Tighter regulations & greater scrutiny are but part of the solution to the issue. Ultimately if we want to attract talented people from all and every background to represent our interests in Parliament, we need to accept that higher salaries are the best way to achieve that.

Richard Harrington is right though. How any party suggests such an idea in the current climate without committing electoral suicide escapes me.

“Of all the self destructing systems we currently have, that are inevitably on course for self-immolation, capitalism is the best of them.”

This obviously contravenes the normal conversational implicature of saying “X is fatally flawed.” The most reasonable interpretation of some-one asserting “capitalism is fatally flawed” is to take this at face value, not to suspect that they think it is the most preferred system. To talk of an option or plan as “fatally flawed” implies that it is not the best option. If capitalism is the best system available, it follows that it is not fatally flawed, qua political option, but is rather the best plan.

“Are you a politician? You’re starting to sound like one. You haven’t even mentioned positive liberty until the last post.”

This sounds like an accusation, but there’s no content. At first you defined liberty in purely negative (and therefore right-wing) terms, I prompted that positive liberty also existed (which is the basis for the left-wing conception of liberty); you told me about positive and negative liberty and I said that I was very glad you were recognising the distinction, what’s the relevance of the fact that I only mentioned it 2 posts ago?

“Positive liberty is not leftist. Positive liberty is a freedom ‘to’ do ‘x’, ‘y’ and ‘z’”

Positive liberty is traditionally considered leftist, because maximising positive liberty means that there is a requirement to facilitate individual’s self-realisation. Freedom to do X, means that one must be literally able to do X, not (as per negative liberty) merely that one is free from external interference by persons against you doing X. Positive liberty can therefore ground leftist demands e.g. to ensure a person has the wherewithal to eat, not merely that they are not overtly impeded from eating- it mandates losses of negative liberty in order to facilitate positive liberty.

“Negative liberty is freedom from external factors which curtail your liberty. Poverty curtails your liberty.”

For all your ad hominems about having reading Two Concepts of Liberty, this is quite demonstrably false. Berlin offers a totally different definition: negative liberty concerns a subject being “without interference by other persons.”

Poverty is not an external interference in the relevant sense. If it were, then your position would collapse, for negative liberty could require limitless intervention in order to ameliorate any circumstance which precluded my plans.

To quote more Berlin: “You lack political liberty or freedom only if you are prevented from attaining a goal by human beings. Mere incapacity to attain a goal is not lack of
political freedom.”

Indeed he discusses the question of poverty explicitly, noting “If my poverty were a kind of disease which prevented me from buying bread…this inability would not naturally be described as a lack of freedom… It is only because I believe that my inability to get a given thing is due to the fact that other human beings
have made arrangements whereby I am… prevented from having enough
money with which to pay for it, that I think myself a victim of coercion or slavery… this… term depends on a particular social and economic theory about the causes of my poverty or weakness.”

Negative liberty only concerns cases where I directly preclude your ability to eat a loaf of bread, for example, by tying you down. If I own a loaf of bread and decide to eat it myself, I am denying your ability to eat the bread, but I am not contravening your negative liberty.

“the question is about how much state intervention and for what purpose? The same with redistribution of wealth. Every time I point this out you just keep jumping back to another argument. No one disagrees with either principle. It’s the extent and purpose that are the question.”

Actually I asked you this question: if you think that “social liberalism and… state intervention and redistribution of wealth” are incompatible (and yet that the social liberalism supports welfare), then how much state intervention is permitted by liberalism? The problem is that your two requirements for social liberalism are contradictory.

“The state doing more to provide equal starting points through…state intervention and redistribution give individuals an equal starting point. If various individuals have an equal starting point, and one ends up on £10k a year and the other on £50k, the libertarian state would not then redistribute much money to the lesser off individuals, as socialism would. It would be ok with the inequalities, so long as they arose from an equal starting point.”

Why have you suddenly started talking about libertarianism? Libertarianism does not advocate robust state intervention to redistribute to ensure agents have an equal starting point, it allows any outcomes of voluntary exchanges, there’s no requirement to ensure equality of opportunity. Redistribution to ensure pure equality of opportunity would in fact be a more left-wing position than any mainstream party in the UK, hardly libertarian. The position you’ve described, is some sort of radical opportunity egalitarianism.

“Of course the state would still seek to have a welfare net to ensure no one lives in poverty if possible, but it wouldn’t redistribute wealth further than that.”

This is not true of libertarianism. If you were to provide a welfare net to ensure a baseline level of resources, how could this be justified on the grounds of maximising personal freedom or on the grounds of self-ownership? You would need a non-libertarian ground for the social minimum.

“And that is where social liberalism and socialism divorce, and you’ll find that your arguments are very much on the socialist side. The fact you think yourself a social libertarian is remarkable.”

