four - Crosland and liberal progressivism: the politics of ‘conscience and reform’

Summary

I would like to see action taken both to widen opportunities for enjoyment and relaxation, and to diminish existing restrictions on personal freedom. (Anthony Crosland, 19561)

Growing prosperity and sophistication bring to the forefront other issues, tending to cut across class lines, such as the rate of growth, educational opportunity, urban and amenity planning, consumer protection, the role of the mass media, and libertarian reform. (Anthony Crosland, 19622)

Introduction: Crosland’s legacy and progressive liberalism

Crosland’s mission was to equip his party with a powerful social democratic identity drawing on the liberal as well as the socialist heritage within the British political tradition. Social democracy was at heart a marriage of individual freedom and social justice: socialism was the ‘legitimate heir’ of liberalism. Despite the commitment to collective ownership of the means of production in Labour’s constitution, socialism’s ‘threadbare doctrines’ were inadequate in the wake of the 1951 defeat: for Crosland, liberalism was essential in reviving Labour as a credible party of government. The revisionists sought to rejuvenate British socialism assimilating prescient arguments from the New Liberalism, which tentatively permeated Labour’s thought from the late nineteenth century. The relationship between Crosland’s vision of socialism and the liberal tradition is the central focus of this chapter. Labour was a traditional party of the Left that in the past had given preference to state socialist policies. In contrast, the final peroration of The Future of Socialism captures the libertarian mood of post-war Britain, articulating the desire for fewer legislative controls, an easing of austerity, alongside support for individual freedom and tolerance of diversity in private life. Crosland was determined that the Conservative party should not be allowed to own the language of liberty and consumerism in the post-war world. That was, to say the least, a controversial aim for many in Crosland’s party.

This chapter assesses the nature of Crosland’s commitment to the radical liberal tradition, alongside his critique of Clause 4 socialism. The revisionists were convinced that the clause was detrimental to the party’s electability after the Attlee Government’s defeat: it defined Labour’s purpose anachronistically as state ownership and nationalisation. This outdated position encouraged damaging uncertainty about Labour’s objectives, making it a less pragmatic and effective party.