Resultados de la aplicación de la propuesta.

John Gummer MP, writing in Faith in Politics in 1987, sought to make a clear distinction between a legitimate application of religious belief to politics and the „party political stance dressed up as Christianity‟ then being offered by the Church of England.71 _{Accusations such} as these, namely that the Church was being run by a load of „communist clerics‟ proved a useful way of discrediting the Church to its Conservative members, but these labels were far from accurate.72 _{In order to understand the precise contribution of the Church however,} there is a need to locate Anglican political involvement within the specific party-politics of the decade. It is only through such a contextualisation, that the position and significance of the Church‟s political intervention can be properly assessed.

There is little doubt that the polarisation of party politics in the 1980s forced the Church to inhabit the middle ground and extol the centralist values of unity, community, and consensus, which was then largely absent from political discourse. The shift to the right by the Conservatives was paralleled by a fundamentally more serious issue, namely the internal strife within the Labour party, which for a large part of the decade, disabled its leadership from acting as an effective parliamentary opposition. The 1970s had prompted an ideological crisis within the Labour party between the left and the right which would take more than a decade to resolve.73 _{In the 1980s, divisions over the EEC and nuclear}

69

Whiteley Pressure, p.146, p.148.

70 _{A. H. Halsey (ed.), British Social Trendssince 1900 (London, 2nd Revised edition, 1988).} 71 _{Gummer, Heffer & Beith, Faith in Politics, p.4.}

72_{Daily Telegraph, 2 December 1985.} 73

For a history of the Labour Party in the 1980s, see Dianne Hayter, Fightback! Labour’s Traditional

Right in the 1970s and 1980s (Manchester, 2007); Sean Tunny, Labour and the Press: From New Left to New Labour (Brighton, 2007); Eric Shal, Discipline and Discord in the Labour Party: The Politics of

rearmament, as well as the excesses of municipal socialism, union militancy and the conflicting priorities of industrial socialism in the north and metropolitan socialism in the south, meant that it was easy for Mrs Thatcher to dismiss the Labour party as ineffectual, outdated and promoting specific class interests which had little appeal to the mainstream. The portrayal of „Loony Left‟ figures such as Ken Livingston, Arthur Scargill and Derek Hatton in the press, fuelled the perception that the Labour party was completely unfit for government and this was reflected at the ballot box, with the decade seeing the party‟s worst electoral results since the interwar period.74

The weakness of the Labour party at this time convinced many clergyman that the Church needed to step into the breach. As The Times editorial confirmed in 1984, Labour‟s civil war and its battle with political extremism had left a „vacant ground‟ which „bishops plainly feel a moral obligation to occupy‟.75 _{Former Bishop of Southwark, Ronald Bowlby,} reflecting on events twenty years later, also considered the Labour party‟s failures crucial to explaining the Church‟s prominence during these years:

There was a sense that the Labour party was in such disarray that they were not offering a voice of conscience of what was going on…..there wasn‟t any sort of constituency that was offering the kind of critique that in normal circumstances one might expect from any party in opposition – this was in our thinking. Who is going to speak for the voiceless?76

As Bowlby‟s comment implies, it was not only that the Labour party was ineffective but also that the Christian and ethical socialist tradition had all but been abandoned by the party‟s leadership.

The influence of Christianity, particularly Nonconformity, in the early formation of British parliamentary socialism is widely accepted. This legacy continued to live on in the postwar period, with Prime Minister Harold Wilson claiming that British socialism owed „more to Methodism than to Marxism‟ and overseeing the formation of the Christian Socialist Movement in 1960.77 _{Yet under the leadership of Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock,} the ethical and largely Christian ethos of Labourism gave way to a more secular and indeed

Managerial Control in the Labour Party 1951-1987 (Manchester, 1988); R. Heffernan & M. Marqusee,

Defeat From the Jaws of Victory:Inside Kinnock’s Labour Party (London, 1992).

74

For electoral statistics see Cook & Stevenson, Longman, p.54.