You’ve switched from referring to libertarianism to social liberalism: are you asserting they’re the same thing? Social liberalism, can vindicate state intervention, interfering with the better off, in order to maximise the position of the worst off (a la Rawls) or in order to maximise some sort of positive liberty (say,
Sen’s capacity’s approach).

“And that is not leftist as you claim in your last paragraph. Lefist movements are in favour of the big state, they like to tax the rich and give to the poor. They don’t like inequality. They are anti-inequality. Social liberalism is very comfortable with inequality, and that is the key difference.”

The Left per se is not in favour of the big state, what of social liberalism or left-libertarians like Chomsky? Let’s say I chuck you the term “social liberalism,” how do you classify persons like Rawls who believe that in allowing inequality only as a means to improve the positions of the worst off? Would you deny that they’re liberals? To say that the left = egalitarianism = statism is simply false (this is a simple dictionary-truth), but since you’ve offered no support for the position, I’ll leave this conceptual truth as it is.

Indeed. Of all the self destructing systems we currently have, that are inevitably on course for self-immolation, capitalism is the best of them. To presume that if you have a certain number of systems, and one presumably is the best, if they are all self destructive, then the best of those systems is by definition going to be fatally flawed.

“I’m glad that you’ve now conceded the existence of social liberalism and positive liberty, having denied them before I pointed them out. This means you’ll have to adjust your claims above about liberalism being intrinsically centrist, by the way. Incidentally you’ve still got negative liberty wrong, it doesn’t include freedom from poverty, since otherwise even strong libertarianism would mandate satisficing redistribution of resources.”

Are you a politician? You’re starting to sound like one. You haven’t even mentioned positive liberty until the last post. Positive liberty is not leftist. Positive liberty is a freedom ‘to’ do ‘x’, ‘y’ and ‘z’. It’s Negative liberty is freedom from external factors which curtail your liberty. Poverty curtails your liberty. You haven’t even read Isaiah Berlin, have you? Come back when you’ve actually read the book from which the idea of positive and negative liberty were discussed. I’d be surprised if you turned round and said you had read it, as you seem to have got it completely wrong.

“Your argument is that: 1) “state intervention and redistribution of wealth etc” is incompatible with 2) the state… provid[ing] the means through which the individual can look after themselves.” This is clearly false, since “the state providing the means through which the individual can look after themselves… through intervention and redistribution of wealth etc” is demonstrably coherent.”

Yeah, it is coherent, but the question is about how much state intervention and for what purpose? The same with redistribution of wealth. Every time I point this out you just keep jumping back to another argument. No one disagrees with either principle. It’s the extent and purpose that are the question. Let’s put it very simply. The state doing more to provide equal starting points through more investment in education to make state schools as good as public schools, or to tax inheritance, are means through which state intervention and redistribution give individuals an equal starting point. If various individuals have an equal starting point, and one ends up on £10k a year and the other on £50k, the libertarian state would not then redistribute much money to the lesser off individuals, as socialism would. It would be ok with the inequalities, so long as they arose from an equal starting point. Of course the state would still seek to have a welfare net to ensure no one lives in poverty if possible, but it wouldn’t redistribute wealth further than that. And that is where social liberalism and socialism divorce, and you’ll find that your arguments are very much on the socialist side. The fact you think yourself a social libertarian is remarkable.

And that is not leftist as you claim in your last paragraph. Lefist movements are in favour of the big state, they like to tax the rich and give to the poor. They don’t like inequality. They are anti-inequality. Social liberalism is very comfortable with inequality, and that is the key difference. Socialism is based on this perverse idea that we are all equal or we should be all equal – which is rubbish. We all know we’re not all equal.

I’m starting to realise that you’ll never even come to some kind of conclusion with anyone who doesn’t entirely subscribe to your opinion so I might have to leave this debate. I’m all for debating, but there’s no point when the person you’re debating with a) moves the goalposts and changes his argument every two seconds and b) has no intention of at the very least coming to some kind of conclusion. You’re very obviously intent on never conceding any ground or willing to believe you’re wrong on any of the above issues. So what is the point? Seriously? If you’re going to have a debate, at least from my point of view, the idea is that you aren’t necessarily right, but you have a conviction, and you want to explore the other side to see who is right, or if the answer is something else entirely. You’ve clearly come into this with your opinion, and with the very clear thought in your mind that no other opinion can possibly be correct. That defeats the whole point of debate, so I’m out.

What can “fatally flawed” be taken to mean then other than simply “flawed”? ‘Fatal’ implies death, the end of x as a system, a system ceasing to be means that it is no longer even a system, let alone the best one.

“There is no left liberalism. Left liberalism is a contradiction in terms. Liberalism is fundamentally centrist. The left stands for more interference from the state, a bigger state. This is at odds with liberalism.”

