Cameron Chameleon and the Current State of Britain's ‘Consensus’

Abstract

David Cameron's election as leader of the Conservative Party has already made a significant impact upon the electoral dynamics between the three major parties in Britain. Whilst the new leader has made serious attempts to redefine his party's policy and ideological stance on a number of issues, Cameron has also been hailed, particularly by key sections of the media, as a serious contender for No. 10. As such, Cameron's leadership of the Conservatives is likely to provoke a significant degree of academic speculation about his impact, both on the Conservative Party and the wider contemporary political context in Britain. In light of this, the purpose of this article is to attempt to address both of these questions. The article begins with a brief examination of Cameron's first few months as leader of the opposition and the impact this has had upon both Conservative Party policy and ideology. This is followed by a discussion of the likely impact Cameron's leadership may have upon the relationship between the two main parties through a critique of theories of ‘consensus’. The article attempts to anticipate a likely desire amongst academics to place Cameron's transformation of the Conservatives in the context of an ongoing party consensus between Labour and the Conservatives. Whilst this part of the article is, to some extent, speculative, I will argue that there are a number of precedents to suggest that the application of a consensus theory to explain the current relationship between Labour and the Conservatives is likely to be tempting to several authors. Overall, I attempt to argue that such a view only serves to hamper, rather than help our understanding of the contemporary political scene.