How does Labour win the election?: A strategic guide.

With all the water that has passed under the bridge in the last month or so of New Zealand’s election campaign (and it’s been a torrent), I thought I’d offer some strategic insight if I was in the captain’s seat looking change the government and offer New Zealand a genuine progressive alternative to the last nine years of selfish soul-crushing neoliberalism. This strategy will be brief and not necessarily analyse in depth parties, or policies. Many others have done this so I wouldn’t be offering anything new. I’m by no means an expert of New Zealand politics, but I read about it a lot. This is based entirely on where things are now, and what’s currently on the table. I’ve looked at voting data from the previous election and compared it with more recent data.

So what do we know so far?:

— National’s support under Bill English is slowly eroding. The emphasis being slowly. They are no longer at the dizzying Key era heights of 47% polling. However they have still regularly been in the mid-to-low 40s. That’s not a bad place for them to be in, and governments can still be formed on those numbers. But inevitably they will need a coalition partner. The Labour leadership change might entice some centrist voters back from National, especially middle-class and educated women, and some might switch to Labour. The trend: a slow leak, but not necessarily in a dire position thus far. The latest Colmar Brunton poll that put National at 40%, 3 points below Labour, can’t be taken as a done and dusted sign. However, if the current trend continues I think this is where the result might settle. This is unless, they do something chronic which could see them dip into the 30s, but not by much.

—Labour’s rising star also must be taken with a grain of salt for two reasons. In order for a strong result they need those young, poorer, and non-voting types to actually turn up or the flashy gimmicks will all be a waste. Despite the latest poll that has them just in front, National could pip them at the post if they get their voters mobilised because of the threat of losing out on the coveted fourth term. But secondly, and more importantly, the need to adhere assiduously to the strategic importance of the Green Party as a valuable support partner. They signed the memorandum of understanding with the goal of changing the government to a real progressive alternative. The data from Horizon released this week suggested that 70% of voters who have switched to Labour have done so on the basis of Labour’s new leadership rather than the Green Party’s own internal strife. A little bit of switching was always expected, but if Labour starts sending the message that it no longer needs the Greens they risk losing this partner if they fall below the 5% threshold. Of course they will be flirting with the idea of New Zealand First, but strategically speaking the more coalition options the better. New Zealand First are a risk: they could join a Labour government that shuts out the Greens like 2005, or they could choose to support National. The point is, if you are someone looking for a strong progressive government, New Zealand First are not reliable in the same way that the Greens are. To me, a Labour-New Zealand First government is more tolerable than a National-New Zealand First Government (with or without the Green Party in Parliament). Even if Labour are still looking towards Winston and co., it would be strategically unwise for them to strangle the Greens out of Parliament as they could offer supply and confidence without being in coalition.

—Which brings me to the next party that Labour needs for a viable progressive coalition: the Māori Party. Party President Tokoroirangi Morgan has suggested that the party, on advice from members and constituents is open to working with Labour again. This certainly works well with kaupapa Māori of always having a seat at the table. On current polling the party still needs electorate seats to remain in Parliament. Labour has suggested it wants to hold all Māori seats, which is a dangerous strategy, because National has proven time and time again the importance of coalition partners. Labour seems to forget it is entitled to seats based on the party vote (unless of course you are a minor party that has a good chance of winning an electorate seat). If the Māori party could hang on to a couple of seats that would be strategically beneficial for Labour.

So what does all this mean? Well here are some things if I was Jacinda Ardern I would be thinking about with regards to forming a government on current number, as well as my prediction.

Here's where I see the number's settling. Below I will offer a bit more explanation as well as some basic MMP strategy.

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	Party vote (%)	Electorate seats	List seats	Total seats
Labour	42.5	29	23	52
National	39.5	39	9	48
NZ First	9	0	11	11
Green	6	0	7	7
TOP	1.5	0	0	0
Māori	1	2	0	2
ACT	0.5	1	0	1
United Future	0	0	0	0
	100	71	50	121

I know there's probably a certain degree of optimism, and therefore some bias, but I have tried to generous to even the right block parties.