This is ignoring the entirety of social liberalism. Rawls and his ilk are left-liberals and uncontroversially the currently dominant political theory. As I noted before it makes no sense to insist that liberalism, in abstraction, is centrist, rather than neutral. If “more interference… a bigger state” is necessarily at odds with liberalism, then how much state interference is compatible with liberalism, surely you can’t point to any non-zero amount of interference? It sound like a belief in no (or next to no) state, would be a decidedly right-wing position, which offers a reductio of your “liberalism is centrist” stance… is libertarianism a non-liberal ideology by your lights?

By your own definition, liberalism means “[belief] individual liberty and freedom,” if you stand by this as the nature of liberalism, then you must concede, that “individual liberty and freedom” can be respected in either their negative or their positive manifestations. There’s no question of conceptual debate here, you’re simply writing as though ‘modern liberalism’ never occurred.

“Relationships are the single most important factor…marriage is intrinsic to this.”

Clearly marriage is not “intrinsic” to relationships, since human history is marked by a preponderance of non-married relationships. You’d need some intervening argument, to wit…

“there is a causal relationship between being married and subsequent happiness. There is almost no dissent in the psychology field to this argument.”

I’m afraid I can’t trust your assertion, given that you evince a misunderstanding of the nature of causation. If you mean that there is no dispute that, as a life-event, marriage is regularly followed by increased happiness, then this is uncontroversial, but this commonplace does not a policy make. To justify encouraging marriage we would need to know not merely that the people who (in fact) marry become happier, but that marriage produces happiness c.p. This distinction is well understood by the literature (pick a review article at random). The consensus is that there are two ways to answer why married people are happier, social selection theory or social causation theory. The ‘social causation’ branch argues that “marriage itself increases happiness by providing emotional and financial support,” but this by no means entails that marriage (the state of having a certain legal contract) is causing happiness but for these factors. To quote from an article from the causal school you’re appealing to: “the relationship between marital status and happiness was marked by two intermediary processes. Marriage increases financial satisfaction, which, in turn, increases happiness. Marriage is also associated with a relatively high level of perceived health,” it notes that these were “the two principle predictors of happiness.” The residual extra happiness (once health and financial security are accounted for)… “may be due to social selection.” If it’s selection bias + extraneous financial and health factors that are producing the benefits (not the possession of a marriage certificate per se), then there’s no reason to expect the same effects to getting unmarried up the aisle.

“resilience is improved by living in a harmonious and happy environment, usually with married parents.”

The “usually” should tip you off to the fact that this is association, not causation, again.

“that is not the point of the policy. It is fundamentally symbolic to David Cameron. It is less to do with economics and more to with a statement of intent in terms of his attitude towards the family.”

That’s not the point of my question: If the policy is a “symbolic… statement of intent in terms of attitudes towards the family,” then what is the point of the “symbolic statement of intent in terms.” I’d have thought that the word “intent” was suggestive here, but that aside, surely the reason for this symbol is to “encourage marriage” in some way. The point of saying “Yay for marriage” is surely to produce some sort of change, not simply an expression of David Cameron’s opinion, for the sheer hell of it.

“Social liberalism emphasies positive liberty….the freedom to do things, rather than negative liberty…freedom from certain things (such as robbery, poverty etc). Social liberalism is fundamentally in favour of the individual, and the state’s role is to provide the means through which the individual can look after themselves. You’re arguing in favour of state intervention and redistribution of wealth etc.

Those two things are incompatible. Your argument is in favour of a state which behaves retrospectively to neutralise inequality. Social liberalism seeks to destroy inequalities as a STARTING point, not an END point, thus allowing individuals to control their own destiny. Liberalism… social liberalism too, is fine with inequalities, so long as they arise from an equal start..”

I’m glad that you’ve now conceded the existence of social liberalism and positive liberty, having denied them before I pointed them out. This means you’ll have to adjust your claims above about liberalism being intrinsically centrist, by the way. Incidentally you’ve still got negative liberty wrong, it doesn’t include freedom from poverty, since otherwise even strong libertarianism would mandate satisficing redistribution of resources.

Your argument is that: 1) “state intervention and redistribution of wealth etc” is incompatible with 2) the state… provid[ing] the means through which the individual can look after themselves.” This is clearly false, since “the state providing the means through which the individual can look after themselves… through intervention and redistribution of wealth etc” is demonstrably coherent.

You go on to say that my argument is for a “state which behaves retrospectively to neutralise inequality,” which apparently means “destroying inequalities as an end point” not “as a starting point.”
All I can infer from this is you mean that I favour tackling inequality of outcome, whereas social liberals only tackle inequality of opportunity.

