Protest parties

Here’s the defaced UKIP poster which seems to have gone viral.

It illustrates beautifully the two diametrically opposed reasons for all the condemnation being heaped on UKIP in the run-up to the Euro elections.

Version 1: the poster as printed

Before it was defaced (or improved, depending on your point of view) it was UKIP’s attempt to set itself apart as different from the three traditional parties. The Conservative, Labour and Liberal Democrat parties are represented by the faces of their leaders, gagged. Nigel Farage, the leader of UKIP, is alongside them but not gagged. He speaks his mind. You are invited to think that the other three are much the same but UKIP is different.

The other three parties have accepted this narrative. There has been a closing of ranks, cross-party cooperation to criticise UKIP. This seems to be the way these parties are moving. There has been similar cross-party cooperation against the Scottish National Party. In the case of the SNP, though, it makes better sense. The SNP expresses one divisive policy issue, the independence of Scotland, and the three traditional parties agree in opposing it.

In the case of UKIP it is harder to point to an issue that sets it apart. UKIP wants to withdraw from the EU, but so does a large proportion of the Conservative Party and some of the Labour Party. The whole EU is becoming more Eurosceptic: according to our news reports the only country currently enthusiastic about it is Ukraine, and we would do well to doubt how deep their desire to join really goes.

As the quality of life continues to deteriorate there is an increasing trend to kick the cat. Witch hunts against unpopular minorities, blaming them for the nation’s ills, currently focus on immigrants. Again UKIP rides the tide, but Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats have all responded positively to the anti-immigrant mood.

UKIP wants lower taxes, less protection for the vulnerable and more incentives for big business to make money in whatever ways it chooses. This, also, has been the direction of travel for decades, promoted by Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Labour alike when in power.

UKIP politicians have a substantial record of making racist statements and fiddling their expenses, but on this count too they are not much different from other politicians.

So why have the three traditional parties been so keen to close ranks against it? I cannot help suspecting that the real reason is petty tribalism. The traditional three parties are used to campaigning against each other. They strain every muscle against each other. They demonise each other. To be faced with yet another opponent is the last thing they want. Worse still the new opponent, by lumping the three of them together, tells them that the differences between them are not that great. The other two parties they have been demonising are mirror images of themselves. No, they tell themselves, UKIP must be wrong. The policy differences between the three traditional parties really do express the big issues; our party really is different from the other two. So where, if they believe that, do they locate UKIP? They have to locate it beyond the pale, as absolutely unacceptable. It is the only way they can retain their belief that the three traditional parties cover the credible policy alternatives adequately.

(I am writing this before the Labour Party’s Policy Review is published. This may change the situation and set Labour apart from the others. At present it seems unlikely. Ed Balls is almost certain to oppose any significant changes. If he is outvoted and resigns in disgust, maybe we can hope once again for a Labour government that reverses the recent deteriorations.)

Version 2: the poster as altered

As altered, the poster tells a very different story. The three traditional parties are still much the same as each other, not worth supporting; but now UKIP, instead of offering an alternative, is depicted as no better.

It is in the nature of protest parties that they garner votes from people who are dissatisfied with other parties. They therefore have short-term appeal. As long as the focus of attention is on the other parties and their weaknesses, a vote for UKIP functions as a way of expressing dissatisfaction. For many voters, that will be as far as their thinking goes.

When the focus of attention turns to the protest party itself, things change. Unless you are a passionate opponent of the EU or immigrants, UKIP do not offer anything outside that narrow range of policies already encompassed by the other parties.

Here we face one of the major weaknesses in the electoral system. Voters need to be well-informed. Nearly all the information comes from the mass media, who present the four parties illustrated in this poster as the only parties worth considering. Some people, following the media’s lead, have judged this altered poster as an anti-voting sentiment; but there are other candidates, with markedly different policies. Of these, the party rising in the opinion polls now is the Green Party. The media narrative, by narrowing the range of parties to the four in the poster, also narrows the range of political philosophies. It reduces political ideas to the ideas held by these four parties, ideas which many of us, in fact, do not share. No wonder so many people do not bother to vote!

The two versions compared

The current attacks on UKIP, therefore, come from two diametrically opposed positions. One position accepts the Conservative-LibDem-Labour spectrum as an adequate range of options and treats UKIP as an unjustified impostor, beyond the pale. The other considers the Conservative-LibDem-Labour spectrum as hopelessly inadequate. Widen it to include UKIP, and it is still inadequate. We must look elsewhere for better government.

Logically, it makes no sense to criticise UKIP for both of these reasons at once. They are saying opposite things about it. Personally I agree with the second. I therefore think the alteration of that poster made a great improvement. Congratulations to whoever did it.

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