The electorate seats here are based on my belief that Labour can win back the Maungakiekie, Ohāriu, and Christchurch Central. United Future is at a loss without Dunne, and National voters in Epsom smart enough to give ACT the tick. New Zealand First will pass the Greens as the third largest party, and the Greens themselves will just hang in there. On current polling in the Māori electorates, if Te Ururoa Flavell can hang on to Waiariki, and if Howie Tamati can pick up Te Tai Hauāuru from Labour, then that's two seats Labour ought to take advantage of. Given these numbers Labour can put together what I believe can be a working coalition of Labour, Greens, and Māori to provide a one seat majority of 61. The remaining parties would add up to 60. In this scenario New Zealand first could offer confidence and supply. This also means National's chances of coalition forming are seriously diminished because not only would they be the second largest party (Winston goes to the largest first), a coalition with ACT seems unworkable.

If Labour was serious about using MMP to its utmost advantage it would have to think like National. It needs coalition partners. If too many Green voters jump to Labour, say 1-2 %, it will make the Labour-New Zealand First scenario inevitable. To anyone putting together a real progressive coalition this is massive disappointment, as the Green Party wouldn't even be in Parliament as a cross-bench or confidence and supply party. Labour can guarantee support partners by allowing the Māori party to retain its current numbers and one other radical strategy: withdraw Grant Robertson from Wellington Central to guarantee the Green Party an electorate seat in the event they fall below the 5% threshold. This is of course a risky strategy and the backlash from National and the media would be phenomenal. Electorate deals are acceptable for National but not Labour would be the message. However, I see the probability of both Labour and Robertson giving this seat to the Greens (even given its strategic value) as a snowball's change in hell.

Whatever happens, Labour needs to be pragmatic rather than attempting to have its cake and eat it too. Don't campaign at the expense of allies, because it's going to be a tight one.

Post script: Here's the "Wellington Central" strategy numbers adjusted from the above table.

	Party vote (%)	Electorate seats	List seats	Total seats
Labour	44	28	26	54
National	39.5	39	9	48
NZ First	9	0	11	11
Green	4.5	1	4	5
TOP	1.5	0	0	0
Māori	1	2	0	2
ACT	0.5	1	0	1
United Future	0	0	0	0
	100	71	50	121

———————————————————————————————————————— "... we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever in peace." —W. M. Hicks.

Refugees, Referenda, and The Rugby-Industrial Complex

Looking back over this past week in politics, I struggle to find the words to describe my feelings towards the messy, incomprehensible, variegated swirl of events that have taken place. It's as if someone has pulled out that box in my cognition that processes events and deciphers them so the can be analysed at a later date and replaced it with a meat mincer. But is this just me, or is it the bizarre mix that has gone into it? In order to process what has possibly become the farcical peak of the Fifth National Government, it is going to need a rigorous break-down of its almost paradoxical parts.

Anybody who knows me personally, knows that my interest in rugby has waned to the point of oblivion over the last ten years. I can't remember the last time I watched a full game (perhaps the the 2011 World Cup final, but even then it was work, as I was a technician in the corporate audio-visual industry at the time—so that wasn't of my own choice). Firstly, it's not that I have anything against rugby per se, or even sport in general, but I just don't find it that interesting. I'm an odd person out: I don't mind cricket, in fact, I wish I had more time to watch cricket, but I just don't like rugby that much anymore. Secondly, and more importantly, I loath the ubiquity of the hyper-commercialised, hyper-masculine, alcohol soaked, and now politicised nature the game has become. I'm sure there are other sports worldwide that get the same treatment, but, what I'm going to call the Rugby-Industrial Complex, has become unique to New Zealand. I've derived this terminology from Dwight Eisenhower's warning to Americans in 1961 of a military-industrial complex that has since derailed the American political system. Eisenhower described the monetary relationship between legislators, the military, and the arms industry. Thankfully, New Zealand doesn't have such a war-mongering culture, but the political ties between rugby and the National Government are almost certainly discernible.

It was Robert Muldoon's National Government that insisted in 1981 that the national rugby team of a country that had openly racist and oppressive policies should not be stopped from touring in New Zealand because, obviously, sport and politics don't mix. Sure, different nations can come together at the Olympic games and compete for the spirit of the game, but below that semblance of unity there are often deep tensions and political motives. Why do all the rich countries win more medals? Surely sporting talent can arise anywhere on the globe? It was Aristotle that said man (just man) was, and still is, a fundamentally political animal. There is no way to completely depoliticise sport, just like every other action anyone takes, the motives for that action are linked to your moral principles, and hence, your political principles. The relationship the 1981 National Government had with rugby is one of convenience, just like the present National Government. Muldoon didn't want to upset his rural rugby-loving, liberal-hating constituents. To Muldoon, the tour wasn't going to become a political football—but in performing that do nothing approach it inherently was still politicised.