This is clearly false, for one thing, Rawls, liberal par excellence, calls for allowing inequalities (in outcome) only if they benefit the worst off; equality of outcome is the default. Also if (according to you) social liberals “provide the means through which the individual can look after themselves” then this can require redistribution of resources to maximise positive liberty, how else would the social liberals provide the “welfare” you say they do? Let us say Incompetent Ian starts from a position of equal opportunity with all his peers, but through his fault or bad luck, he ends up jobless and with a wooden leg. The libertarian say that this happened because of voluntary exchanges and is therefore no concern of the state, the social liberal, conversely, mandates intervention to protect his interests, and not merely to protect his negative liberty (by stopping individuals beating him with his wooden leg) but to protect his positive liberties, to food, security, happiness and such goods.

“Are you in favour of more redistribution of wealth, state interference, and control of industries, or do you prefer a system in which all have the equal start to allow them to pursue their own dreams without interference from the state?”

If you cast your mind back the question isn’t whether I’m a socialist or social liberal, the question is whether social liberalism is leftist. Two points first “all have the equal start to allow them to pursue their own dreams without interference from the state” doesn’t make any sense- you might mean that every-one is equally free from state interference, or you might mean that the state guarantees equality of opportunity and then doesn’t interfere. The former isn’t social liberalism, that’s libertarianism. The latter doesn’t preclude state intervention, it might plausibly require state redistribution to the point of perfect equality of resources in order to ensure equality of opportunity. It’s such a potted definition that I’m loathe to call it “social liberalism” but this pure opportunity-no outcome egalitarianism is obviously leftist and interventionist.

No it’s not! All the systems we currently have are fatally flawed. Capitalism is the best of them though. Where is the contradiction?

“This, again is simply incorrect, by definition. The Left includes both state socialism and left liberalism, both of which I refer to in my article.”

There is no left liberalism. Left liberalism is a contradiction in terms. Liberalism is fundamentally centrist. The left stands for more interference from the state, a bigger state. This is at odds with liberalism.

“married people are happier on average than those who are not,”

“Any evidence of causation?”

Yes, much. Read the analysis of Ilona Boniwell for a start, who has conducted in depth research into what makes us happier. Relationships are the single most important factor, something underlined by the most eminent psychologists such as Dr Martin Seligman, and marriage is intrinsic to this. You can trust me on this, it’s what we’ve been researching in some depth at my work – it is beyond doubt that there is a causal relationship between being married and subsequent happiness. There is almost no dissent in the psychology field to this argument.

People born into dysfunctional families, with single parents etc, are more likely to have mental illnesses. It is related to one’s ability to cope, their resilience to mental setbacks. Such resilience is improved by living in a harmonious and happy environment, usually with married parents.

“To what end? Might I venture that the point of “encouraging the idea of marriage as the preferential form” is in order to “incentivise marriage”?”

Yes it is but that is not the point of the policy. It is fundamentally symbolic to David Cameron. It is less to do with economics and more to with a statement of intent in terms of his attitude towards the family.

To the key point here though, social liberalism. Not content with trying to steal and pervert the meaning of liberalism, the left is now trying to steal social liberalism for themselves? This is again a very centrist concept.

I don’t know your political philosophy background, but from the outside it looks as though you have got essential flaws in your understanding of various strands of political philosophy. Social liberalism, loosely defined, is the state providing the means for individuals to look after themselves through welfare. Social liberalism emphasies positive liberty. In case you’re not familiar with this, positive liberty is the freedom to do things, rather than negative liberty, which is freedom from certain things (such as robbery, poverty etc). Social liberalism is fundamentally in favour of the individual, and the state’s role is to provide the means through which the individual can look after themselves. You’re arguing in favour of state intervention and redistribution of wealth etc.

Those two things are incompatible. Your argument is in favour of a state which behaves retrospectively to neutralise inequality. Social liberalism seeks to destroy inequalities as a STARTING point, not an END point, thus allowing individuals to control their own destiny. Liberalism, most fundamentally, social liberalism too, is fine with inequalities, so long as they arise from an equal start. That is at odds with the ideas you’re putting across.

So let’s be clear. Are you in favour of more redistribution of wealth, state interference, and control of industries, or do you prefer a system in which all have the equal start to allow them to pursue their own dreams without interference from the state? Because the latter is social liberalism, and what your ideas are, frankly, come across as some kind of socialist muddle. You might not call it socialism, but you can attach whatever label you want to it, in political philosophy, that’s what your views correlate to. Stop abusing the meaning of liberalism! Liberalism is a wonderful, brilliant and forward thinking political ideology, and the left are trying their best to steal, discredit and destroy its meaning and values.

It’s pushing the borders of credulity to insist, against all the evidence that this is my conclusion. It’s not even what the article is about! Even if it were, the conclusion would surely have to be the bit immediately after my statement about public opinion, where I say that public opinion shouldn’t be fundamental to the Left.

