The most vital debates are not happening in the Universities, and certainly not in the comments pages of the Guardian, but in the modern mirror of the pamphlets and independent newspapers of the first wave of 19th Century socialism; the blogosphere.

There are plenty of blogs that reflect the orthodox left lunacy and ones that use seductively more ‘reasonable’ language to reach similar conclusions. However, there are two other broad categories of sites that can be found. Firstly, there are those that are firmly anti-totalitarian but have little or no critique of domestic politics. They have made their peace with the establishment and the legacy of Thatcherism. However dramatic their declarations of human rights, they are Tom Paines abroad but Edmund Burkes at home. Whilst the finely tuned English ear is quick to pick up the contented cadences of the privilege of class.

As for the other, it is a, sometimes fractious, cacophony. There are humanist Marxists, left libertarians, social democrats, Old Labour diehards, those who would combine Marx with Mill, querulous liberals, and others who place human emancipation at the centre of an ecological understanding of the diversity of the natural world. It is where I feel most at home and where the more interesting, and idiosyncratic, writing is taking place.

What will emerge is unclear, but socialism, in the broadest sense of the term as an emancipatory, egalitarian social movement, is alive, well and thinking. Come and join in.

Fat Man on a Keyboard

1. How long will the fading away take?

2. Are the ‘modern rules of communication’ likely to lead to a better quality of democracy or a slicker PR machine?

“politicians not only knew the rules of the game, but also believed they understood most of the issues that were confronting them in the policy arena. Now they understand neither very well.”

I believe that a new genereation of politicians will be connected with real life issues and play by modern rules of communication. The older generation will fade away in the end. So there’s hope, I think.

‘Enabling’ is one of those words that’s littered around local government without its meaning ever really being pinned down accurately by those that use it.

But what you seem to be talking about is the decline of that old deal that most of us have signed up to where we pay the tax and the state delivers the services. If this has changed then this has not been terribly well communicated to us and when do we get our money back?

Most of us are paying around 40%-45% of our incomes in taxes for services. If the state is no longer willing/able to deliver them then we obviously need that money to enable ourselves to buy the services don’t we? Otherwise we are effectively being ‘disenabled’.

To give a slightly soppy example: last week Stephen Hilton wrote about the government setting up interactive health and wellbeing websites. This amused me because I was sat there at the time with toothache, courtesy of a chipped tooth, because I can’t afford to get my teeth fixed while feeding my two year old son cheap and nasty Nestle yogurts full of chemicals from Asda because it was the end of the month and we had no money left.

Now I know what to feed my son – Rachel’s Organic Yogurts (no sugar kids!) – but I am simply not able to because I’m handing the money I could buy them with over to the government so that they can enable me to make informed healthy choices that I then can’t afford to take! Bonkers isn’t it?

At present we don’t seem to have an enabling state. We have a we’ll-have-our-cake-and-eat-it-state whereby we pay for through the nose for a service that tells us we have to go out and buy services.

Why does the cheap “enabling state” cost as much – if not more – than an expensive “redistributive state”? I don’t understand.

A lot of citizens, and maybe a lot of councillors too, don’t always buy into notions like shared accountability, co-production, pooled resources and joint working practices. They see only blurred responsibilities and that unsettles them. Isn’t this the source of a lot of the ‘bewilderment’

It’s not bewilderment. It’s outrage. Most of these organisations you refer to – SWRDA, West of England Partnership, the Regional Assembly, PCTs, Safer Bristol Partnership etc, etc – are quite obviously government organisations quite obviously spending huge sums of government money but they’re appointed rather than elected and therefore not accountable. A democracy without accountability is not a democracy is it? And a democracy based on patronage is better called an oligarchy.

On the other hand, the call for straightforward redistributive policies presupposes that the local state has the authority and legitimacy anymore to direct resources unilaterally.

Well they seem to be able to when they want to – the Olympics, Millenium Dome, Channel Tunnel rail link, billions gone into the NHS etc.

My question is this: can you cordon off some policy spheres (transport, health, housing and education were mentioned) for ‘traditional’ types of state intervention (and ‘traditional’ modes of citizenship (voting the rotters in and out while leaving them to get on with it in between times)?
Or does the extolled ‘new’ settlement between state and citizens, based on power-sharing and all the uncertainties and risks as well as the potential for innovative solutions that come with it, necessarily apply across the board (if one accepts it applies at all)?

To be honest I find the idea that the state is somehow unable to run schools, straightforward health services, build transport infrastructure and influence planning and housing slightly unbelievable.

For a thread that’s proclaimed the end of ideology, there’s an awful lot of it about isn’t there?

If we’re talking about the changing nature of citizenship in the 21st century, it’s helpful to think about how the state itself is changing. The consensus view is that its redistributive role is being replaced by an enabling one, in ‘partnership’ with a plethora of other actors, including citizens themselves. But a lot of citizens, and maybe a lot of councillors too, don’t always buy into notions like shared accountability, co-production, pooled resources and joint working practices. They see only blurred responsibilities and that unsettles them. Isn’t this the source of a lot of the ‘bewilderment’ – the lack of clarity about where the important decisions are being taken and which arenas or channels of participation it’s worth our while using to try to influence anything?

Moreover, the Bristol Blogger might well be right that in a lot of situations a politics of distributed power and knowledge isn’t a very effective way of getting the things people want done. On the other hand, the call for straightforward redistributive policies presupposes that the local state has the authority and legitimacy anymore to direct resources unilaterally.

My question is this: can you cordon off some policy spheres (transport, health, housing and education were mentioned) for ‘traditional’ types of state intervention (and ‘traditional’ modes of citizenship (voting the rotters in and out while leaving them to get on with it in between times)?
Or does the extolled ‘new’ settlement between state and citizens, based on power-sharing and all the uncertainties and risks as well as the potential for innovative solutions that come with it, necessarily apply across the board (if one accepts it applies at all)?

PS I really must stick my head next door for a chat one of these days, Stephen (C)

a generation of politicians who’ve emerged through think tanks and as SPADs makes for cautious politics.

It’s not cautious politics; it’s high-risk profligate politics for the private sector that’s the problem.

Here in South Bristol what’s needed are simple and straightforward redistributive policies around, for instance, transport, health, housing and education.

How can it possibly be incautious for politicians to invest £100m into public transport in south Bristol but it’s not apparently a risk at all to squander more than that on a doomed PPP for the London tube, Metronet?

Or why is it impossibly risky for them to spend money on providing simple ante-natal physiotherapy classes but not a risk at all to throw hundreds of millions at a failed NHS computer project?

They seem to love risk.