THE PROMISE OF CENTRISM IN A POLARIZED WORLD / PROJECT SYNDICATE

The Promise of Centrism in a Polarized World

A centrist politics of hope infused with empathy and pragmatism would represent a dramatic break from the current direction of global politics. It is our best alternative to the politics of fear and alienation being peddled by contemporary populists.

Andrés Velasco, Yair Zivan

LONDON – Confronted with populists of the right and left in a year when countries accounting for roughly half the global population will hold elections, centrist politicians are very much on the defensive. 

Can they mount a comeback? 

Can centrism offer coherent answers to the variety and complexity of challenges around the world? 

Is there a brand of political centrism that works in Latin America and North America, in Europe and Asia, and in Africa and in Australia?

Centrism consists of an unflinching commitment to certain core values: individual rights, liberal democracy, cultural pluralism, and equality of opportunity. 

These fundamental principles have connected centrist thinkers and leaders everywhere for at least 40 years – from the “Third Way” of former US President Bill Clinton and former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair to contemporary centrists like French President Emmanuel Macron and former Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid.

Some of the most urgent political challenges the world faces are shared – among them extreme ideological polarization and the rise of populism. 

Other problems are dominated by domestic political considerations but also reflect global themes.

How, for example, do we balance the vast benefits of international trade and the deleterious impact it can have on certain local communities? 

How do we guarantee security while scrupulously maintaining personal freedoms? 

How do we capitalize on the boundless potential of technological innovation while protecting populations from its unwanted side effects? 

How do we ensure innovation and entrepreneurship can thrive while ensuring that the poorest are not left behind? 

By applying the principles of progressive liberalism, the political center can provide distinct answers to each of these policy challenges.

Centrists rightly believe that the complex challenges we face require complex solutions, that moderation is a virtue, and that compromise is not a vice. 

Yet centrism cannot succeed as simply a reasonable midpoint between the two extremes of an illiberal populist left and an illiberal populist right. 

Instead, centrism must offer its own political approach which, if suitably articulated, will force other political actors to define themselves in response.

On their own, principles and policy proposals are not enough. 

If governing is often the art of the possible, then politics is first of all the art of winning. 

For centrists to win the hearts and minds of the broader public, they must connect with the strong sense of identity and the genuine anxieties of the voters they seek to represent.

Populists thrive on the exploitation of fear and on the division of society. 

Understanding the tribal nature of humanity, they promise a sense of belonging to an in-group (the people or the nation), which is defined by its opposition to some real or imagined out-group (the elite, immigrants, foreigners, the other). 

Populism is always a kind of identity politics: Us versus Them.

This manipulation of identity for political gain is dangerous. 

But so is the denial that voters’ fears have deep and genuine causes. 

A sense of national and communal identity is a core part of most people’s sense of themselves. 

The decline of left-behind towns in the American Midwest or the North of England threatens that sense of belonging. 

The feeling that mass immigration threatens local identities is also understandable, as is the concern that rapid technological change will destroy jobs and hollow out the middle class.

Centrists must show they understand where those fears come from. 

Voters trust only those politicians with whom they can identify and, better still, who can identify with voters’ anxieties.

A serious national conversation about the pros and cons of immigration can begin only after politicians have earned the trust of voters. 

With luck, a migration policy will then emerge that prevents human trafficking, provides asylum for those genuinely in need, and captures the benefits of immigrants’ skills.

The same is true of employment. 

Long-held jobs provide a sense of identity and links to the local community. 

Workers will agree to move away from a declining industry only if they trust the government to provide the kind of quality reskilling that leads to decent, well-paying jobs. 

It is not a coincidence that active labor-market policies, which combine contractual flexibility, generous unemployment insurance, and ambitious retraining, first emerged in high-trust Scandinavian countries.

And think of the mother of all policy challenges: global warming. 

Combating climate change requires citizens to accept a cost today (for example, a higher price for diesel and other fossil fuels) in exchange for a benefit (a cooler planet) in the distant future. 

Agreeing to such a deal requires abundant doses of mutual trust between politicians and voters.

Where populists peddle fear, centrists must offer hope. 

Humanity has shown again and again that it can tackle complex problems and overcome adversity. 

A politics of hope infused with empathy and pragmatism would represent a dramatic break from the current direction of global politics. It is our best alternative. 

And centrists are the ones who can make it happen.

Andrés Velasco, a former finance minister of Chile, is Dean of the School of Public Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Yair Zivan, a foreign policy adviser to former Israeli Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid, is the editor of The Centre Must Hold: Why Centrism Is the Answer to Extremism and Polarisation (Elliott & Thompson, 2024).