“There is no serious alternative. Socialism is no alternative. It has been tried and failed.”

What about social democracy? That seems to be pretty dominant.

“I still believe capitalism is a flawed system. But it is also the best current system we have.”

If you’ll attend to your own words, we were discussing capitalism being “fatally flawed,” which is clearly at odds with it being the best system we have.

“Liberalism is NOT left wing. Classical liberalism yes, is right wing, but actual liberalism is centrist. It believes in individual liberty and freedom.”

Your objection is redundant, if we insert your own definition of liberal we simply find the claim that Britain is “left-wing and [values individual liberty and freedom],” what’s the problem there?
(Fwiw, you can’t talk of “actual liberalism” as being centrist, in isolation from a concrete manifestation. If you’re talking about liberalism in essence, abstracted from any specific nature, then it can’t be naturally centrist, it would be neutral.)

“And the difference between socialism and the left?”

Socialism implies statism, the Left includes non-statist leftism (a form of liberalism).

“Are Labour not a socialist party by nature?”

No, they’re a social democratic party (like every government in Europe), who endorse neo-liberalism combined with an ambivalent attitude to the welfare state (e.g. increasing spending, while marketising).

“You make a very clear reference to socialism.”

This is flatly false. Even in the comments I don’t mention socialism once. Indeed when I use the term in reply to your point about alternatives to capitalism I say “some sort of social(ism)” to demarcate between socialism and social liberalism.

“Now it’s ‘I wasn’t referring to socialism’, ‘I was referring to the left’, there is barely any difference and you know it.”

This, again is simply incorrect, by definition. The Left includes both state socialism and left liberalism, both of which I refer to in my article.

“The confusion you get yourself into is that you appear to believe most people are very liberal whilst also being in favour of more redistribution of wealth – which are contradictory ideas. Redistribution of wealth is a pro-equality move, an attempt to remove inequalities through taxation. Liberalism promotes the idea of an individual’s autonomy and favours that over collectivism. To believe in individual autonomy and also in redistribution of taxes are not entirely incompatible, but the more you believe in redistribution of wealth, the less you can be a believer in liberty. There is a balance between the two, which the left has got hopelessly wrong.”

This again is flatly mistaken. You’re assuming a definition of negative liberty (archetypal of the classical liberals) rather than positive liberty (archetypal of social liberalism). State redistribution contravenes negative liberty (freedom from), because it imposes on the outcomes of voluntary action. State redistribution, however, can be required by positive liberty (e.g. to allow the positive freedom to eat).

The contrast is not between autonomy and collectivism, since social liberalism values individual freedom simpliciter.

“Rawls, the classic libertarian, has it spot on.”

Rawls is one of the intellectual fathers of modern social liberalism, not a libertarian.

“Redistribution of wealth should be metered out so that the poorest aren’t any worse off as the result of the rich getting richer.”

You mean, “should be distributed so as to maximise the position of the worst off” in other words, the only justification for any inequality is to make the poorest better off.

“That’s the difference between liberalism and socialism. Socialism just believes in reducing inequalities,and favours the collective over the individual. And that is something you have missed entirely.”

I’ve “missed it” for two reasons. Firstly, as reading my statements will show, I don’t refer to socialism. Secondly, that’s not an accurate description of socialism.

You seem to have missed the actual points regarding the marriage debate. Consider:
“married couples tend to earn more per partner than single parents do”

And yet there’s no plausible mechanism by which marriage would make each partner earn more.

“tax credits won’t incentivise … The idea is to encourage the idea of marriage as the preferential form of the family.”

To what end? Might I venture that the point of “encouraging the idea of marriage as the preferential form” is in order to “incentivise marriage”?

“Economically, the married couple will generate more money for the economy than a single father and single mother, and take less money in benefits etc.”

I’ve pointed out a few inconsistencies about this on your previous article about marriage, but here’s a new one. The main class of people likely to be impacted by the tax credit are people who are in couples. Truly single parents do require more benefits, but co-habiting couples do not, and it is only these who could plausibly marry in any case.

“climbing on your outraged high horse and go ‘how dare they discriminate against the single parents!’ But if you move beyond emotional outrage…”

Let’s have a look at what I actually wrote:
“This is both economically and sociologically incoherent, in part for reasons already outlined at length on your marriage-tax article. There remains no evidence nor even a convincing theoretical reason why tax breaks would incentivise marriage. Secondly, why would married couples being more money for us all? If you’re going to point to any sociological reason, you’d need to prove that marriage causes, rather than merely tracks better social outcomes. If you mean fiscally, then clearly the tax breaks are self-defeating.”

Where’s the emotional outrage?

“married people are happier on average than those who are not,”

Any evidence of causation?

“stress, mental illness and … are more prevalent among those who aren’t married.”

