Aug 30, 2015

A 10-Point Programme for 21st Century Democratic Socialism

In response to Jeremy Corbyn's  'Standing to Deliver' plan "for a fairer and more successful Britain," Jeremy Gilbert suggests an additional 10 things to plug some of the holes in Corbyn's plan, making it a more relevant and robust radical plan for 21st Century Britain and beyond.
By Jeremy Gilbert / wire.novaramedia.com
A 10-Point Programme for 21st Century Democratic Socialism

Here, just as examples, are ten policy proposals that could be bolted on to Corbyn’s skeleton list, to really make a programme that looks like it belongs to the present and the future, and which can imagine a socialism that does too:

1. Introduce democratic governance into all public services.

We don’t need to revive the paternalist, bureaucratic welfare state. Radicals, feminists, the New Left, etc. were asking for more democratically run public services from the early 60s onwards. This should be a central radical demand today. See, for example Neal Lawson’s ‘Dare More Democracy’, his more recent pamphlet coauthored with Indra Adnan on the nature of our ‘new times’, or Hilary Wainwright’s Reclaim the State.

 

2. Bring forward plans to convert all schools to become democratic community schools.

…along the lines proposed by reformers calling for Citizen Schools and Common Schools. Abolish league tables – they don’t work (they’re supposed to give parents reliable information about likely educational outcomes for their kids –they don’t).

 

3. Implement a massive programme of distributed renewable energy generation.

…through the reinstatement and extension of feed-in tariffs and investment in localised energy production. In fact, look, just implement the full Green Party energy policy . Do you really think you can come up with a better one than they can?

 

4. Set up a Ministry for Mutuality.

…to encourage launch of co-operatives and mutuals and transition of existing private firms to mutual status wherever possible. Appoint Robin Murray to run it.

 

5. Create 50k new housing co-op places every year for five years.

We don’t just need more social housing on the old models or more private housing. We need to give people without capital the chance to run their own communities and their own built environments, together.

 

6. Democratise the BBC.

Implement direct elections to the position of Director General. It’s a no-brainer, really.

 

7. Reclaim the media.

Give the proposed National Investment Bank a specific remit to encourage the development of independent media, including social media platforms.

Introduce a bill to force all media providers over a certain size to become self-governing trusts within three years. Yes that’s right, force the Sun and the Mail to be run by basically the same governance structure as the Guardian. Murdoch will hate it, but we’d be offering his journalists and editors the same kind of license to indulge their personal middle-class prejudices in perpetuity for life – free from proprietorial interference – that is currently enjoyed by their colleagues at Kings Place (both the revolutionary heroes of Corbynism and the snivelling running-dogs of Toynbeeism); so how’s he going to stop even them from publicly supporting it?

 

8. The proposed Constitutional Convention should include suggestions for participatory budgeting and participatory democracy in local government.

…and experimentation with nationwide deliberative mechanisms using web technology, etc.

Yes of course it should also include discussion of which form of proportional representation should be introduced for the House of Commons (retaining first-past-the-post should be off the agenda), abolition of the Lords, a written constitution, maximum possible devolution to nations, regions, cities and other localities. But all of that would add up to possibly bringing the UK constitution roughly in line with European norms of the 1960s. We shouldn’t be looking to Germany in the 1960s as our democratic model. We should be looking to Venezuela, Barcelona, Bolivia, and our own future. The convention should also be as pluralistic as possible, as suggested by Dan Hind.

 

9. Bring forward plans for Universal Basic Income.

But don’t just do it. Set up a nationwide process of extensive democratic deliberation reaching into all local communities in order to discuss this and other possible futures for welfare and incomes policies in a democratic and informed fashion. Until we can find a way to counter the deeply-held, demonstrably-wrong, carefully-cultivated (especially by the right wing press)set of misperceptions which inform public opinion on these issues, we can never hope to win support for enlightened policy.

 

10. Empower and mandate the proposed Ministry of Labour to explore all possible uses of new technology.

…to facilitate organisation of workers and encourage union membership across the workforce, especially in sectors in which unionisation is currently low. This must include exploring the possibilities of new forms of organisation, online unions for precarious workers in industries which rarely congregate physically, etc. Aim to increase union membership by 100k per year for five years.


This list comes from a Novara Media article of the same name that you can read in full here.

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