Fast-forward three decades and that switched has been flipped in its opposite direction, but as aforementioned, the relationship is a relationship of convenience. I'm not going to go terribly in-depth with the events of the 2011 Rugby World Cup because they have been highly publicised and scrutinised. But suffice to say, that is when the Rugby-Industrial Complex reached maturity. What other country has a Rugby World Cup minister? How about that awful political point scoring three-way handshake? As we descend on another traffic-stopping tournament the Rugby-Industrial Complex is stoking its boilers and exercising its political muscle. The rugby and politics train collided head-on on Sunday when John Key opened Parliament especially for the announcement of the 2015 World Cup Team. For the "sport and politics don't mix" attitude this seems the be a juxtaposition. This is the Key Government putting the spotlight on themselves as just as rugby-mad as the rest of New Zealand rather than on the mounting political failures of late. Also, I can't remember the last time there was so much media attention given to the players that didn't even make the team. Are we that obsessed?

Yet again, the telling influence of the Rugby-Industrial Complex has shown its ugly side this week with the bill rushed through Parliament allowing bars to be open at the early hours of the morning to coincide with games in the United Kingdom. I'm sure the political-business ties are many and numerous between the hospitality industry, alcohol companies, Sky TV, and the National Party. But would I, along with many others, be a killjoy by pointing this out? No, because it just seems so bizarre that this event gets such special treatment—and inevitably this is just the result of our socially destructive hyper-masculine, drinking, homophobic, rape culture. Will the roastbusters team be out during the world cup picking up drunk and vulnerable women? Why this event and not any other? Why do we need to drink to be a part of, or enjoy sport? Surely the unhealthy habits of binge drinking seem oxymoronic to the athleticism of rugby? This is obviously a complex relationship—again, a relationship of convenience—that runs deep and what I've mentioned is just food, or should I say drink, for thought.

This other week's farcical political sideshow was the dreaded flag referendum. Apologists for the referendum often suggest the $26 million spend is a drop in the bucket; welfare costs billions. Never mind that gutting the modern welfare state would be turning back the clock to the social Darwinism of Victorian Britain. However, Key was unequivocal in his reluctance to spend $9 million on the citizens' initiated referendum on the partial sale of important public assets. I'm sure the Taxpayer's Union had a collective moan at the money spent on the referendum whose result was arrogantly ignored. You'd think a referendum initiated by the people would set a democratic percent and warrant somewhat more budget attention. But this shinning example of direct democracy didn't suit the ideologically blindfolded agenda of a cynical and fundamentally anti-democratic government. Again, a relationship of convenience. Apologists will chime that this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to have a collective say in the future of our nation. But this horribly misses the mark. There was largely collective disgust or apathy when selection panel released its top forty flag choice, which was repeated again more vehemently with this week's release of the final four. It's quite clearly a politically motivated distraction and carefully planned money waster when the Prime Minister's pet flag appears in the top four. It might to interesting to follow any ties Kyle Lockwood has to the National Party and the Prime Minister. Again, the Rugby-Industrial Complex rears its head again when three of the four final designs feature the silver fern. Which is why I find it so perplexing that the NZRU is threatening legal action regarding the silver fern. Perhaps there will be some golden handshake for the boys at the NZRU courtesy of the tax payers. The National Government is not exactly averse to hook-ups for the boys.

As John Oliver has shown, the entire process has descended into internationally embarrassing farcical levels. Given most public opinion polls, people don't want this political pet project shoved down their throats. But no, the fruitcake-of-a sideshow must go on because it's democratic. Also, how exactly is having a say in the primary symbolic representation of our nation having a say in its future? It's akin to spending more time worrying about what colour tie to wear at a job interview than rehearsing answers to questions one might be potentially asked. One is quite clearly more relevant to your future economic outcomes than the other. We can have a politically sanctioned say in jingoistic semiotics, but how dare we have a say in the fundamental structures of political economy. It's the scraps of democracy left over for the masses from meal of the political and economic elites.

