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My thinking on Starmer is not that he is a centrist but that he goes full valence in contrast to Corbyn's purely positional opposition.
Not a lot to play with when doing valence politics in opposition, but on the other hand it is simple.
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Not a lot to play with when doing valence politics in opposition, but on the other hand it is simple.
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It is basically: keep your house in order and poke the government on policy delivery and management.
And given the competence issues this government has, it is an obvious strategy and one that Labour was dearly missing throughout the preceding years under Corbyn.
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And given the competence issues this government has, it is an obvious strategy and one that Labour was dearly missing throughout the preceding years under Corbyn.
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It emphasises getting into government over what you would do once you are in, which works well with the general population during a seemingly never-ending era of self-inflicted crises, but it obviously goes against the ideological parts of your basis.
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And basically, during the entire Brexit saga the government left an open goal for the opposition to score but they were let off by Corbyn's government caring more about what they considered deeper issues than Brexit.
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Corbyn and his ilk had of course a point, but if you want to reverse austerity etc., you first need to get into office. And you evidently don't by not exploiting government weakness.
Starmer makes Corbyn's team look more authentic but also more amateurish.
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Starmer makes Corbyn's team look more authentic but also more amateurish.
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Starmer is not a centrist in the same way that a bullshitter is not a liar: he disregards (at least at this point) ideological stances and demands.
But he is also not a centrist in the sense that a valence approach does not presuppose ideological moderation in office.
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But he is also not a centrist in the sense that a valence approach does not presuppose ideological moderation in office.
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If my copy was not tucked away in my office, I could check what @drjennings and @ProfJaneGreen said in more detail in their chapter on "government performance and opposition" about how valence politics works when in opposition.
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I find it a fascinating problem how to project competence while not in charge. I think Starmer's approach is a mixture of a technocratic approach to opposition and being more proactive in party leadership than the government is. It is a smart approach.
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What I am not so sure about is how far valence opposition can get you. At some point you do need to set out what you want to accomplish in office. But tbf Starmer cannot know yet what context he will be facing whenever that next election comes along.
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But his approach avoids two things that different factions want to see: (a) ideological continuation from Corbyn, a left agenda (the Labour agenda is as hybernating as the UK economy) or (b) addressing the "Red wall" issue: re-engaging with lost more authoritarian voters.
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I was surprised that Lisa Nandy was given the foreign policy shadow brief, but that helps perhaps in parking this issue as much as the ideological direction of the next programme.
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He can first see how far he gets with projecting competence in contrast with a chaotic government, and with that also how soft the new gained Tory support in ex-Labour heartlands actually is, before deciding on targeting groups with policy or symbolics.
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Starmer's approach is frustrating for the leftists in the party, and perhaps also too much celebrated by centrists who may mistake his non-positional approach for one that implies ideological closeness to them.
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