Indeed? And all these trends hold true of the lower economic classes as well… is it not an odd co-incidence that these are also the people least likely to be married? Also, have you considered that the causal link between stress, mental illness, alcoholism etc and not marrying might run the other way?

Re Capitalism: “What serious alternative is in question apart from some form of social(ism)?”

There is no serious alternative. Socialism is no alternative. It has been tried and failed. I will support the capitalist system until a suitable alternative is found – which there is not at the moment. But I still believe capitalism is a flawed system. But it is also the best current system we have.

And you say ‘“Britain is a far more left-wing and liberal society than our parliamentary representatives or media’s representations allow.” This symbolises your confusion. Liberalism is NOT left wing. Classical liberalism yes, is right wing, but actual liberalism is centrist. It believes in individual liberty and freedom.

“If you refer again to my article you’ll note that there’s no reference to socialism, but simply to the Left.”

And the difference between socialism and the left? Are Labour not a socialist party by nature? You make a very clear reference to socialism. Every time I make a point you just move the goalposts and act as though you were actually referring to something else. Now it’s ‘I wasn’t referring to socialism’, ‘I was referring to the left’, there is barely any difference and you know it.

The confusion you get yourself into is that you appear to believe most people are very liberal whilst also being in favour of more redistribution of wealth – which are contradictory ideas. Redistribution of wealth is a pro-equality move, an attempt to remove inequalities through taxation. Liberalism promotes the idea of an individual’s autonomy and favours that over collectivism. To believe in individual autonomy and also in redistribution of taxes are not entirely incompatible, but the more you believe in redistribution of wealth, the less you can be a believer in liberty. There is a balance between the two, which the left has got hopelessly wrong. Rawls, the classic libertarian, has it spot on. Redistribution of wealth should be metered out so that the poorest aren’t any worse off as the result of the rich getting richer. But at the same time, the rich should be free to pursue their economic liberty. That’s the difference between liberalism and socialism. Socialism just believes in reducing inequalities, and favours the collective over the individual. And that is something you have missed entirely.

Regarding marriage, married couples tend to earn more per partner than single parents do, and of course take up fewer benefits. The Conservative proposals for tax credits won’t incentivise people to get married; that’s not the point, it’s a symbolic gesture, ideological. The idea is to encourage the idea of marriage as the preferential form of the family. No one is compelled to get married though. Economically, the married couple will generate more money for the economy than a single father and single mother, and take less money in benefits etc. There are powerful economic reasons to promote marriage in the tax system. It’s all very well climbing on your outraged high horse and go ‘how dare they discriminate against the single parents!’ But if you move beyond emotional outrage and consider the facts, the benefits of marriage are worth promoting. I’m the son of a single mother, I know that side of the coin. But look at the facts – married people are happier on average than those who are not, and this has other knock on benefits for the economy (the cost of stress, mental illness and depression to the economy is somewhere near £100 billion). Such conditions are more prevalent among those who aren’t married.

That’s not ignoring your point, look again what what you’ve quoted from me:
“I don’t argue that “80% want to address climate change, ergo 80% are leftists.” What I said, clarified that I did not claim that environmental views meant you were a leftist. Indeed my original reference to the environment was not about whether people were left-wing; which as I noted before, is not what my article is about, but which repeatedly insist on believing it is.

“There really isn’t much difference between the main three parties’ economic policies. And obviously many will be worried about cuts”

None of your claims address the point at all. So far that there is a difference between the policies the Tories are the most vociferously in favour of deep cuts quickly and the most hostile to maintaining spending. My point was that it is odd that people would most support the party that most represents that which they fear. Note that it is irrelevant for this distinction why people support the parties or prefer the policies- be it self-interest or otherwise. Note also that I have not talked about the motives underlying people’s brute policy preferences, merely contrasted these with their party support.

“Encouraging marriage has huge financial benefits for society. Every married couple brings in more money for us all, and therefore contribute to a healthy economy in which we can have lower taxes.”

This is both economically and sociologically incoherent, in part for reasons already outlined at length on your marriage-tax article. There remains no evidence nor even a convincing theoretical reason why tax breaks would incentivise marriage. Secondly, why would married couples being more money for us all? If you’re going to point to any sociological reason, you’d need to prove that marriage causes, rather than merely tracks better social outcomes. If you mean fiscally, then clearly the tax breaks are self-defeating.

“As for inheritance, I’m against inheritance full stop. But currently 27% of GDP comes from the banking sector. I’d say we should not alienate a group who we are relying on economically.”

What’s the connection between inheritance and the banking sector? My best reconstruction is this: Bankers are rich, the rich like inheritance, ergo taxing inheritance will piss off bankers. If this is your argument then clearly it doesn’t stand, to irritate the richest 6% qua taxpayers is not to offend the banking sector. Ignoring the fact that any-one with any financial nous at all can evade IHT with ease, there is nothing to fear in “alienating” bankers, they bank because of self-interest and will continue to do so, because banking in the City of London is still preferable to banking in the City of Mogadishu.