75 _{„Hand to Mouth Leadership‟, The Times, 9 October 1984.}

76 _{Interview with Ronnie Bowlby conducted by author, 5 September 2006.}

77 _{The Christian Socialist Movement was an ecumenical and extra-parliamentary association. In 1988 it}

had membership of 1200, including 20 Labour MPs, an MEP and a trade union General Secretary. Previous incarnations had existed throughout the century including the Christian Socialist League,

radical outlook.78 _{This change largely explains the general indifference of the Labour Party} towards the Church in the 1980s. Faith in the City received a lukewarm endorsement, but the general view was that while the Church‟s intervention was well-meaning and welcome, it was essentially too moderate to merit serious consideration.79 _{Tellingly, Labour MPs did not} expend half as much energy engaging with clergymen as Conservative members did.80 There were of course notable exceptions, such as Frank Field, but very little support or interest emanated from the Labour leadership. In fact, the most fruitful conversations came from those on the far left of the party, chiefly the anglo-catholic Eric Heffer and low- Churchman, Tony Benn.81 _{Despite being on opposite sides of the theological spectrum,} both Benn and Heffer believed in the revolutionary nature of the Christian message and were in agreement that the Church needed to completely disassociate itself from temporal power in order to live-out the radical message of the Gospels.82

Some Labour MPs were of the view that the party‟s abandonment of its Christian ethical heritage was one of the chief reasons for its ideological and electoral difficulties in the 1980s. Speaking at the CSM‟s Annual Tawney Lecture in 1981 (the year the SDP had been founded) Frank Field reminded the audience of Tawney‟s important legacy for the party. According to Field, Tawney‟s central premise – that „morality was superior to dogma‟ – was the defining ethos of the party, which had historically separated British radicalism from the more extreme forms of socialism on the European continent. Field urged his fellow MPs to remember this maxim in these fractious times.83 _{Tony Blair} advanced a similar argument when he became leader of the party in the 1990s. Writing in 1996, reflecting on the problems of the Labour movement in the 1980s, Blair concluded that „the Left got into trouble when its basic values became divorced from [this] ethical socialism in which Christian socialism is included.‟84 _{Incidentally, as the party sought to re-} establish itself as a centrist political force in the 1990s, it‟s Christian and ethical heritage

78

Unity between these two strands of socialism in the 1980s could be seen in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

79 _{The General Secretary of the TUC stated that „it was an important, but basically moderate report‟: The}

Sunday Times, 8 December 1985.

80 _{The author has found no substantial evidence of a linkage between the Labour party and Nonconformist}

churches in this period.

81 _{David Ormrod (ed.), Facing the Future as Christians and Socialists (London, 1985), p.2.} 82 _{Tony Benn, „The moral basis of the radical left: the best hope for the future of British politics‟ in}

Ormrod (ed.), Fellowship, Freedom and Equality, pp.103-110; Gummer, Heffer & Beith, Faith in Politics,

pp.45-92. In 1988, Tony Benn raised the issue of disestablishment in a motion in the House of Commons, yet he received little support from his fellow backbenchers or others in the House.

83 _{Frank Field, „Socialism and the Politics of Radical Distribution‟ reprinted in Ormrod (ed.), Fellowship,}

Freedom and Equality, p.57. See also Anthony Wright, R. H. Tawney, ch.6.

84 _{Tony Blair, „Why I am a Christian‟, Sunday Telegraph, 7 April 1996 reprinted in New Britain: My}

became more pronounced and Christian MPs became more prominent.85 _{This transition} had been underway as early as 1986 when the Christian Socialist Movement was officially affiliated to the Labour party, yet it gathered significant momentum under the leadership of John Smith and subsequently Tony Blair; two leaders whose political beliefs were firmly rooted in a Christian faith. This inspired a greater interest in the social justice agenda of the churches. In the mid-nineties, a group of Anglican bishops began to meet regularly with shadow Labour ministers while David Sheppard was also invited to sit on the committee of the Institute of Public Policy Research‟s Commission for Social Justice.86 _{The report,} published in 1994, directly drew on Faith in the City and would eventually act as the foundations for New Labour‟s social agenda once in office.87 _{Interestingly, however,} Sheppard turned down the offer, fearing that his association with the report would be deemed a political act and align him too closely with the Labour party.88 _{At the celebratory} service for the tenth anniversary of Faith in the City in 1995, Tony Blair spoke in glowing terms of the report‟s achievements and in an article for the Guardian penned soon afterwards, he made a direct connection between the New Labour project and what the Church had been saying during the 1980s: „the essential challenge posed by Faith in the City remains unanswered – do we have the confidence and the ideas as a nation to achieve prosperity with fairness in the next century?‟89 _{The Church had to wait ten years for such an} endorsement from the Labour leadership, during the 1980s however, it was the newly- formed SDP with whom the Church seemed to have greater affinity.90