Finally, I move on to this week's equally farcical, but tragic event: the unfolding humanitarian crisis in Europe and the Middle East, and the New Zealand Government's morally vacuous response to it. They haven't lost their moral compass, no, they just threw it on the ground and stomped on it. There is a vicious hypocrisy appearing when earlier this year Key verbally insulted Andrew Little's carefully considered stance on sending New Zealand troops to Iraq by telling him to "get some guts". Despite our pittance contribution that could very well be ineffectual given the massive corruption in the Iraqi military and the surrender-inducing tactics of ISIL, Key insisted it was our moral duty, which was later revised to the payment for being part of the club—the FVEY alliance. How can we have this sycophantic behaviour but turn a blind eye to the other, inconvenience of the war—refugees? But the rugby mentality runs deep: it is more righteous to go to war, fight, and die than deal with the consequences. I can understand the response to criticism of such a woeful quota. Taking refugees does require money and infrastructure. But surely the quota could be doubled all for the cost of a flag-referendum? It is almost soul crushing nihilism that this government will rush to support legislation to extend public drinking hours for the Rugby-Industrial Complex but will not rush to support legislation for our moral duty to humanity. The same could be said for the $11 million paid to a disgruntled Saudi businessman; the same theocratic kingdom that has carried out hundreds of brutal public executions this year alone. There is some something horribly askew when we can throw money away at some quixotic sheep-deal in a nation that is not discernibly different from ISIL. The National Government had the audacity to claim that although they disagree with their human rights record, the Saudi judicial system is legislatively sanctioned and therefore legitimate. This is possibly one the most weakly ignorant arguments to grovel to a nation whose judicial system is medieval. The Third Reich in Germany from 1933 to 1945 was legislatively sanctioned as was the Final Solution at the Wansee Conference in 1942. The refugees from war-torn Europe were accommodated in New Zealand including our Prime Minister's mother. Imagine if New Zealand had not opened its doors. Also, we are not talking about immigration, we are talking about people fleeing for their lives. Surely when the morality of life or death is involved the initial concern is more pressing and the financial considerations become secondary. But the National Party does not think like this: its moral concerns are subjugated to the market, the primary moral reality. This is most certainly obvious when it comes to workplace health and safety legislation; that horrible red tape that actually stops people losing life and limb is not morally more important than letting the market do its invisible hand thing. As a myriad of commentators have already said, its time this government got some guts.

This is just scratching the surface of the beat-your-head-against-a-wall train wreak that is not just a third term National Government, no this is something truly spectacular, a third term Key government. A government run by ideological obsessive free-market fanatics that paint themselves as politically pragmatic with their Crosby-Textor spin-doctors. But in time the paint wears thin, and eventually the people will see the shoddy woodwork below. The social and culture rhetoric might be centre-right, but the fundamental structures of political economy are on a death-march to the far-right, surely, but slowly, where money talks, and morals walk.

———————————————————————————————————————— "... we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever in peace." —W. M. Hicks.

Campbell Live and its Discontents: The Culture Industry, Repressive Desublimation, and Investigative Journalism in New Zealand

It beggars belief that in a liberal democracy there is such a passive acceptance of the inevitability of Campbell Live’s fate—why is a fundamental cornerstone of democracy being eroded away within a system that purports to actively champion it? I aim to offer a dual explanation for the general demise of rigorous news media under late capitalism by application of Theodore Adorno’s culture industry thesis, as well as Freudian psychoanalysis via Herbert Marcuse’s repressive desublimation thesis. These two theories when applied in tandem shed light on why this has not only willingly occurred by suggesting that it is in capital’s interest to orchestrate such a system, but that we accept this system because it caters for our deepest irrational desire for it.

There has been a plethora of media analysis of the situation Campbell Live is facing, and to trawl through all of them to give a comprehensive picture is beyond the theoretical application of this essay. However, I wish to draw attention to Gordon Campbell’s editorial that highlights the inevitable demise of investigative journalism on broadcast television as an inherent, and dangerous, reality in a market orientated environment. Campbell’s paraphrasing of Oscar Wilde to describe the market telling us the “price of everything and the value of nothing” should be to be considered pertinent rather than a mere quip.[1] Lord Darlington was answering the question: “What is a cynic?”[2] The Oxford English Dictionary defines cynical as:

Believing that people are motivated purely by self-interest … concerned only with one’s own interests and typically disregarding accepted standards in order to achieve them.[3]

Pay particular attention to these definitions in relation to the market—and both Campbell’s application of Wilde to the market, and how this relates to Adorno’s thesis (as well as Marcuse’s). Keep in mind that under capitalism producers and consumers are self-interested. The disjunction between intrinsic and exchange value touches at one of the contradictions of capitalism, both with regards to the aesthetic of culture highlighted by Adorno, as well as, more troublingly, the fundamental principles of democracy. While journalism can be said to have use value in terms of information content for consumers, at a higher level its relationship to maintaining a functioning democracy and distributing knowledge could be considered intrinsic.

