Chris Bowen (2)

Every time I read one of these Little Books on Big Ideas (now rebadged as the On Series, by Hachette who seem to have taken over the series from Melbourne University Press), I want to read the whole lot. There's currently 35 of them listed at Dymocks and so far I've only read:

• rel="nofollow" target="_top">On Beauty, by Susan Johnson


• On Experience, by David Malouf.


• On Fairness, by Sally McManus


• On Father, by John Birmingham


• On Identity, by Stan Grant


• On Patriotism, by Paul Daley


• On Rape, by Germaine Greer

On Charlatans could be a (much, much shorter) companion volume for The Lonely Century, by Noreena Hertz because it explores the same phenomenon of people voting against their own best interests. If you subscribe to the view that progressive parties tend to be on the side of working people while conservative parties tend to look after The Big End of Town, then you will accept ALP MP Chris Bowen's starting point:

It has become the central question of modern social democracy: why have working-class communities become less supportive of our cause? Our sister parties around the world are grappling with the same question. The social-democratic project can recover but social democrats have to face up to why populist charlatans are succeeding and what we have to do to regain the initiative in rebuilding trust between urban, suburban and regional Labor communities. (p.6)

Bowen's diagnosis is perhaps a bit simplistic but the format of this series means this is not a book that attempts to unpack all the complex reasons for an election loss. He argues that battlers and people being left behind in the economy were convinced by charlatans who claimed to have the answers, when actually they had a false product. He writes that political charlatans—right-wing populists— are willing and able to tell people who are struggling that they have the solutions. Actually, their policies make those same workers worse off. These people are not only disrupting politics, they are disrupting their own parties, as we can see in America and elsewhere.

Right-wing parties have been taken over by effective politicians who make a virtue of being 'non-politicians'. This is part of the contrivance. Baseball caps, ruffled hair and a false bonhomie are deployed in various guises by millionaires and professional political operatives to present the picture that they are somehow new, different to the political class and in touch with the working class. They have constructed a narrative that they have better solutions to improve the lot of ordinary people who have been buffeted by stagnant wages growth and growing inequality. (p.17)

Bowen identifies four key tactics of the charlatans...

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2021/05/21/on-charlatans-by-chris-bowen/… (meer)