Sunder Katwala (London, Fabian Society): We are exactly a year from the happy prospect of a new US President taking office. Bush’s progressive critics must now deepen the debate. So this year’s Fabian conference – ‘Change the World’ – was dedicated to global issues,– to ask what change in America and the year in which China will take the global spotlight will mean for us, but also to ask how progressives in Britain and Europe should respond. Hopes of progress on the great issues we face – from climate change to a response to terrorism - which uphold our democratic values depend on making 2008 a year of new ideas in foreign policy.David Miliband offered a thoughtful keynote speech arguing that a number of fundamental power shifts were reshaping our world.
Power is shifting from West to East. It is shifting from the national to the international level. But there is a third shift – in the balance of power between government and people.
This ‘civilian surge’ - an increasing demand among citizens to have a voice and to hold power to account – plays a central role in his argument.
Miliband’s response is for a new ‘progressive fusion’ to unite the social democratic and radical liberal traditions. He wants us to combine essential insights about equality and the fair distribution of resources with a commitment to individual freedom and the plural distribution of power. This is a potentially important idea about the future of left-liberal politics in domestic as well as foreign policy, and deserves further debate.
The Foreign Secretary faces various constraints in public discussion. The government can not comment publicly on US politics, having to work with Bush and whoever his successor is. With the Prime Minister in China, he gave a careful answer to a question about human rights in China. Miliband rightly suggests that Labour should have the confidence to take the European argument to the opposition; it isn’t clear that the Prime Minister agrees.
Above all, references to the lessons of Iraq remain in code too, though Milband’s tone reflected his remarks in this week’s New Statesman about the need for humility about the consequences of war. He noted that
democratic institutions need to be built from the bottom up not just the top down; and military victories are never a solution in themselves; they need the backing of economic and social reconstruction.
That seems to me to intend to signal ‘never again’ on Iraq – but without saying so.
On Pakistan, Miliband said that we needed to be committed to democratic institutions rather than personalities. (He argued this has been the goal of western policy, though the opposite might be argued more plausibly. Still, a shift of strategy towards the Musharaff regime would be welcome, and he agreed with a question about the danger of being perceived to be on the side of regimes against a "civilian surge").
On Kenya, his language about the importance of maintain the non-recognition of the Kibaki government was important given its unwillingness to take domestic or international mediation seriously. Champions of civilian surges can’t condone stolen elections.
A recurring theme of the conference sessions was whether hopes of change in America would be disappointed. Yes, if we hope for too much too soon. Ex-Ambassador Sir Christopher Meyer argued that continuity will trump change whoever wins. That seems to me to be based more on a generalised diplomatic scepticism about politics ever making a difference than on the evidence. If John McCain or Rudy Giuliani is the Republican nominee, we can anticipate some significant divergence on Iraq, anti-terrorism and the US conception of its role in the world more generally. Barack Obama is a rather more unknown quantity than Hillary Clinton – and John Kampfner argued
There is a danger of excessive expectations – but also positive grounds to expect a dialogue to be possible, not least over climate change.
But arguments need to be more about what we should do than wishing America were different. Mark Leonard.made an important point: there is a danger that an obsession with America "infantilises" Europe:
"We must not let a running commentary on American foreign policy become a substitute for having our own foreign policy".
There were several concrete ideas for change which progressive should pursue. A diplomatic resolution to Iran is possible. The EU has a key role here in paving the way for full engagement between Iran and the US. But the credibility of efforts to stop proliferation require a renewed commitment to multilateral disarmament. Both Shirley Williams and Malcolm Chalmers were excellent on this issue (noting that Henry Kissinger is leading an extremely undovelike coalition pursuing a significant multilateral reduction in nuclear weapons in the US).
Pursuing universal values while respecting national contexts and supporting a more bottom-up, civilian approach to democratic solidarity means asking what values and principles we want to support, whether in Iran, Kenya or Burma want from us. At the same time we risk undermining progress on development if we do not seriously address the skills drain to the west which is undermining health development strategies. Dr Dorothy Ngoma, chair of the Malawian nurses and midwives association told the conference that four hundred out of a thousand trained nurses have left her country,
On migration and asylum, there was consensus on a panel including Labour’s Jon Cruddas, Kate Allen of Amnesty and Danny Skriskandarajah of ippr that regularisation of illegal immigrants must be faced however steep the political barriers.
We ended with a final session on "one idea to change the world" with a Dragons Den style debate on new ideas. A sign of increasing scepticism about the effectiveness of aid was the defeat of an idea – which I support – of a UK commitment to increase development aid beyond the 0.7% target to 1% of GDP, with the additional resources going to universal healthcare and primary education. So was a proposal to tax passengers on low cost flights, proposed by Islington MP Emily Thornberry.
Two excellent ideas did carry the day, and ended tied for support among conference delegates: a Europe-wide citizens service scheme seeking to improve British engagement with our continent, while former Cambridge MP Anne Campbell successfully advocated of a 'poppies for medicine' campaign to licence Afghan poppies to deal with the world morphine shortage, on which the Senlis think-tank has made detailed proposals.
With several parallel sessions going on at once, this is just a snapshot. I heard that throwing Ukip leader into a Europe debate with Margot Wallstrom, James Purnell and Polly Toynbee proved entertaining, and that there were some sharp exchanges and a significant debate about terrorism and security, which Sunny Hundal has promised to blog. Reports of the various conference sessions will appear over the next day or two on the Fabian website, with transcripts to follow, and also on my modest new blog on The World After Bush.