                  The original aim of Adorno’s thesis was to show what we would perceive of as artistic culture—film, music, literature, radio, television—is being standardised in such a way as to increase its market value and well as undermine its critical element, all to the benefit of capital.[4] The underlying causal mechanisms that he exposed in doing so can be discerned, explicably, in every facet of late capitalist societies, including journalism. By using a more encompassing definition of culture within Adorno’s theory, investigative journalism (in this case within the context of broadcast television), has also become subject to the same marketability and standardisation that has subsumed artistic culture.^[5] The archetypal measure of success in business is sales volume, and in turn, repetition of the formula of success. The product is worthy only insofar as it can be sold to the largest possible market. It is beyond belief that Television New Zealand’s pseudo-journalistic venture Seven Sharp consistently has substantively higher viewer ratings than Campbell Live, nevertheless, the show has found a formula that guarantees higher advertising revenue than a more qualitative editorial enterprise. The show’s less contentious and predictable content appeals to a larger public and appeases advertisers. It is little wonder then that MediaWorks, Campbell Live’s producers, wishes to replicate this formula for its own commercial imperatives. Profit will always trump any higher value offered by journalism. This fusion of entertainment and information produces a muted critical thinking in its viewers that will feedback into supporting the capitalist media enterprise.

                  Surely within a highly educated society consumers would see this apparatus at face value and demand otherwise? It seems not. In order to understand this we must engage with Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis and Marcuse’s Marxist application of it. Freud suggests our deepest irrational desires for instant pleasurable gratification (the pleasure principle) is regulated by normative rules in our social sphere that we internalise (the reality principle).[6] Freud refers to the process of transformation of these desires into useful activity as sublimation. In addition to claiming civilization is driven by the process of sublimation, Freud argues that art as an end is a principle manifestation of sublimation. Marcuse, however, has suggested that late capitalism has reversed this notion. High culture, he claims, was originally a subversive dimension of society as the result of sublimation. However, the culture industry under late capitalism has flattened out any subversive element that it once had.[7]

While journalism does not explicitly fit the mould of art, and it can nevertheless be considered within high culture, as there is something to be said for the subversive element it can contain, namely, the critique of power. It is the changes in the mode of production under late capitalism that is rendering some forms of television journalism less antagonistic by blurring the distinction between its critical discourse, and trivialised news snippets and puff-piece journalism that satisfies instant gratification. This desublimation in turn generates the market demand that cynically demands this easy-to-digest and less subversive news content that capital, seeking to return a profit, is more than happy to supply.

A common critique of the trivialisation of television media suggests that the sphere of interactive discourse has shifted to the medium of the internet. While somewhat true, the desublimation hypothesis still suggests a required critical thought to actively engage with this sphere; a concerted effort is required to seek out and critically analyse news media and editorialised writing. However, a desublimated consumer will defer this critical thought via various modes of instant gratification: referring to websites of television news media such as TVNZ or 3 News; corporate dominated print media websites such as the New Zealand Herald or Fairfax; social media feeds such as Facebook or Twitter; or in an unfortunately increasing number of consumers, even the need for trivalised journalism is trumped by less critical forms of entertainment of which the internet offers an almost bottomless pit of. Any engagement with news media is still taken at face value uncritically, whether in agreement or not, instant gratification is satisfied and the matter is seldom engaged further than satisfactorily necessary.

Both Adorno and Marcuse had something important to say in the critique of late capitalism, and no doubt features of their theory are seen not just in artistic culture, but all culture. 'I don't want to think; I want to feel' is the epitome of the consumer under late capitalism. What Adorno and Marcuse have shown us is that the passive acceptance of this system, because of capital's manipulation of it, is destroying the 'think' supplied by investigative journalism, and exacerbating the 'feel' supplied by predictable and formulaic infotainment. The market becomes the measure of everything and offers the (intrinsic) value of nothing. We have become astonishingly self-interested and cynical as a consequence.