I fail to see how else taxing inherited wealth is punishing the banking sector.

As for your point about capitalism and how many people think it’s fatally flawed, you’re over playing the significance. My brother is an investment banker. You know, one of them. He thinks capitalism is fatally flawed. He’s not the only one. Many of those who think that capitalism is fatally flawed, are capitalists themselves. And they’re certainly not socialist.

Who cares whether he’s “one of them” apart from the caricatured Marxist you find in the imaginings of the right? If he thinks capitalism “fatally flawed” then what does he favour? What serious alternative is in question apart from some form of social(ism)? We can assume that most, even if not all, of those who hold capitalism fatally flawed, favour some form of social-statist or social liberalism, very few of them will favour some non-capitalist, non-socialism. Fascism or anarchism are the only alternatives that spring to mind; I don’t know what your brother favours.

Your history lesson is totally irrelevant. You can’t conflate political parties with political ideologies. If a Conservative party champions the advancement of a categorically left-wing, statist idea like the welfare state, then good for them and good for Leftism. Redistribution by the state is by nature a leftist policy, whether socialist or liberal in intention; redistribution by non-statist means could be adopted by the right, but that’s not what’s in question, we’re looking at “redistribution by the state.”

“You really need to understand the difference between liberalism and socialism; they are poles apart.”

If you refer again to my article you’ll note that there’s no reference to socialism, but simply to the Left, which includes both left-statism and left-liberalism, but thanks for the help with political philosophy! The fact that I refer to the Left, not socialism, may well help you make sense of the fact that I sketch out a broad contrast between the status quo and the Leftist alternative (which could take multiple forms).

“Redistribution of wealth is compatible with liberalism, which is the centrist brand of politics I personally favour. Unfortunately, we have no party that represents this ideology.”

Redistribution of wealth is compatible with social liberalism (which is a position on the left), but not with classical liberalism. State redistribution of wealth is obviously in tension with minimising the role of the state in favour of the market.

“Conclusions only form small parts of bigger pieces of writing. It’s your conclusion that I take issue with.”

How can you call the paragraph you’ve been objecting to my “conclusion”, when it occurs 7 paragraphs into an 18 paragraph essay? (And precedes the statement that aggregate public opinion shouldn’t be central to the Left.) My conclusion, if you’re interested is that: the Left ought to challenge social structures which reproduce dominant interests (e.g. in the political field) rather than simply buying into the logic of the political field, which is stacked against progressive/universalising interests.

“your opinion that those social views which aren’t socialist are regressive is somewhat judgemental.”

Actually it’s a value-neutral term, simply meaning “tending to return or revert,” that rather comes with the label “conservative.”

“liberalism is a centrist position, not leftist. Liberals don’t tend to believe in a large state or state control of non major industries.”

No, classical liberals believe in minimising the state, social liberals, do not (c.f. Hayek versus Rawls), classical ‘laissez-faire’ liberalism is right-wing, social liberalism believes in a robust state ensuring substantive individual liberty .

“redistribution of wealth, regulation, state control of major industries, the environment, those issues you cite, are issues on which there is not a great deal of difference between the major parties.”

Spooky, this seems to match precisely my insistence that the dominant parties are all centrist, at odds with the public’s views on all of the above issues (since the public favour more state intervention on all of the above issues, contrary to all three major parties.

“Ideological differences are more subtle. They are to do with whether you believe in a big state or a small state.”

If more state redistribution, more state regulation, more state control of major industries and more state action on the environment aren’t emblematic of big state versus small state then what is?

“Most people believe the state should control major industries; there is no difference between the right and left anymore on that”

Not one of the three major parties favour state control of major industry. State control of major industry is viewed by even the most centrist right-winger as a great evil to be avoided at all costs (that’s the point of a small state). You seem to be confused by the notion of non-essential industry, many paradigmatically essential industries, such as defence, are not state controlled; similarly for almost all major industries, e.g. steel, coal etc.

“people generally believe more in punishment than rehabilitation. A majority of people would be in favour of a death penalty, whilst the majority also believe in God. Socialist? Really?”

Pointedly, no-one mentioned socialism, I actually said “Britain is a far more left-wing and liberal society than our parliamentary representatives or media’s representations allow.” Belief in God has nothing to do with the Left at all. The death penalty and “more punishment than rehabilitation” are respectively very minor and hopelessly abstract points. They’re also best explained as simplistic emotional reactions in the absence of any sort of appropriate reasoning. They don’t represent any intellectual attachment to conservatism (and are inimical to right-liberalism), indeed they’re clearly very isolated intuitions. The same cannot be said of people favouring state redistribution, direction of industry, regulation of the markets, redistribution etc, these are not only not a consequence of persistent social pressure (e.g. from the press), in fact they are viewpoints formed contrary to a mass of pro-business agitation. It’s this contrast that is significant.

