What does Starmer stand for?

Keir Starmer has been leader of the Labour party for just eight months. But that hasn’t stopped analysts defining what it is that ‘Starmerism’ represents. To some, it is an empty space where ideas should be: technocratic, electorally-driven but otherwise strategically rudderless. Others – most obviously implacable Corbynites – even detect elements of free-market individualism. So what does Starmer really stand for?

Commentators seem addicted to attaching the suffix ‘-ism’ to leading politicians’ names to capture what they are ultimately all about. Too often however this ‘-ism’ gives leaders’ actions a fake coherence. Margaret Thatcher certainly had a clear vision of where she wanted to go when elected Conservative leader in 1975. But what became known as ‘Thatcherism’ was fashioned by the vicissitudes of electoral competition. It was also dependent on events over which she ultimately had no control. What if the Tory ‘Wets’ had put up more of a fight? Or Labour had not descended into civil war? Or if Argentina had not invaded the Falklands? ‘Thatcherism’ was defined by these variables, and more – it wasn’t simply down to Thatcher.