- Position‹2 of 2
- Keir Starmer will make a better Prime Minister
The last few years have seen identity politics - around race, gender and religion - explode across the British political scene, stoked by Johnson. Starmer is a unifying figure whose politics focus on economics, injustice and social inclusion.
The argument
Supporters who preferred Keir Starmer to Boris Johnson argued that he would steer politics away from divisive identity politics and back towards the universal, material concerns that they believed should be at its centre. On this view, the politics of recent years had become increasingly preoccupied with questions of group identity, and proponents contended that this had fragmented the electorate, alienated traditional voters and distracted from the bread-and-butter issues — jobs, wages, healthcare, housing, public services — that affect everyone regardless of identity. They argued that Starmer was temperamentally and intellectually suited to refocus politics on those common, class-based concerns. Proponents pointed to Starmer's emphasis on competence, seriousness and a broad national appeal, and to his stated determination to make Labour once again a party that could speak to the whole country rather than a coalition of particular groups. They argued that his forensic, evidence-led approach favoured policy substance over symbolic culture-war battles, and that a leader who concentrated on universal economic and social goods could rebuild a wide coalition and lower the temperature of identity-driven division. In their framing, this was a return to a politics of solidarity around shared material interests. From this standpoint, a prime minister who could move beyond the politics of identity towards what unites people would govern a fractured country more effectively and command broader support than one who thrived on division. Reorienting politics towards common ground, proponents argued, was both better for the country and a route back to power for the centre-left. Because Keir Starmer would move politics beyond divisive identity politics towards universal concerns, this argument holds, he would make the better prime minister.
Premises
Counter-arguments
Supporters of Boris Johnson, and critics of this argument, question both its premise and its prediction. The claim that a focus on group identity is merely a distraction from 'real' material concerns is itself contested: many argue that inequalities tied to race, sex and other identities are material questions, so 'moving beyond identity politics' can amount to setting aside the grievances of particular groups rather than transcending division. They also dispute that Starmer would deliver the promised shift — critics on both left and right accused him of engaging in exactly the identity-focused politics the argument says he would abandon, making the prediction more aspiration than fact. And the framing rests on a false choice: a leader can address class-based economic issues and identity-based inequalities at once. On this view the argument credits Starmer with a virtue that is neither clearly desirable nor clearly his.
Rejecting the premises
[Rejecting P1] Critics deny that attention to identity merely fragments the electorate; they argue identity-linked inequalities are themselves material concerns, not a distraction from them. [Rejecting P2] Whether Starmer's approach actually favours substance over 'culture-war' symbolism is disputed, with critics accusing him of the same identity-focused politics the argument says he rejects. [Rejecting P3] The premise assumes a trade-off between universal and identity concerns, but a government can pursue both, so refocusing on one need not require abandoning the other.