Across Europe and much of the world, it is not the centre but the left that cannot hold. The Labour Party’s disastrous showing in last week’s British general election is but the latest example of a trend. Germany’s Social Democrats have not won a general election since 2002. Spain’s Socialist Party suffered its worst ever result in last year’s European elections. In January, Greece’s once mighty Pasok claimed a meagre 4.7 per cent of the vote and barely made it into parliament.
Even where social democratic parties are in power, they might wish they were not. His ratings have recovered after a dignified response to the Charlie Hebdo killings, but France’s socialist leader, Francois Hollande, managed the distinction of achieving the lowest ever approval ratings of a sitting French president in late 2013.
Ah, it might be said: but what about Podemos, the radical insurgents who grew out of the Indignados movement in Spain and whose rise – despite a recent hiccup – has been so spectacular that a TV station asked if they could win elections to be held later this month? After all, Podemos’s ideological comrades in arms, Syriza, managed to do just that in Greece this January.
These, however, are essentially protest movements. Their members are disparate, with a substantial proportion coming from the Communist or hard left. They are coalitions of the angry and disaffected and, once in power, cannot deliver on the radical programmes that won them votes, as Greece’s prime minister Alexis Tsipras is finding.
It is the mainstream left that has lost its way and now appears bereft not only of confidence but of any clue as to how to find its way out of the wilderness.
Already the predictable siren voices are being heard in Britain, with the New Labour trio of Tony Blair, Peter Mandelson and David Miliband criticising Mr Miliband’s brother Ed for having abandoned the middle ground.
“The way to the summit lies through the centre,” Mr Blair wrote in The Guardian.
I would argue, however, the opposite. It is precisely those who pushed not only for turning to the right, but for the wholesale appropriation of right-wing policies, who have been the architects of the left’s misfortune. Bill Clinton-style “triangulation” – taking the middle road between the positions of the two major parties in a duopolistic political system – may have made some sense in America. There the label of “liberal” is considered an insult by so much of the population that to be associated with anything remotely “left-wing” is electorally catastrophic.
In Europe however, triangulation or the politics of the “third way” represented a capitulation to the right. It was a belief that the left couldn’t win by putting forward its own arguments.
While this strategy did enjoy success and almost certainly greater success than if such a shift to the centre had not taken place, it hollowed out the left, removing its sense of self and its moral clarity. Why else, for instance, has the mainstream left in Europe bowed before the orthodoxy of austerity even though, as Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman has argued convincingly, Keynesian borrowing and spending is exactly the solution to recession at a time when interest rates are so low?
Britain’s Conservatives have claimed that their much trumpeted belt-tightening worked. In fact, they gave up on austerity after the first two years – and that was when the recovery started. They kept on using the same language though because it sounded tough and allowed them to continue to paint Labour as irresponsible on the economy. If, as Krugman wrote last week, “nobody with influence is challenging transparently false claims and bad ideas”, that was partly because the left had lost confidence in what it once believed.
And that has been the poisonous legacy of triangulation. Once you give up on your core beliefs in pursuit of votes, it becomes difficult to hold to them again should you wish to return to them. This is why social democrats have caved on immigration, not projecting the internationalism they ought to believe in. On any number of issues they’ve acted as though the right sets the agenda and have been afraid to articulate their true passions. But why should that be any surprise when the very act of triangulation is an explicit acceptance of right of centre dominance?
There has been much talk of the need for parties of the left to appeal to aspirational voters. I agree. They should appeal once again to those who aspire to a better life for everyone; to those who aspire for public service to be once again in higher esteem than the pursuit of private profit; and to those who aspire to a common morality underpinning the actions of governments and institutions.
This is not a plea for the return of old-fashioned socialists, but let me end with the words of a former prime minister who could be described as one: “The Labour Party is a moral crusade or it is nothing.” That was said by Britain’s Harold Wilson. How curious that, in the western world today, the one person who could be relied on to speak with uncompromised – and often left-leaning – clarity of purpose about the institution he leads is the Catholic Pope Francis.
Sholto Byrnes is a senior fellow at the Institute of Strategic and International Studies, Malaysia
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Xpanceo
Started: 2018
Founders: Roman Axelrod, Valentyn Volkov
Based: Dubai, UAE
Industry: Smart contact lenses, augmented/virtual reality
Funding: $40 million
Investor: Opportunity Venture (Asia)
Company Profile
Company name: Hoopla
Date started: March 2023
Founder: Jacqueline Perrottet
Based: Dubai
Number of staff: 10
Investment stage: Pre-seed
Investment required: $500,000
Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus
Developer: Sucker Punch Productions
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Console: PlayStation 2 to 5
Rating: 5/5
The biog
Favourite Quote: “Real victories are those that protect human life, not those that result from its destruction emerge from its ashes,” by The late king Hussain of Jordan.
