Instead of demanding answers from politicians about how they plan to change things, mainstream commentators tend to ask the same old tired question whenever political power changes hands in the UK – What does the election result mean for the ‘special relationship’ with the United States?
They, like the foreign policy establishment, are weighed down by the kind of groupthink that frames any ‘change’ as possibly destabilising to the ‘status quo’ – in relation to NATO, Israel, China, Russia, Iran and market-led globalisation. That is, Western power under US hegemony. They want continuity when the world and the people in Britain demand change. Power is addictive, especially when it is ebbing away.
But they needn’t worry – the ‘special relationship’ between the UK and US foreign affairs establishments is safe in Labour hands and pretty much always has been. After all, President Truman and Prime Minister Attlee were the architects of the post-1945 international system, just as George W. Bush and Tony Blair were of the horrors of post-9/11 Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, and the wars of terror.
NATO goes on, AUKUS goes on, the ‘Five Eyes’ Anglospheric collaboration goes on, seeking monsters to destroy.
The bigger and more important issue is expressed by the electorate, however. They hated the Tories and wanted them out because things cannot and should not go on as usual.
People demand change – at home, and internationally. The level of anxiety and discontent – about war (Israel’s in Gaza, Ukraine and Russia), the tensions over China, the havoc in people’s lives caused by globalisation and inequality, climate change and conflicts forcing massive migration flows – is at boiling point. In Britain and across many other countries too.
In the face of demands for change, the big parties are happy to offer loud, rhetorical shifts even as they remain committed to business as usual or lack the sort of leadership needed to grasp the nettle.
The main parties in Britain and the US remain in hock to the sources of greatest wealth – the major corporate interests that effectively hoard profits and invest in election campaigns, political parties and media organisations, to narrow political agendas and squeeze out the chances of radical change.
That has been the story since the Reagan-Thatcher revolution and the triumph of the corporation under the guise of the ‘free market’ and dismantling the welfare state – the Washington consensus.
The fact that the elites are sitting atop a volcano ready to erupt appears to have been missed altogether. Instead, they celebrate their great victory.
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But Labour’s landslide is an artefact of the collapse of the Tories, a low turnout and the peculiarities of the first-past-the-post electoral system.
On a 60% turnout, only 20.4% of the electorate actually voted for Labour. Of those who did vote, a mere third voted for Keir Starmer’s party. This is not a landslide in popular terms but a sign of discontent, anger and a cry for change.
In this context, it is significant that at least four pro-Palestine candidates defeated Labour in several safe seats. The election of the left-wing Jeremy Corbyn – despite a major effort by the Labour party and the media establishment to smear him – is also significant. In addition, several other pro-Palestine candidates almost toppled Labour candidates, including the shadow health secretary, Wes Streeting, who held on in Ilford by a mere 500 votes.
Pragmatic realism, or business as usual
Instead of change, we have already received assurances that Starmer and his pick for foreign secretary, David Lammy, will work with the Americans and preserve the ‘special relationship’. And broadly speaking, US-UK relations remain strong more or less regardless of which PM and president are in office, or of specific political party combinations. The Anglo-American elite compact isn’t going anywhere soon.
In fact, Starmer and Lammy have been preparing for power for some time and paying due homage to their US overlords. Over many years they have gotten very close to Barack Obama and, more recently, several Biden appointees. They have been courted by trans-Atlanticist think tanks in the UK such as Chatham House and elite US think tanks like the pro-Obama/Clinton/Biden Center for American Progress.
They have even attended the Bilderberg Conference – an exclusive, secretive, establishment-oriented Cold War grouping that seeks to preserve trans-Atlanticism. And finally, they paid homage at the court of President Trump and his MAGA cheerleaders in the past year or so. Business as usual – we can do business with the far right; pragmatism is the order of the day.
Of course, one or two issues will need ironing out. Lammy called Trump a “racist Nazi KKK sympathiser” back in 2017, a description many would say is accurate, actually. Lammy threatened to chain himself to the door at 10 Downing Street in protest at a Trump state visit.
But, on reflection, Britain’s new foreign secretary has now realised that Trump is merely ‘misunderstood’ – pragmatism rules in power politics, a can-do spirit.
In opposition, and in the Corbyn era, Lammy had thought that nuclear weapons were a bad thing. He now backs the UK’s independent nuclear deterrent/Trident renewal.
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Anglo-Americans rule, non to France
The US and UK are NATO allies, and both oppose France’s ideas about European ‘strategic autonomy’ or of a European army; and the US-UK have a near identical line on Ukraine and Russia/Putin; also mostly on Israel/Gaza; Yemen and the Red Sea, and Iran.
In the opposition, Starmer and Lammy backed the International Criminal Court prosecutor on his indictment of the Israeli PM, but whether they will act on it now is a different matter. Of course, the appointment of Richard Hermer KC, as UK attorney general, might signal a shift away from the Biden administration’s approach.
On China, the British state generally backs the US line re AUKUS and ‘containing’ China security-wise but competing economically and cooperating on global issues like climate change. But the US may press for a harder line on China’s challenge in the re-emerging power’s own backyard than the UK may be willing to go, given Brexit woes and the dim prospects of a US-UK trade deal anytime soon.
In terms of the bigger picture, the West’s view is that major powers need an industrial policy to renew their economies and strengthen popular legitimacy, and that the advanced economies and emerging powers like India and Brazil need to cooperate more and be strong against a ‘rising’ China.
This US-led new grand bargain waters down neoliberal ‘market fundamentalism’ in favour of enabling more strategic state intervention aimed at strengthening economies at home and building a stronger liberal international order in order to outcompete China. This approach has made some headway but seems doomed in a number of respects given that it remains wedded to the market and corporate power.
The US-led strategy is usually presented as facing up to the ‘China threat’, which suggests a neo-colonialist, aggressive, militarised – even racialised – framing. The West needs to come to terms with some basic facts: their own people aren’t happy with how they’re governed and non-Westerners aren’t happy at their marginalisation from the top tables of world power.
The domestic condition in many countries is fuelling authoritarianism and a shift to the right, while global power shifts are causing major tensions and intensifying geopolitical rivalries, leading to greater arms spending and military and naval deployments. Any serious government seeking to make a real difference must recognise these fundamental facts, build new coalitions for change and jettison the forces happy with the current status quo.
Only time will tell if this new Labour government is up to the job.
Inderjeet Parmar is a professor of international politics and associate dean of research in the School of Policy and Global Affairs at City, University of London, a fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, and a columnist at The Wire. He is an International Fellow at the ROADS Initiative think tank, Islamabad, and author of several books including Foundations of the American Century. He is currently writing a book on the history, politics, and powers of the US foreign policy establishment.