The formation of the Social Democratic Party, with its promise to offer a moderate alternative as a via media in British politics between market economics and state socialism, was welcomed by many Anglicans.91 _{Indeed, the links between the Anglican position and}

85 _{This also triggered a renewed interest in Christian Socialism‟s history within the Labour party: Chris}

Bryant (ed.), Reclaiming the Ground (London, 1993) and Possible Dreams; A Personal History of the British Christian Socialists (London, 1996); Graham Dale, God’s Politicians: The Christian Contribution

to 100 years of Labour (London, 2000); Alan Wilkinson, Christian Socialism: From Scott Holland to Tony Blair (London, 1998). On the debt that New Labour specifically owes to Tawney and Temple: Richard Woolley, The Influence of William Temple and R.H. Tawney on New Labour (Lampeter, 2007).

86

LCA, SP, Social Issues Box, BSR Chair file, correspondence between Sheppard and the IPPR.

87_{Social Justice: Strategies for National Renewal (London, 1994). John Gladwin, previously at the BSR,}

was the Anglican representative on the Commission.

88 _{CAP had close ties with the Labour party; Labour MPs such as Gordon Brown and David Blunkett}

addressed their annual conference, while two former CAP Chairmen went on to become Labour MPs.

89

„Battle for Britain‟, Guardian, 29 January 1996; „The Stakeholder Society: Faith in the City – Ten Years On‟ in Blair, New Britain, pp. 297-309.

90 _{Incidentally, Robina Rafferty, who sat on the Faith in the City Commission, has since stated: „the whole}

of the „social exclusion agenda‟ that was in force from 1997 onwards was actually what we were taking about.‟: Robina Rafferty, Faith in the City Witness Seminar, p.15.

91 _{On the SDP see Ivor Crewe & Anthony King, SDP: The Birth, Life and Death of the Social Democratic}

that of the SDP were such that many commentators re-branded the Church as the „SDP at prayer.‟ Both the Church and the new party were dissatisfied with the ideological direction of politics, both could be defined as left-of-centre, and both saw themselves as defenders of the consensus tradition in British politics. The Church and the SDP also generated huge media interest quite out of proportion to their membership and coincidently, both suffered from internal ructions which would eventually undermine their impact.92

Yet the connections do not stop there. David Martin has highlighted how the SDP- Liberal Alliance did have a distinct Christian presence within its leadership with the Roman Catholic Shirley Williams, Anglican David Owen, the Methodist Alan Beith and Scottish Presbyterian David Steel.93 _{Moreover, there is evidence of a conscious attempt by the SDP} to fashion itself as the true inheritors of the Christian reformist political tradition through its naming of the party‟s think-tank, the Tawney Society – much to the anger of Labour activists.94 _{These claims to a Christian heritage continued even after the SDP had aligned} with the Liberals. In the run up to the 1987 election, Alliance man, Alan Beith proposed that it was his party, with its appreciation of centrist and consensual values, that provided „the most promising opportunity available to pursue those [Christian] values in the political sphere‟ and expressed his wish that Christians would make the Alliance „the means of expressing their religious faith in the political world.‟95

Yet not all were convinced that the SDP was the new living embodiment of

Britain‟s Christian reformist tradition. The appropriation of Tawney‟s name was, according to historian and Labour party-supporter Raphael Samuel, „an exercise in generating

fictitious moral capital rather than the acknowledgment of a spiritual debt‟.96 _Samuel dubbed the SDP as Britain‟s first „post-Christian party‟ judging that it was nothing more than an ideologically confused conglomeration of personalities with a penchant for the „patrician politics of the English upper classes‟, which was being transmitted through „flashy American media techniques‟. For Samuel, the SDP‟s position as a via media meant in reality

92 _{The SDP was formed amidst huge media hype with initial poll ratings suggesting that it could}

potentially become the ruling party. The internal struggles within the leadership and its lack of a network at the grassroots meant that the SDP-Alliance‟s influence would be restricted to being a third-party force in politics: Crewe & King, SDP.

