David Lammy’s Tribes promises a lot, delivers something, but ultimately fails to convince. His problem lies in the very nature of his vision, not that it is wrong, misguided, or anything less than laudable. This latter failure to convince, in fact, stems from the inability of the overview to address the very problems the author identifies at the outset.
David Lammy is a British politician, currently a member of the Shadow Cabinet of the Labor Party. In Tribes, he attempts to assess the political landscape, beginning with a theoretical analysis of why class and other larger identities have fragmented into what might appear to be smaller, interest-driven groupings he calls “tribes.” Many readers may expect this analysis to develop, but instead the author pursues a personal reflection on some of the ideas raised. And, as the book progresses, the context becomes even more personal, before a final section attempts its rational, believable, and, given what precedes, impossible ending. The approach makes the book highly readable, but less than satisfactory after its promise of theoretical discussion.
The author is an extraordinary man. He was born into a family of Guyanese immigrants in Tottenham, north London, raised by a single mother and later attended Cathedral Choral School in Peterborough. The University of London preceded Harvard Law School, where he became the first black British graduate. In Silicon Valley he became a lawyer and was later elected to Parliament for the Labor Party. And then he was a government minister. These are just some of the facts from the life of this brilliant man, so far! His wife is white and his children are mestizo, whatever that means, since we are all mestizo, if we are human.
But on a quest for identity of the kind that seems to haunt modern people, David Lammy sought out a DNA test. The results suggest a mix of origins, one of which linked to the Tuareg of the Sahel of West Africa. The author spends a great deal of time and resources investigating this link and then, as much as possible, experiencing it firsthand. Although this association ultimately proves tenuous at best, perhaps even illusory, the author’s willingness and enthusiasm to pursue it illustrates a point he makes early in the book, that identity today seems to be felt more strongly. on a personal rather than a group level. Except, of course, when the group has the ability to reinforce and confirm the personal.
David Lammy introduces Maffesoli’s concept of neo-tribes, communities of feeling, to identify a contemporary tendency to see one’s personal identity purely in terms of a group identity. Thus, rational approaches to certain issues that are by their nature universal are devalued as neo-tribes develop their own internal values and explanations. It is the fact that these are identity-conferring minority positions that provides the focus of the neo-tribe’s identity. The fragmentation of our social, economic and religious life favors the substitution of universalism. This is a crucial point.
A few pages later and David Lammy pretty much pinpoints how this behavior, even propensity, has been exploited by the political right. He cites two successful election slogans, “Make America Great Again” and “Take Back Control,” to which might be added “Let’s Get Brexit Done,” as examples of labels that made campaigns successful by exploiting fears of the groups above rational arguments, thus defeating rational analyzes that recognized, or at least tried to recognize, the true complexity of the issues discussed. The slogans denied this complexity and offered an illusion of simple solutions. David Lammy persuasively illustrates how these simple, emotional but inaccurate messages prevailed over the complex, unclear but accurate counter-argument.
Still in the introduction, he cites a poll claiming that nearly two-thirds of UK voters still believe the often falsified claim that the country sends £350m a week to the European Union. David Lammy follows this up by stating that there is still a group of deluded people who think Arsenal are the best football team in North London. By way of balance, I will remind you that some thirty-five years ago, the philosopher AJ Ayer wrote that it should be impossible for a logical positivist to support Tottenham Hotspur. Jokes aside, the author illustrates that once accepted by a neo-tribe, a falsehood can retain its own internal illusion of truth.
But people support Arsenal and others Tottenham. Both cannot be right if they claim to follow the ‘best’ team. However, from internally accepted values within the group, both may be right. Even a moment after chanting “what a load of rubbish” on their own team, that tribe would rally if the opposition expressed the same sentiment. Welcome to the Conservative Party, which is eternally divided internally, but externally as united as Stalin’s allies, until purged, and then largely silent. And who cares if the message is irrational, impossible, implausible, or even irrelevant? The tribe will back you to exclude others. And works.
There is much in Tribus that is rational, clearly expressed, believable and sincere. It is a magnificent snapshot of where British politics and society now reside, precariously in opposing camps, armed ideologically but often without agreement on a language in which debate could take place, where sensitive questions are usually answered with an irrelevant and unrelated positive phrase.
However, the overall message of the book is wrong, as in the end we have come back to the need to recognize and recognize the complexities of real problems. We must trust our rationality and engage in the politics of discussion and debate. Global problems need global solutions. Working in isolation will encourage failure. The disorderly international cooperation and therefore, indeed, globalization is the only way out of local problems. However, the difficulty with such a laudable, deliverable and sensible analysis is that it fails, repeatedly, in the face of slogans that seek and achieve short-term solutions, but that give identity. Do you remember Vote for Victory?