Ignoring my point! My point is that wanting the environment dealt with doesn’t make you a tree hugger or even mildly socialist.

Currently 40% of people are afraid that spending will be cut too deeply, compared to only 25% fearing that the deficit will not be cut quickly enough. That people have this set of preferences, yet think the Tory plans are the best and LD’s the worst, is not easy to make sense of.

ALL the parties are going to make cuts, and none of them are going to make cuts that quickly (at least until 2011 most likely). There really isn’t much difference between the main three parties’ economic policies. And obviously many will be worried about cuts; we’re all concerned primarily with one thing – ourselves. Matthew Parris wrote an excellent piece in The Times the other day about this phenomenon. He talked of an actively Conservative friend of his who is thinking of voting Labour, because he’s worried about cuts, and he fears he’ll lose out. It’s about him. Not party politics. It’s not a deep rooted policy position, it’s self interest. Which surprise surprise, is a more Conservative trait than socialist.

Whilst we’re on the economy I must take issue with your criticism of Tory economic policy. The two policies you refer to – tax credits for married couples and a reduction of inheritance tax. Do you understand the economics behind these policies? Encouraging marriage has huge financial benefits for society. Every married couple brings in more money for us all, and therefore contribute to a healthy economy in which we can have lower taxes. As for inheritance, I’m against inheritance full stop. But currently 27% of GDP comes from the banking sector. I’d say we should not alienate a group who we are relying on economically. We need to do more to create a more balanced economy that doesn’t rely on bankers, but until then, it is sheer chip on the shoulder madness to keep punishing the industry we are most reliant upon. If you’d rather pay higher taxes to take a swipe at the middle and upper classes, vote for it. I know I won’t.

As for your point about capitalism and how many people think it’s fatally flawed, you’re over playing the significance. My brother is an investment banker. You know, one of them. He thinks capitalism is fatally flawed. He’s not the only one. Many of those who think that capitalism is fatally flawed, are capitalists themselves. And they’re certainly not socialist.

There are millions who believe in redistribution of wealth who probably aren’t on the left. Of course it is a socialist idea. But to seemingly argue that belief in redistribution of wealth is incompatible with liberalism or conservatism is not only wrong, it shows an ignorance of history. Which is possibly the greatest means we have of redistribution of wealth? The welfare state, most prominently the NHS and the safety net created in the aftermath of the war. Sir William Beveridge was of course a Socialist, but his recommendations for the creation of the welfare state, outlined in his 1942 report, were accepted by the wartime cabinet, which was made up almost entirely of Conservatives and Liberals, without a single member of the Labour party. Going back further, it was David Lloyd George, a LIBERAL, not a SOCIALIST, who first had the idea for a welfare state. You really need to understand the difference between liberalism and socialism; they are poles apart. Redistribution of wealth is compatible with liberalism, which is the centrist brand of politics I personally favour. Unfortunately, we have no party that represents this ideology.

How can this be “the problem with the piece” when only 94 out of 1200 words even address the claim you’re criticising? Not all 1200 are the conclusion. Conclusions only form small parts of bigger pieces of writing. It’s your conclusion that I take issue with.

The fact that an individual can have left-wing economic views, yet regressive social views, doesn’t overturn the fact that the British public is very socially liberal (cf the Social Attitudes Survey).

Aha! We agree on something – though your opinion that those social views which aren’t socialist are regressive is somewhat judgemental. The public is very socially liberal though, on that you are right and I agree. But I presume you take that to support your view, when Liberalism is pretty much down the centre of the political spectrum. I know the left have made quite an effort to steal and malform the meaning of liberalism over the years, and it has succeeded to some extent in destroying its true meaning. But liberalism is a centrist position, not leftist. Liberals don’t tend to believe in a large state or state control of non major industries.

Your whole argument seems to be that the public thinks ‘x’, and ‘x’ is a socialist idea. Rubbish. Things such as redistribution of wealth, regulation, state control of major industries, the environment, those issues you cite, are issues on which there is not a great deal of difference between the major parties. Ideological differences are more subtle. They are to do with whether you believe in a big state or a small state. You cite people’s opinions on state control over major industries, which is no real marker. Most people believe the state should control major industries; there is no difference between the right and left anymore on that. It’s non essential industries that there is a difference over, and that is what you’ve ignored. And just to throw in some other issues that there are statistics on in the UK; people generally believe more in punishment than rehabilitation. A majority of people would be in favour of a death penalty, whilst the majority also believe in God. Socialist? Really?