There is rising concern about political disengagement. For those who believe in active government, even more in active citizenship, there are indeed many lamentable trends. Turnout at elections is low, and getting lower. Even the London mayoral contest tempted only 34 per cent of the capital's electorate to vote. At the same time, party membership is dropping. New Labour temporarily reversed this long-term trend when Tony Blair's appeal was at its freshest, but in the past two years the decline has begun again.
The status of politicians has also declined-being a Westminster MP is nothing like as important as it used to be; being a local councillor even less so. We have yet to see what standing the new Scottish and Welsh representatives will earn, although the early signs are not good. And, after a few decades, the Strasbourg MEPs have failed to increase their status among voters.
Various explanations are given for this decline: ideology is dead and class allegiance less strong; the differences between parties are much less sharp; and a lazy cynicism about politics and politicians pervades public debate.
Reinforcing this disrespect for traditional politics is the decline in media coverage of serious political issues. The broadsheets have cut back parliamentary reporting and are almost as interested in the personal and the sensational as the tabloids. ITV has killed off News At Ten. The BBC is marginalising Panorama. Specialist political current affairs has disappeared from Channel 4.
But this is not because the journalists and producers have become bored with politics-far from it. These developments took place because newspapers and television organisations picked up the changing tastes of their readers and audiences-and over the past 20 years these have steadily moved away from an interest in politics. In this sense the media has responded to the "crisis of disengagement" more effectively than the politicians.
For the past 200 years it has made sense to be politically active-in the first instance, to try to win the vote if you didn't have it, and thereafter to use it either to improve your lot or to defend what you already had. In addition, you knew that the attitudes and abilities of those elected to run the country could determine whether you would have to fight a war, or watch the men in your family do so. Politics mattered. Now many people think it doesn't matter, or matters far less. And surely they are right.
Today it is reasonable for most of us in mainland Britain to assume that we are not going to be killed in a war. And Margaret Thatcher put an end to the idea that either national or local government would find you a job or a home. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown have shown that Labour can run the economy as well as the Tories-so we are all technocrats now. And while it remains possible that different politicians with different policies will be more or less able to improve education, health provision and transport, it is not always easy to know enough about the the details of policy to enable you to decide how to vote on those issues. So voting-and politics-has lost much of its direct link to many of the things which are most important to people.
At the same time, people's lives have become much fuller and richer. There is more to do, and more money to do it with. The time when going out to political meetings was a form of leisure activity is long past.
For a minority of people, political values form an important part of their identity. Some people care sufficiently about particular issues such as the environment to become actively engaged. This kind of political activity is almost a lifestyle thing-not very different from deciding to be a vegetarian or a jogger.
So why is political disengagement said to be a problem? People on the left say that without the belief that life can be improved by political action the status quo will always prevail. Others argue that there is a more basic problem: if no one will stand up for liberal democracy, then extremists will start to win elections. But surely this would be self-correcting-in such circumstances the majority would stir itself to vote its representatives back in.
Alternatively, we could find that the range of people willing to take part in politics begins to narrow-our representatives would not be extremists but specialists, and thus unrepresentative in a different way. This is already happening. Westminster politics is becoming professionalised. MPs are increasingly drawn from people in the para-political professions-political PR people, advisers, consultants, researchers, think-tankers, journalists. It is possible to start your career in such a job, move into parliament, then go back if you lose your seat.
This may be no bad thing. If fewer of us are willing to take on the chore of serious political activity, we must accept that those who are should have a reasonable prospect of getting decent jobs when they are not in parliament.
The new political professionals have another asset. They are generally well-equipped by their backgrounds to handle the day-to-day technicalities of legislation-they can master a wide range of issues to a respectable level, and can make reasonable assessments of the extent to which a lobbyist's case coincides with the wider public interest. We are unlikely to see the likes of Ernest Bevin-or even Margaret Thatcher-emerge from such a political class, but politics no longer requires such figures.
This does not mean that we will be worse governed. Rather the opposite. As a broadcasting lobbyist for the past 13 years I have seen a big improvement in the way governments and their officials and advisers have developed policy. I also know that in the same period the European parliament has done an excellent job in scrutinising media policy. The process has been helped by the existence of a small number of specialist journalists able to report the industry's affairs intelligently.
However, this high level discourse is carried out by small elites. Most of us don't know it is going on, and wouldn't much care if we did. I assume that similar processes have been at work in other areas-but here, like most people, I am taking things on trust. I have neither the time nor the interest to follow the detail of most government activity. I pick up impressions of general performance from casual reading, listening and viewing. I am sure that I am less well informed in this sense than the mid-Victorian middle-class voter celebrated by Walter Bagehot.
Things get worse when it comes to local and European politics. Unlike most people, I vote in these elections, but I have no idea who my local councillors are, nor who is my MEP. I do not know what they are doing on my behalf. I assume-perhaps na?ly-that they are not going to do anything that will have much impact on me. Since my voting in these elections is founded on ignorance and indifference, it might be more honest not to vote at all. I vote because I recognise that some of us must in order to keep the mechanism ticking over, just in case we really need it at some point.
This is less true of national politics. As a Londoner, I am aware that the economy is doing fine, the schools are getting better and the tube is not-all matters on which I attribute blame or credit to the government. But you don't have to be an "informed citizen" to do that. You can be completely disengaged and still make reasonably well-informed decisions about a government's general competence, if not about policy detail.
In the 1970s, some commentators began to think that Britain was "ungovernable." In the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher proved them wrong; but she also contributed to the developments which have led to us needing much less from government than we used to.
Paradoxically, as a result we may now be more difficult to govern. We have learnt to expect the highest level of private sector service from our public services (without privatisation), and we become impatient when we are told that this takes time and depends on things outside government control.
At the same time, we set much more store by the theatrical elements of politics-personality, and how leading politicians handle themselves. This showbiz aspect of politics is entertaining, but it is mediated almost exclusively through press and broadcasting organisations which are either partisan or proud of their critical independence.
Political disengagement is a fact of life. We should stop worrying about it. It does not mean that we are, collectively, becoming less public-spirited- indeed, people's readiness to devote significant time to charitable or voluntary activity is increasing.
Disengagement, combined with popular impatience, does, however, make life more difficult for politicians. They could help themselves by raising fewer expectations which they cannot meet, and by educating the public in the limits of politics. New Labour knew this once-hence its five modest pledges in 1997. The pressures of government have blurred this insight. It would be as well for all of us if it could recover it. n
