Every generation develops its own New Left. This is a natural process as proponents struggle to come to grips with new challenges and old failures.

The current generation is reinventing the left, but the process is still in its early phase. We find promising hints of a new approach in the ‘anti-globalization’ and Occupy movements, Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain, the experiments in mitigating extreme inequality via moderate social democracy (Brazil, Uruguay and Chile) and left populism (the Chávez era in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador), and recent attempts to turn ossified party systems to progressive ends (Jeremy Corbyn in Britain and Bernie Sanders in the US). Worsening problems of out-of-control markets, climate change, fragile states and massive migrations impel the search for viable democratic approaches.

Although a uniform strategy on the left is unlikely – and inadvisable in light of diverse circumstances – certain common principles will define a new left. An innovative and successful left needs to find answers to four complex issues.

What is the Vision?

An inspiring vision of a potentially feasible Good Society is critical in mobilizing support for the new movements. In the 19th and 20th centuries, utopia was visualized in largely economic and statist terms: relying heavily on state structures to rectify the ills of capitalism and build prosperity and security for the underlying classes. Is this program sufficient today? Is this ‘productivist’ approach compatible with limiting carbon emissions in this age of climate change? And what of post-materialist goals, such as gender parity, gay rights and indigenous rights? Should they not also be critical in any vision of progress? Building a coherent vision is challenging when a variety of disparate issues vie for attention.

What is the Role of Social Movements?

Twentieth-century strategies, whether revolutionary or reformist, envisaged a paternalistic state providing benefits to aggrieved groups, with the party acting as a prod or a controller of the benevolent state. This top-down scenario characterized the communist systems and other socialisms, but it is also applied to European social democracies. But the hierarchical and paternalistic model failed, most spectacularly in the communist world. It also proved unviable in the social-democratic universe, when Thatcherism and Reaganism (and Pinochetism earlier on) routed statist approaches with an appeals to free markets.

Today, the hierarchical and paternalistic model should not, be resurrected. So where does that leave us? Certainly, with a far more participatory approach to governance. Does that mean we should give precedence to grassroots social movements, rather than to party politics? Not necessarily, since electoral politics remains central to gaining power. In devising a new balance between social movements and progressive parties, there is much to be learned from the global south. Cases such as Bolivia, Brazil and Kerala have a lot to teach us about achieving (and failing to achieve) a propitious balance between mobilized social movements, on the one hand, and, on the other, progressive parties that must balance other interests to survive and make progress.

 What is the Constituency of the Left?

To bring about wide-ranging change requires the enthusiastic support of a majority of electorates – since I am discussing the democratic left. Who will belong to this coalition? The working class was the default answer in the late 19th and early and mid-20th centuries. But the shrinking size of the proletariat in the West, combined with its increasing casualization, the waning influence of trade unions and the attractions of right-wing populism to the working class, has undermined this electoral strategy. Even in the countries of the global south with significant industrialization, such as China, Brazil and South Africa, the working class remains small, fragmented and frequently subject to state tutelage.

Thus, leftist parties everywhere have made appeals to the amorphous middle class(es). This strategy has major leverage where many in the middle classes are heavily indebted and survive on precarious employment or stagnant wages’ or crave attention to post-materialist issues. However, it is likely that middle-class supporters will have a limited view of what needs to be done: supporting the establishment of a generous welfare state and social protections, but leery of policies bringing private property into question. In short, the middle class may be a fickle partner of the left. Who actually comprises the middle class(es) and where the interests of the various segments lie are questions deserving close consideration.

What about Levels Other Than the National?

To this point, the focus of progressives has been the national level. This approach made sense during the period of the Keynesian consensus (roughly 1946-1976). Economies then were largely national in scope. But the globalization of markets has wrought major changes. Now, many important decisions impacting national populations are taken at the international level (and regional level too, in the case of the EU). So a new left must concentrate also on effecting change at the international (and sometimes regional) level as well. What precisely is the international order the left seeks to forge, and how will this program be achieved? Or do we intend instead to resurrect the centrality of the national level by recourse to nationalistic and protectionist policies? Many of us oppose the latter alternative, in light of the interconnectedness of problems, the importance of developing cosmopolitan identities, and the advent of globally-connecting communications, information-processing and transport technologies.

Surely, the issue of levels of action also must include the local. The left may be able to make progress at the municipal level when it is blocked at higher levels. By winning elections at the local level, progressive parties can demonstrate their capacity for effective, honest and fair administration and experiment in participatory schemes, such as participatory budgeting. This was the approach taken by leftist parties in Brazil and Uruguay, for example, with good effect.

In sum, the forging of a new left in the complex circumstances of the 21st century opens up a broad agenda. We anticipate many lively debates ahead. But the glaring inadequacies of neoliberalism and the deadly onset of climate change signal that decisive action cannot be long delayed.