Summary of Lecture 6: Reorienting the Left: New Democrats, New Labour, and Europe’s Social Democrats

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00:00:00 - 01:00:00

This lecture discusses how the left has reoriented itself in the 1990s in reaction to the successful campaign by the right to shift the debate to the issue of civil rights and economic growth. The lecture also discusses how the decline of unions has affected the effectiveness of left-of-centre parties.

00:00:00 The lecture discusses the left's reaction to Thatcherism, focusing on Michael Foot and Tony Benn. Benn argues that despite the fact that Thatcherism has fundamentally restructured the British economy and political landscape, she is a victim of market forces. Benn also discusses the negative effects of Thatcherism on the UK's trade unions, the sick, pensioners, and the travelling public.
00:05:00 Tony Blair's speech to the 1995 Labor Party Conference in which he outlined plans for a new Constitution for the Labor Party outlined his vision for a society rooted in teamwork, cooperation, and partnership. New Labor, Blair's vision for the Labor Party, would go on to win the 1997 election.
00:10:00 In this lecture, Ken Rogoff explains how the left reoriented itself in the 1990s in reaction to the Republican Party's successful campaign to shift the debate to the issue of civil rights and economic growth instead of discrimination and welfare. The Democratic Party followed a similar path in the 1990s and today's agenda focuses on creating a new, inclusive American dream for the next generation.
00:15:00 This lecture revisits the comments made about distributive politics and the psychology of distributive politics. It explains how absolute and relative gains work, and how they differ in their effects on individual welfare. The lecture then moves on to discuss power and politics in relation to distributive politics, and how market transactions and government action can result in different levels of welfare for those involved.
00:20:00 The example given of a college professor and an attorney illustrates the different psychological reactions people can have to relative gains and losses. The professor is more upset by their salary being $10,000 less than the attorney, while the attorney is more delighted by their salary being half a million more than the professor. The implication is that people are more likely to be happy with relative gains than losses, which is why the majority rule often leads to people being happy with relative gains even when they don't have absolute gains.
00:25:00 The lecture discusses the concept of loss aversion, which is the tendency to weigh potential losses more heavily than potential gains. The lecture also discusses the decline of unions in the United States and the UK, and how this affects the effectiveness of left-of-centre parties.
00:30:00 This lecture discusses how unions have decreased in power and importance in the UK, leading to a divergence of interest between the government and the unions, which leads to many strikes.
00:35:00 The lecture discusses the history and effects of unions in the United States and Europe, and how they have changed over time. It explains how triangulation can be used to win the support of middle-of-the-road voters.
00:40:00 The speaker discusses how the left in America has lost its sense of solidarity due to the weakening of unions and the focus on individual issues over collective ones. He suggests that the left move towards the center in order to win elections and appeal to more people.
00:45:00 The conventional wisdom is that multi-party systems are more representative, but this is not always true. Inequality has increased in recent decades in both two-party and multi-party systems. Union membership has declined in both types of systems.
00:50:00 Union membership is declining in most European countries, which has consequences for left-of-center parties. The reforms enacted by Germany's social democrats in the 1990s, including the Hartz reforms, were designed to reduce unemployment and not to protect workers' wages.
00:55:00 This lecture discusses how the move to the center by traditional left of center parties has been unsuccessful in multi-party systems. The increased number of parties and fragmentation of parties has resulted in less effective representation for unionized workers and other lower income earners.

01:00:00 - 01:10:00

The lecture discusses how the Left has changed in the past few decades due to the rise of global capitalism and the need to compete in a new world order. It then discusses how the Right has shifted its focus to attacking taxes, and how the Left has had to adapt by reorienting its goals.