Chums: How a Tiny Caste of Oxford Tories Took Over the UK by Simon Kuper
I guess that when this book was published in 2022 the country had already begun to understand that this Tory government was the King’s New Clothes. Now that the country doesn’t seem to be paying much attention to them and is waiting for the opportunity to kick them out of office, this book ought to feel less urgent. After all, we now know about the partying and incompetence at the heart of government during Covid, which we had all suspected; we’re also aware that Brexit has damaged the country, and those who pushed its cause have either fled the scene blaming others or are blithely protected from its consequences; and despite all the world class claims by our leaders and willingness to assert Britain’s continuing greatness and exceptionalism, we can see that nothing seems to be working properly in our day to day lives.
Despite this bucketload of … harsh reality, this book still left me raging with anger. As a reasonably educated person, I thought I had a good grasp of the insidious effect of the narrow tranche of Oxford educated, mainly public school boys, who still constitute the establishment. I was wrong. Kuper’s book forensically, albeit with good anecdotes, lays bare all the networks of influence and inherent weaknesses of this privileged group that have so damaged this country over decades, but most pointedly in the last thirteen years. I can feel my blood boiling even as I contemplate the way he opened my eyes to the great con that has been perpetrated by this group in plain sight.
Let’s begin with the con that pretends this is all about excellence. Now, of course, anyone involved in education knows that the smaller class sizes and individual tuition that private education buys are the first steps to academic achievement; and when this is allied to the wonderful surroundings and facilities that boost the self-esteem of private school pupils as well as the prevalence of a rich, cultural capital (books, trips to museums and theatres) in their families, then it is no surprise that the Eton alumni have dominated the Oxford colleges. However, our ruling class leave nothing to chance. There are still the donations and bequests to school and college that ease the way for those born to rule. Toby Young has written a rather sniffy review of this book labelling such criticisms of the system as one sided. Well, he would, wouldn’t he? After all, as Kuper reveals, when Toby didn’t do as well at A level as expected or required, his dad made a few phone calls to an Oxford college and he was in. The irony is, of course, that his father Michael Young, sociologist, politician and member of the post war establishment, coined the term “meritocracy”.
And that’s where this book gets interesting. You see, with the in-built deference of my class, I thought that despite my political differences with Cameron, Gove, Cummings, Osborne, Hunt and the many other Tory ministers and advisers who’ve dominated political life this century, they were, nevertheless, intelligent, committed and thoughtful people – the talent at the top of our system. Turns out that Boris Johnson, dishonesty and low morals aside, is not an aberration. Shallow understanding of the massive issues of government is the default setting. Short term strategy and persuasive rhetoric are prized above deep thinking and a willingness to embrace complexity. As Kuper carefully and clearly explains PPE and the importance of the Debating Union underpin the caste’s approach to government. Talking and writing entertainingly, with style, in order to win the day were the key outcomes from such an education for this group; little knowledge of the cause under discussion was no impediment to these future political leaders.
We are all aware that there are networks that operate in all sectors of society. You will, however, be overwhelmed and surprised by quite how extensively this particular network has managed to secure so many of the key positions of influence in this country. Yes, this has always been the case historically – MacMillan’s government was crammed with his fellow school and university chums. That was sixty years ago, though, and we expect to live in a country nowadays where diversity and merit are prized - and this should mean a resulting diminution of leaders who were born to rule. Sadly, though, the situation is even worse nowadays. And for balance’s sake, I ought to point out that Labour has lost a tranche of trade unionists who once filled the ranks of their MPs.
It is Rory Stewart in his excellent memoir ‘Politics on the Edge’ who highlights the consequences and problem with this situation. He describes meeting with Cameron, who had invited him to discuss his experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was bad enough that Cameron felt he knew more about the topic than Stewart because he had read books about the topic – there’s that arrogant, shallow PPE attitude in action. However, what most struck Stewart as someone who was a product of the same educational route as Cameron, was that Cameron’s four political advisors in the room were people who had been at Eton with the prime minister. The austerity strategy his government followed during the coalition was out of step with most other western governments whose countries bounced back more quickly than the UK after the financial crisis in 2008; and social inequality has increased significantly in this country since then. It seems fair to say that the key people in the room making these decisions might have paused for thought about the public sector cuts that austerity brought if they had been drawn from a wider circle.
Kuper also makes the excellent point that even the MacMillan cabinet and other governments from times of greater class division could call on their experiences in the world wars. Military service and involvement in the war effort not only brought them into contact with people from different backgrounds but also gave them a political purpose to avoid future conflicts. This meant trying to create a better world where the catalysts for such conflicts – nationalism, societal divisions, unemployment and the evils set out in the Beveridge Report - were constantly being addressed.
The post-Thatcher Oxford Tories had no such vision or cause. As Kuper explains: in the calm of a post -cold war world with relative prosperity, the chums were on the lookout for a cause. Unfortunately, the group who have mainly governed the country since then settled on the vision of a swashbuckling Britain reaffirming some form of imperial greatness. Inevitably this appealed to the chums’ innate ability to build emotive rhetoric around concepts of sovereignty and freedom, powerful words that can mean whatever you want them to mean. And equally inevitably, for some key members of the group, this meant Brexit and some cockeyed notion of independence minus the details. Oh, and as regards Cameron and Boris there was the opportunity for rivalries from their school and university days to be reignited – bugger the good of the country. Or rather, what they thought was best must be the best for the country – after all, their birthright was to be the natural, national leaders. As Cameron explained when asked why he wanted to be prime minister, he thought he’d be good at it.
I could go on pulling from the book numerous outrageous examples of this group’s privileges and incompetence rooted in the particular education they received. I want to finish on a more positive note by pointing out that, during the same period when this narrow caste took over the country, real world class experts were being produced via this academic route. They, generally, kept their heads down, avoided the debating and political societies and got on with their work. Yes, some came from Eton but many others came from less fashionable schools, public or state. These were the scientists, engineers, medical scientists, social scientists and other experts from a range of fields who developed the vaccine, for example, and daily keep things ticking over in this country despite the worst efforts of the chums.