. What happens when the UK is fully outside of the transition period?
• For now at least, all this political theatre isn’t immediately derailing the process of getting an agreement on a future relationship.

The ultimate obstacles to a deal are existential: the UK wants to guarantee respect for its autonomy, so does the EU.

• The EU’s great fear is that the model of a social market economy that it has been building among its member states would be threatened if the UK could engage in regulatory competition or distorted subsidies with the EU.
• That’s why the level playing field rules and state aid are so important for the EU.
• There’s also the geopolitical question: the consequences for both sides of not reaching a deal would be significant.

Johnson gave his conference speech and he barely mentioned Brexit.

• The stakes of the ongoing negotiations are as high as they were a year ago, but the political heat—at least for now—has gone out of it.
• Johnson hopes that if you can get through the next few years and stabilize the Union from the present threats then it will be possible to put the Union on more solid constitutional groundings.
• This is a politics of crisis. There’s not a clear strategic vision.

The pandemic has made the politics of devolution even more complicated because it’s created a de facto English government, which is the UK parliament.

• The more the Scottish government, the Northern Irish government and the Welsh government disagree about what the rules should be, the more the fact that there is an English government comes to the surface.
• This becomes an electoral issue too.

Is Johnson on his way out?

• His track record may be a liability where the Union is concerned. There may be better people to lead the Conservative party on the Scottish question.
• Making a deal with the EU could hurt him with the Spartans of the European Research Group.
• Johnson’s health could also be an issue; that’s why he’s determined to show that he doesn’t have long-COVID.

Mentioned in this Episode:

This week we go back to the first ever interview we recorded for Talking Politics, when David talked to Yuval Noah Harari in 2016 about his book Homo Deus. That conversation touched on many of the themes that we've kept coming back to in the four years since: the power of the big technology companies; the vulnerability of democracy; the deep uncertainty we all feel about the future. David reflects on what difference those four years have made to how we think about these questions now.

Talking Points:

In Homo Deus, Harari distinguishes between intelligence and consciousness.

• Intelligence is the ability to solve problems; consciousness is the ability to feel things.
• Humans use their feelings to solve problems; our intelligence is to a large extent emotional intelligence. But it doesn’t have to be like that.
• Computers have advanced in terms of intelligence but not consciousness.
• What is more important: consciousness or intelligence? This is becoming a practical, not theoretical question.

Artificial intelligence could create a new class—the useless class.

• Institutions or mechanisms might become obsolete.
• In humanist politics, the feelings of individuals are the highest authority; could algorithms know your feelings better than you do?

The idea of the individual is that you have an indivisible inner core and your task as an individual is to get away from outside forces and get in touch with your true, authentic self.

• According to Harari, this is 18th century mythology.
• Humans are dividuals: a collection of biochemical mechanisms. There is nothing beyond these mechanisms.
• In the 20th century, no one could understand these mechanisms.
• We haven’t abandoned humanism—the rhetoric is still there—but it is under pressure.

In a long-tail world, everyone has a little bit—there’s lots of tailored, personal politics—but there’s also a huge concentration of power and wealth.

• Think of Google or Facebook: they are basically monopolies.
• Technology is not deterministic: it could still go in different ways.
• There is human pushback.
• Voters may be right in sensing that power is shifting, but are they right about where it is going?

In the four years since this interview, machine intelligence hasn’t hugely advanced.

• Machines are more a part of our lives, but they aren’t necessarily smarter.
• Are we becoming less intelligent as we adapt to a world increasingly dominated by machines?
• Human agency is not just under threat from machines. It’s also under threat from corporate power. Amazon is much more powerful than it was four years ago.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Homo Deus
• ‘Inside Out’
• David’s review of Homo Deus
• Our episode with Brett Frischmann
• Dominic Cummings’s blog

Further Learning:

• The Talking Politics Guide to... Facebook
• On...

David is joined by Helen Thompson and Chris Brooke to try to get beyond the current crisis and work out where British politics is heading. How different is Starmer's political programme likely to be from Corbyn's? Can the Labour party become the party of the workers again? And is Brexit really going to happen without an extension and without a deal? Plus we explore the renewed influence of the trade unions and ask what it means for the political choices ahead.

Talking Points:

What kind of Labour Party is Keir Starmer looking to create?

• He never presented himself as a Corbynite, though there are some significant leftward moves policy wise.
• Labour is a more recognizably a social democratic party than it was during the new Labour era.
• We probably will see party management return to something that is more familiar from Ed Miliband’s era.
• Starmer seems to be moving away from a Green New Deal kind of Labour politics.

Does moving back to being a workers’ party move you away from being a students’ party?

• Once you have enough people going to university and acquiring a lot of debt to do so, the question of separation between workers and students starts to fall away.
• The nature of work is changing.
• The current crisis may give Starmer a chance to cut across these divides.

Issues about unions and workplaces go to the top of government policy at the moment.

• The unions will be pushing health and safety issues as far as they can.
• The unions can make a better case that they’re on the side of ordinary people.

The universal basic income question has emerged again.

• Starmer doesn’t seem to be that keen.
• Public opinion isn’t fully behind UBI.
• A lot depends on the medium-term economic fallout, especially the employment damage.
• So far, the biggest hits have come in the service sector.

Starmer is trying to move on from Brexit.

• Is this just tactical? The government will have to make decisions on Brexit.
• The virus could be easier for the government to move towards a no trade deal exit.
• From the point of view from the EU, negotiating a trade agreement with Britain is even less of a priority now.

Mentioned in this Episode:

• Starmer’s column on VE day
• Peter Sloman’s book, Transfer State

Further Learning:

• The New Statesman on Keir Starmer
• Union leaders sound warnings about the return to work
• Is Keir Starmer like John Smith?

And as ever, recommended reading curated by our friends at the LRB can be found here: lrb.co.uk/talking