ABSTRACT

This chapter starts by considering New Labour’s imprint on the British constitution and political institutions, amid the increasingly vocal chorus of dissatisfaction with British democracy. Having addressed the impact of the Labour administrations on the economy and polity since 1997, it considers their long-term effect on the terrain of British representative democracy. Labour’s reforms felt like shuffling the constitutional deckchairs rather than pursuing a vigorous, popular revolution in democratic life. New Labour’s strategy to tackle democratic disengagement prescribed by Philip Gould was to ‘under-state, under-claim, under-promise’. New Labour failed to acknowledge that devolution almost inevitably leads to institutions being captured by politicians who thwart central government’s authority, mobilising against the imperial British state. The paradox that arises is that New Labour’s main legacy was shifting the party sharply to the Left, more than at any previous moment in its history. The weakness of Labour’s campaign was the inability to foresee shifting sentiment among voters.