Caroline Lucas and the problem with diversity

As Caroline Lucas found out last week, there comes a moment when a defective ideology collapses under the weight of its absurdities. For the doctrine of diversity, the meltdown happened when the former Green party leader was forced to apologise for including no black people in her all-women fantasy Cabinet. Labour supporters were particularly angry at Lucas’s omission of Diane Abbott. Why hadn’t the shadow Home Secretary been included?

Yet in leaving Abbott out, Lucas actually did Labour a favour. She showed, all too clearly, that even as a thought-experiment when you have controlled for sex, views on Europe, and position on the left/right spectrum, Diane Abbott still does not make the cut.

Unfortunately, Lucas then undermined her good work by apologising for flouting the doctrine. But it was too late. The flaws of focusing squarely on diversity – promoting white women at the expense of others, in this instance – had been exposed.

So what is this diversity doctrine? And why is it doomed to fail? It’s worth thinking about the central tenets behind it.