Favourite Hobby: Writing and cooking
Favourite Book: The Prophet by Gibran Khalil Gibran
The specs
Engine: Single front-axle electric motor
Power: 218hp
Torque: 330Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Max touring range: 402km (claimed)
Price: From Dh215,000 (estimate)
On sale: September
COMPANY PROFILE
Company name: Nomad Homes
Started: 2020
Founders: Helen Chen, Damien Drap, and Dan Piehler
Based: UAE and Europe
Industry: PropTech
Funds raised so far: $44m
Investors: Acrew Capital, 01 Advisors, HighSage Ventures, Abstract Ventures, Partech, Precursor Ventures, Potluck Ventures, Knollwood and several undisclosed hedge funds
Sarfira
Director: Sudha Kongara Prasad
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Radhika Madan, Paresh Rawal
Rating: 2/5
The specs: Fenyr SuperSport
Price, base: Dh5.1 million
Engine: 3.8-litre twin-turbo flat-six
Transmission: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 800hp @ 7,100pm
Torque: 980Nm @ 4,000rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 13.5L / 100km
Abu Dhabi traffic facts
Drivers in Abu Dhabi spend 10 per cent longer in congested conditions than they would on a free-flowing road
The highest volume of traffic on the roads is found between 7am and 8am on a Sunday.
Travelling before 7am on a Sunday could save up to four hours per year on a 30-minute commute.
The day was the least congestion in Abu Dhabi in 2019 was Tuesday, August 13.
The highest levels of traffic were found on Sunday, November 10.
Drivers in Abu Dhabi lost 41 hours spent in traffic jams in rush hour during 2019
COMPANY PROFILE
Company name: Almouneer
Started: 2017
Founders: Dr Noha Khater and Rania Kadry
Based: Egypt
Number of staff: 120
Investment: Bootstrapped, with support from Insead and Egyptian government, seed round of
$3.6 million led by Global Ventures
Company Profile
Name: HyveGeo
Started: 2023
Founders: Abdulaziz bin Redha, Dr Samsurin Welch, Eva Morales and Dr Harjit Singh
Based: Cambridge and Dubai
Number of employees: 8
Industry: Sustainability & Environment
Funding: $200,000 plus undisclosed grant
Investors: Venture capital and government
A Bad Moms Christmas
Dir: John Lucas and Scott Moore
Starring: Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn, Kristen Bell, Susan Sarandon, Christine Baranski, Cheryl Hines
Two stars
Grand slam winners since July 2003
Who has won major titles since Wimbledon 2003 when Roger Federer won his first grand slam
Roger Federer 19 (8 Wimbledon, 5 Australian Open, 5 US Open, 1 French Open)
Rafael Nadal 16 (10 French Open, 3 US Open, 2 Wimbledon, 1 Australian Open)
Novak Djokovic 12 (6 Australian Open, 3 Wimbledon, 2 US Open, 1 French Open)
Andy Murray 3 (2 Wimbledon, 1 US Open)
Stan Wawrinka 3 (1 Australian Open, 1 French Open, 1 US Open)
Andy Roddick 1 (1 US Open)
Gaston Gaudio 1 (1 French Open)
Marat Safin 1 (1 Australian Open)
Juan Martin del Potro 1 (1 US Open)
Marin Cilic 1 (1 US Open)
Generational responses to the pandemic
Devesh Mamtani from Century Financial believes the cash-hoarding tendency of each generation is influenced by what stage of the employment cycle they are in. He offers the following insights:
Baby boomers (those born before 1964): Owing to market uncertainty and the need to survive amid competition, many in this generation are looking for options to hoard more cash and increase their overall savings/investments towards risk-free assets.
Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980): Gen X is currently in its prime working years. With their personal and family finances taking a hit, Generation X is looking at multiple options, including taking out short-term loan facilities with competitive interest rates instead of dipping into their savings account.
Millennials (born between 1981 and 1996): This market situation is giving them a valuable lesson about investing early. Many millennials who had previously not saved or invested are looking to start doing so now.
The specs
Engine: 77kWh 2 motors
Power: 178bhp
Torque: 410Nm
Range: 402km
Price: Dh,150,000 (estimate)
On sale: TBC
DEADPOOL & WOLVERINE
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Hugh Jackman, Emma Corrin
Director: Shawn Levy
Rating: 3/5
The past winners
2009 - Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull)
2010 - Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull)
2011 - Lewis Hamilton (McLaren)
2012 - Kimi Raikkonen (Lotus)
2013 - Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull)
2014 - Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes)
2015 - Nico Rosberg (Mercedes)
2016 - Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes)
2017 - Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes)
The British in India: Three Centuries of Ambition and Experience
by David Gilmour
Allen Lane
If you go
Flying
Despite the extreme distance, flying to Fairbanks is relatively simple, requiring just one transfer in Seattle, which can be reached directly from Dubai with Emirates for Dh6,800 return.
Touring
Gondwana Ecotours’ seven-day Polar Bear Adventure starts in Fairbanks in central Alaska before visiting Kaktovik and Utqiarvik on the North Slope. Polar bear viewing is highly likely in Kaktovik, with up to five two-hour boat tours included. Prices start from Dh11,500 per person, with all local flights, meals and accommodation included; gondwanaecotours.com
Abu Dhabi GP schedule
Friday: First practice - 1pm; Second practice - 5pm
Saturday: Final practice - 2pm; Qualifying - 5pm
Sunday: Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi Grand Prix (55 laps) - 5.10pm
SPECS
Engine: 1.5-litre turbo
Power: 181hp
Torque: 230Nm
Transmission: 6-speed automatic
Starting price: Dh79,000
On sale: Now
RESULTS
Tottenham 1
Jan Vertonghen 13'
Norwich 1
Josip Drmic 78'
2-3 on penalties
KINGDOM OF THE PLANET OF THE APES
Director: Wes Ball
Starring: Owen Teague, Freya Allen, Kevin Durand
Rating: 3.5/5