93 _{David Martin, „The Churches: Pink Bishops and the Iron Lady‟ in Dennis Kavanagh & Anthony Seldon}

(eds.), The Thatcher Effect: A Decade of Change (Oxford, 1989), p.336.

94 _{Tony Benn, for example, felt that Tawney belonged to the left of the Labour party and was dismissive}

of those who undermined Tawney‟s radical credentials: Tony Benn, „The Moral Basis of the Radical Left: the Best Hope for the Future of British Politics‟, in Ormrod (ed.), Fellowship, Freedom and Equality,

pp.103-110, see also Ormrod‟s introduction.

95 _{Gummer, Heffer & Beith, Faith in Politics, p.134; similar claims were made by David Steel in Church}

Times, 3 June 1983.

96 _{Raphael Samuel, „Religion and Politics: The legacy of R. H. Tawney‟ republished in Island Stories:}

that it was a party built on the „pursuit of the arts of government rather than as a struggle between darkness and light‟.97 _{The SDP did not advocate „moral imperatives‟ and instead} believed that „all the great questions are negotiable, if they can be defused of their

ideological charge.‟98 _{Tellingly, exactly the same accusations were launched at the Church} leadership by both Anglican traditionalists and Conservatives MPs in respect to the Church‟s consensual stance on politics and morality. Both the SDP and the Church, therefore, faced criticisms from opposite ends of the religious and political spectrum, for being ideologically vacuous and motivated by pragmatism and expediency. This hints at the way in which both Christianity and politics in this period were locked in a debate about the purity and dilution of doctrine.

In political terms, there were also important parallels in tone and language between the SDP-Alliance and the Church of England. Both shared a desire to counter the

ideological dogmatism then propagated by the two main parties and thus emphasised unity rather than class division and negotiation rather than confrontation. Alliance MPs also posited the domestic agenda in the same moralistic language which the Anglican hierarchy effectively deployed. David Owen in a speech to the party conference in 1983, for

example, argued that one of the chief aims of the party was to persuade the affluent that they had responsibilities to those less fortunate in society.99 _{The Church was a keen} advocate of Proportional Representation, while the SDP-Alliance laid particular emphasis on the environment and Britain‟s obligation to the developing world; two issues which especially resonated with Christians. Moreover, when the SDP was founded, it, like the Church, made a point of presenting itself as the „national party‟ above class interest, and endeavoured to frame its support base as a coming together of all those disillusioned with the direction of Britain.

Yet the SDP‟s pretensions of being a „national party‟ were as questionable as the Church‟s own self-appointed role as the Church of the nation. In the same way that the Church made claim to a national constituency but in reality drew its support largely from the middle classes, so did the SDP. According to Crewe and King, the SDP supporters were often university educated, employed in the public sector and were „mildly statist,

97 _{Ibid., p.241.}

98 _{Ibid., p.243.}

99_{The Times, 13 September 1983. David Owen had also penned a moral justification for compromise:}

Human Rights (London, 1978). Incidentally, David Owen had been taught by Mervyn Stockwood at Cambridge and had provided the Foreword to Stockwood‟s book: Mervyn Stockwood, The Cross and The Sickle (London, 1978), p.ix-x.

mildly conservative, certainly not radical‟.100 _{Significantly, Crewe and King described the} party‟s membership as like a „well-heeled suburban church congregation‟ who „seemed to think that all one had to do to solve the world‟s problems was to think the right thoughts and occasionally write out a modest cheque on one‟s substantial bank balance‟.101 _This image was not too distant from reality, as figures relating to the partisan affiliation of the clergy in the Synod demonstrate; the SDP and Liberal parties were supported by over 60 per cent of Anglican priests in the chamber.102

The „Gang of Four‟ founders of the SDP party recognised that they had a potential ally in the Church. In January 1981, Shirley Williams wrote to the Bishop of Manchester with a copy of the Limehouse Declaration, encouraging the prelate to join the Council for Social Democracy.103 _{David Sheppard, Derek Worlock and Free Church Moderator Michael} Hollins, were also approached to lend their names to the Council‟s published „Group of 100‟ – a list of non-political figures and former affiliates of the Labour party who supported