‘A different species’: the British Labour Party and the Militant ‘other’, 1979-1983

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article assesses the efforts that were made within the British Labour Party to isolate and exclude the Militant Tendency, a Trotskyite entryist group, during the period 1979 to 1983. It argues that the battle over whether or not Militant should be expelled from Labour was, primarily, a battle of metaphor and semantics. More specifically, it suggests that these years witnessed the successful construction of Militant as Labour’s unwanted and malignant ‘other’. Five central discursive motifs (medical, subhumanal, emotional, ideological, and historical) for ‘othering’ are identified. These motifs were operationalised in a systematic and sustained manner by individuals and groups who were hostile to Militant, such as the Labour Solidarity Campaign. Over time, Labour leader Michael Foot, who had, initially, been reluctant to take action against Militant, also adopted the language of this active and purposive rhetorical strategy. In response, Militant’s main counter-discursive strategy, the ‘witch hunt’ narrative, failed to shape party opinion decisively and prevent the initiation of exclusionary processes. By 1983, the pattern of interrelated discursive motifs for ‘othering’ that would be applied to Militant throughout the decade had been established: a hegemonic narrative, concerning the tendency’s imminent ‘threat’ to Labour, had permeated all levels of the party.