Kinnock Reconstruction With The Labour Party (1983-1992)

The years from 1979 to 1983 witnessed one of the most turbulent periods in the history of the British Labour Party, which was confronted with a triple crisis: ideological decomposition, a breakdown of governance and electoral disintegration. At this historically vital moment, Kinnock, becoming the leader of the Labour Party in October 1983, took on the responsibility of rejuvenating the Party.The first dedicated step taken by Kinnock was to reorganize as well as to modernize the Labour Party. Fighting with great efforts against the resistance to the reforms, he built the Mid-Left coalition. With the coalition as a foundation, and with gradual restructuring measures, he restored the control over the whole Party by its high level officials, extended democracy within the Party, and readjusted the relations between the Labour Party and the Trade Union. Thus, the Labour Party was transformed, which was a key step toward its rejuvenation, from an old party with the leader commanding no authority, the Party members enjoying no democracy, and sub-parties running against one another to a new one full of fighting edge, and cherishing smooth functioning in its organizational affairs.Reflections on and readjustments of the Labour Party's policies constituted another important aspect of Kinnock's reconstructing efforts. The unconformity to the changing new social realities and the unacceptability by the middle-class voters of its traditional theories and policies were to a large extent responsible for the decline of the Party from its popularity. So, Kinnock gave it a rethinking and readjusting in a comprehensive manner to the Party's policies towards assets ownership, market, Europe, as well as those on macroeconomics, social welfare and so on. Meanwhile, abandoning the out-fashioned creed and policies, Kinnock devoted himself to the reconstruction of new theories and policies that would not only conform to the development of the times, but also gain the acceptance by the mainstream voters. All these won to some extent the trust of the people towards the party.Kinnock, as its leader, contributed a lot to the Labour Party's revival, whichmade unquestionable his particular status and role in the history of the Party. In spite of that, his reconstructing efforts, as a matter of fact, in the face of the Party's unprecedented troublesome situation and grave challenges of the times, were destined to have various limitations, which resulted that Kinnock was merely a transitional figure in the Party's history. In a sense, it was almost impossible, without Kinnock's restructuring efforts between 1983 and 1992, for Tony Blair to win overwhelmingly the general election in 1997, let alone the putting forward of the "Third Way" theory.Finally, taking the significance of the reforms by Kinnock on the British Labour Party into account, the author comes to the conclusion that a political party has to reform itself in accordance with the needs of the times and to enlarge its social basis, and in the meantime, transcending the Left and the Right in the area of ideology, in order to get even stronger.