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[1] Gordon Campbell, "Gordon Campbell on the Demise of Campbell Live," Scoop Media, last modified April 10, 2015, http://gordoncampbell.scoop.co.nz/2015/04/10/gordon-campbell-on-the-demise-of-campbell-live/.

[2] Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan (Cambridge: ProQuest LLC, 1996), 95.

[3] Oxford Dictionary of English, Third Edition, 2013, s.v. “cynical”.

[4] Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, trans. John Cumming (London: Verso, 2010), 120-167.

[5] Precise definitions of culture are numerous and debatable, and vary between sociological and anthropological disciplines. I intend to utilise Ian Buchanan’s definition of culture as a “set of beliefs, practices, rituals, and traditions shared by a group of people”, which within a democratic society would include journalism as valued for its contribution to political accountability. Oxford Dictionary of Critical Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), s.v. “culture”.

[6] Sigmund Freud, Civilization and its Discontents, trans. David McLintock (London: Penguin, 2004), 16-20.

[7] Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society (London: Routledge, 2002), 59-86.

———————————————————————————————————————— "... we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever in peace." —W. M. Hicks.

Quote of the Week: Oscar Wilde

"Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man's original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion."

—Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism,  1891.

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"... we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever in peace." —W. M. Hicks.

“We must name that system”Tracking the revolutionary rhetoric of the American New Left

“All men recognize the right of revolution; that is, the right to refuse allegiance to, and to resist, the government, when its tyranny or its inefficiency are great and unendurable.”

Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience, 1849.[1]

“This nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address, November 19th, 1863.[2]

In just over two minutes amidst one of the darkest periods of American history, Abraham Lincoln succinctly outlined the guiding principles of modern democracy. Many have struggled to reach this utopian vision of government and it is a struggle that was to be repeated a century after Lincoln’s address by an emerging intellectual movement that put all people at the centre of their political framework—a movement that came to be labeled the New Left. Radical 1960s political idealism is often characterised by the New Left, but Van Gosse has argued that it is ineffective to view the trajectory of the New Left movement within the explicit confines of the 1960s but “acknowledge that the New Left began earlier and lasted longer than a focus on the Kennedy and Johnson years will permit”.[3] In order to broadly understand New Left radicalism of the 1960s an examination of each individual movement is necessary, as Gosse argues, “in terms of its own inner development, which a best reproduces the enormously diverse and plural character of the New Left”.[4] Gosse’s argument for a methodology for understanding the New Left certainly carries weight; however, a comprehensive historiographical analysis of the multi-faceted nature of the New Left is beyond the scope of this essay. This essay will focus primarily on the politicisation of college students within the New Left and their shift in strategy and rhetoric. The New Left movement, although rooted in intellectual origins (among other factors to be discussed) that suggested young college students were the new revolutionary class to overthrow capitalism, at the beginning of the 1960s did not appear overtly revolutionary, but rather reformist from a community focused perspective. However, because of the movement's rejection of a hierarchical political methodology, its quixotic aims, and failure to gain widespread popularity outside the student populous, combined with the intensification of opposition to the Vietnam War, the momentum of Civil Rights movement, and the failure of the Federal Government to respond to criticism (aside from violent suppression), the New Left movement took on a more revolutionary disposition. The growing membership of various New Left movements could not be systematically organised without a rigorous and coordinated structure, and as a consequence the movement split into factions—each with its own tactics and ends without any popular support.

The guise of the New Left in the United States in the wake of World War II and the McCarthyism of the 1950s served to offer a neo-Marxist critique of American society. This was in contrast to methodology and rhetoric of Old Left criticism, which believed that the working class was the primary impetus for socialist revolutionary change. Academics of the Old Left had succumbed or acquiesced to American liberalism; their effectiveness reduced by the storm of anti-communist purges of the Red Scare.[5] Amidst the height of Cold War tensions younger radicals were averse to the centralisation, authoritarianism, and bureaucracy of Soviet socialism. Irwin Unger has argued that the conformity and banality of 1950s America—in contrast to the economic upheavals and war of previous decades—was a recipe for an estranged youth.[6] Although post-war "American society produced material abundance, it also produced alienation, especially among its youth".[7]