Introduction: modernity and tradition

When New Labour swept to power in May 1997 it was on a manifesto that had little to say about rural areas or rural policy. The countryside was acknowledged as “a great natural asset, a part of our heritage which calls for special stewardship”, but balanced with the “needs of people who live and work in rural areas” (Labour Party, 1997, pp 4 and 30). In contrast to Labour manifestos of old, there were no grand plans for land nationalisation, agricultural tenancy reform or investment in public services infrastructure. The proposals to establish a ‘right to roam’ across open country and to hold a free vote on outlawing hunting with hounds attracted much attention, but they did not amount to a rural policy and were redolent more of ‘old’ Labour rather than New.

The manifesto's mantra of ‘modernisation’ signalled the break with the past – but the focus was on the welfare state and the constitution. Having modernised the Labour Party, the manifesto promised “we will modernise Britain” (Labour Party, 1997, p 5). The process of modernisation had started with the reorientation of the Labour Party itself. Philip Gould, the Blairite pollster, had diagnosed the failings of old Labour as being “too rooted in trade unionism; too obsessive about public ownership; too tied to myth; too rooted in its past” (Gould, 1998, p 24). Instead, the manifesto promised a programme for “a new centre and centre-left politics” characterised by an approach “that differs both from the solutions of the old left and those of the Conservative right” (Labour Party, 1997, p 3).

The meaning of modernisation

If one word captured the essence of New Labour's ambitions in 1997 it was ‘modernisation’. The word littered the general election manifesto and was deployed widely in Tony Blair's speeches (Fairclough, 2000, p 19). The meaning of modernisation is a source of rich debate. Is it simply the adoption of Thatcherism by the Labour Party, the continuation of the social democratic Gaitskellism of the 1950s and 1960s, or simply a superficial sheen to cover mere pragmatism and lack of ideology? Finlayson (2003, p 67) argues that to understand the meaning of modernisation, the term has to be considered from three angles: its rhetorical function, its concrete reference, and its use as a strategy of governance.