‘Corbyn mania’ takes Britain by storm

Relatively unknown to most of the British public until now, Jeremy Corbyn is turning British politics on its head, writes Laura Mackenzie.

Jeremy Corbyn (in the foreground) from the Labour Party has been credited for being one of the major factors behind the party’s recent membership surge. Peter Nicholls/Reuters

Just three months ago, Jeremy Corbyn was a veteran rank and file MP, consigned to the political wilderness for his self-confessed socialist and often unorthodox views, and little known to most of the British public.
Since then, the man who has come under fire for advocating dialogue with Hamas and Hizbollah has emerged as the favourite to win the ongoing Labour party leadership election which closes on September 10.
His rising popularity has sparked a grassroots movement that has turned British politics on its head and prompted the media to coin the phrase "Corbyn mania".
Mr Corbyn, 66, has never held a senior position in the centre-left party despite serving as an MP for 32 years. Yet commentators believe his campaign – with its anti-austerity message – has been one of the major factors behind Labour's recent membership surge.
Since losing a general election to the centre-right Conservative party in May, Labour says its membership has increased from 187,000 to 292,973.
Another 260,981 are eligible to vote in the leadership election – some due to their membership of a trade union or other organisations affiliated to Labour, others after paying £3 (Dh16.96) to become a registered supporter, which has fewer privileges than full membership.
Stephanie Phillips, a 27-year-old psychologist, signed up as a registered supporter to be able to vote for Mr Corbyn, the first politician in a mainstream party that she has found "inspiring".
"I'm particularly interested in what he says about an alternative to austerity. That there are ways to save money and be more efficient that aren't just going to target the most disadvantaged in society," said Ms Phillips, who until now did not belong to a political party.
"Seeing these ideas in a mainstream party is exciting because it feels like [they could actually be implemented] … rather than feeling like they're sidelined, wacky ideas."
Drawing thousands to his rallies and inspiring the slogan "Jez we can" – a play on Barack Obama's first presidential campaign slogan – Mr Corbyn is achieving a kind of rock star status in Britain.
"[When the leadership race began], many ... believed that the [era and legacy of former centrist prime minister Tony Blair] had reduced the left-wing supporters within the party to such a degree that no left-wing candidate could succeed," said Dr Victoria Honeyman, a lecturer in British politics at the University of Leeds.
"However, Jeremy Corbyn has tapped into something else. It isn't just that he is selling a set of popular policies – who actually likes austerity measures? No one – but [he] is also being sold as a conviction politician. This is very popular with many voters who want someone who seems genuine."
Jesse Ashman, a 22-year-old student from Wickford, a small town in the south-east of England, agreed.
"People are looking for someone with actual compassion, not someone who cares more about his personal brand than people's welfare," said Mr Ashman, who joined Labour in order to vote for Mr Corbyn.
It's not just younger people who are inspired by Mr Corbyn. Mr Ashman's father, Peter, has been a member of a trade union affiliated with Labour for 30 years, but currently feels alienated from the party.
"I'm voting for Jeremy Corbyn because I want Labour to represent the working class," said the 52-year-old, who holds three jobs.
"He has re-awakened a lot of people that felt there was no alternative as Labour seems to be as much in the pockets of the rich as the Tories [Conservatives] are."
While the success of Mr Corbyn's campaign may have been unexpected – even by the MP himself – he has stressed that it is no anomaly.
"There are equivalent movements across Europe, the USA and elsewhere. It's been bubbling for a long time," Mr Corbyn told The Guardian newspaper, referring to the radical leftist parties Podemos in Spain and Syriza in Greece, as well as Bernie Sanders' campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in the US.
Professor Archie Brown, emeritus professor of politics at the University of Oxford and author of The Myth of the Strong Leader: Political Leadership in the Modern Age, agreed that there was an international trend of "dissatisfaction with the political establishment".
"There is tremendous dissatisfaction with many things, but not least the increasing inequality in many western societies," he said. "The fact that the financial crash of 2008 was in most analyses caused by financiers themselves and yet it was the ordinary taxpayer who had to bail them out. [And that even] the opposition parties, social democratic parties, to some extent have accepted the conventional wisdom that private sector is always better than public sector."
Mr Corbyn has been plagued by suggestions he would make the Labour party "unelectable" and that his policies – which include renationalising the UK's rail service and introducing a £10 hourly minimum wage – are unrealistic. Even if he were to lead the party to power, critics say, he would struggle to implement the kind of agenda that he is proposing.
This assessment has no doubt been given weight by the recent resignation of former Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras, whose Syriza party won national elections on an anti-austerity platform in January but quickly bowed to pressure from the country's creditors.
But while Professor Brown acknowledged that radical, left-wing parties and leaders face a lot of economic realities "that impose limits on what can be done" when they come to power, he believes they are not doomed to fail.
"I think a lot depends on their political skills and the extent to which they can adapt," he said.
Governments in Britain and other democracies have pursued more social democratic policies in the past "and so there's no intrinsic reason why [this] can't happen again."?
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