This is Only the Beginning: The Making of a New Left, From Anti-Austerity to the Fall of Corbyn

by Michael Chessum

The 2010s were a decade of foodbanks, riots, and the rebirth of political alternatives. Looking to escape a future of rising debt, falling living standards and climate meltdown, a set of movements were born across the globe, led by students, workers and the tent cities of Occupy.
A new wave of optimistic, radical young people were building mass movements outside the political bubble, rejecting the neo-liberal consensus and the enrichment of the 1%, and laying the foundations of a new left. Eight years later, Bernie Sanders was favorite to clinch the Democratic Party nomination, and Jeremy Corbyn and Momentum had taken over the Labour Party in Britain, promising 'a new kind of politics'.
But as the new left poured into Labour, it was overwhelmed by older, institutional forces on both left and right. Four years after Corbyn became leader, after bitter-infighting and a Brexit-fuelled strategic crisis, it all fell apart.
This is the inside story of how the left came back to life in the 2010s, from a man who found himself at the centre of events - featuring unparalleled access and a range of interviews with key left-wing figures. Influential journalist and activist Michael Chessum explains how this movement was built, why it failed, and what it needs to do now.

Genres: Politics, Nonfiction

248 pages, Hardcover

Published October 6, 2022

Reviews

[Kate Page · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is readable and interesting, another useful contribution to the post Corbynism debate. It’s left me with plenty to think about and discuss. It was really interesting to read something from the perspective of an activist, and a reminder of the significance of 2010 movements.
I had some disagreements with his analysis, although often we’d have ended up in quite similar places about what to actually do.

[Dan Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book really interesting, particularly his sharp and damning analysis of austerity at the beginning of chapter 3.

Chessum argues that the success of the Corbyn project is down to its support from grassroots social activists and organisations, and its failure stems from the bureaucracy of the Labour Party ultimately silencing them. The Leader's Office turned away from democratic organisation in favour of slick and bureaucratic efficiency, exacerbating internal divisions and causing a lack of clear policy line.

Corbyn was a huge part of my formative political years, but I knew relatively little about the project and its disintegration in 2019. This book was really useful for filling gaps in my knowledge, and its insights and interviews were really illuminating. However, it is the first book that I have read on the Corbyn project, so cannot speak for its wider utility/how it compares to other texts on it.

[Tom Harris · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was (very peripherally) involved as an activist in most of the stuff recounted in this book. I found it oddly transfixing to read a well-written 'first-draft-of-history' account of things I actually remember. Even more jolting is to be reminded of fairly significant events I'd completely forgotten!

The book is written from the perspective of a grassroots activist, rather than an MP or party grandee. It roots Corbynism in the student and labour movement ferment of 2010-11, and the wave of revulsion with austerity politics that manifested itself around the world in the early '00s.

It does not focus much on the cloak-and-dagger politicking in the Parliamentary party (such accounts are available in almost tedious detail elsewhere). Nor does it spend much time on the enormous challenges faced by the left-wing leadership in the face of an overwhelmingly hostile media.

Instead, Chessum analyses how a socially significant mass of people were cohered by their opposition to austerity around a new left-wing politics, how that mood was channelled into a freakishly unexpected challenge for the Labour leadership, and how that movement was then strangled and deformed.

In my view, Chessum is at his strongest when describing how the potential for a durable, democratic and grassroots socialist organisation were squandered. His account of how membership democracy in Momentum was brazenly shut down is shocking to read, and he has performed a real service in committing it to the record in accessible and cogent form.

He does well, too, in linking the stultifying bureaucratism that overtook Corbynism, to the strategic incompetence which lead the project to wreck itself on the rocks of Brexit. By gutting the nascent democratic structures of the movement, and by bending over backwards to squash any proper debate over Brexit strategy at Party conference, the leadership created a culture in which it was impossible for the Party as a whole to thrash out a coherent and inclusive position. Instead, we got deliberate ambiguity for years, followed by a series of sudden and erratic turns. It is no surprise at all that such an approach failed to convince the British public.

There are areas I would have liked to hear more about. The deeply damaging antisemitism scandal is only briefly alluded to, for example. I also feel Chessum's conclusion could have done with some expanding, too. He says that Labour will ultimately need to split - but does that mean socialists should continue to participate within it? Or hammer it from the outside? He doesn't tell us.

Nevertheless, a great read that I can anticipate being very useful to future historians of the British left.

[Darran Mclaughlin · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have read a few books about the rise and fall of Corbyn and the explosion of the British Left over the past few years, and this is a good one. Michael and I were in opposing camps on the question of a second Brexit referendum, but nonetheless I tend to agree with most of his analysis here after several years working in the same trenches as him. I think this book is very useful for situating Corbynism in the context of what was happening at the grass roots, which tends to get lost in some of the accounts that focus more on internal Labour Party politics and court history. He makes a convincing argument through examining the situation in a bottom up approach.

[Grant · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting read about one man’s journey through Labours near resurgence, occupy protests and anti-austerity work. Chessum offers a pretty narrow view at times and doesn’t cover much into the media side of Corbyn’s character assassination but he does at least give a solid history of the internal running of Labour over the past 20 odd years.