Right Side Down

The eagerly awaited British election finally kicked off last week. Yes, we had one already earlier this month, a real barnburner: it so absorbed the public that 40% of Britons forgot to vote. Good thing it was only a warmup act. The main event will unfold over the next few weeks, as the Conservative Party selects a new leader to replace the hapless William Hague. It should make for great entertainment. The frontrunner, Michael Portillo, has shed his reputation as a right-wing rabble-rouser to become the soothing, centrist voice of Tory moderation. "Our party has to appeal to the whole range of people who live in Britain," Portillo says, a commitment to tolerance that may also remind party members of his admission of a homosexual past. Last week one top Tory said that should disqualify Portillo from the head job. Another leadership hopeful, the delightfully graceless Ann Widdecombe, declared she would never serve under Portillo and his "little band of backbiters."

It's going to be messy. And given the depth of the rifts within the party, particularly over the E.U. and British entry into the common currency, a bitter leadership battle seems unavoidable. But choosing a leader is the least of the Tories' concerns. The party faces not only another term in opposition but also signs of chronic decline. Party leaders have given up trying to spin the election results. Portillo has called the overwhelming Blair victory "catastrophic"; one Conservative M.P. last week admitted that the Tories are hurtling toward third-party wilderness.

They may have company once they get there. The electoral landscape for center-right parties appears desolate in many parts of Europe. Left-tilting parties hold power in 11 of the E.U.'s 15 nations, and only in Italy and Spain does the right govern alone. In Germany, where elections are due next year, the incumbent center-left government is poised for a Labour-esque landslide. The outlook is slightly brighter in France, although the left remains a fair bet to win control of both Parliament and the presidency next year. The most encouraging recent result for Europe's conservatives, the triumph of Silvio Berlusconi's center-right coalition in May's Italian election, was as much an expression of voter fatigue with the leftist government as an endorsement of Berlusconi's positions. And let's face it: any political movement with Silvio Berlusconi as its flagbearer is a movement in trouble.

How did the right, which only a decade ago claimed to represent Europe's mainstream, wind up in this mess? In part by winning the battle of ideas. During the cold war, the center-right defined itself against the specter of communism and assailed the socialist left for giving comfort to the enemy. But as communism crumbled, the European center-left adopted conservative positions on social issues, while embracing free markets, cozying up to business and supporting military interventions. Most significantly, center-left governments in Britain, France and Germany have earned voters' confidence as competent stewards of the economy, responsive to the challenges of globalization.

As the left rebranded itself, the right retrenched. The Tories' abysmal campaign exposed the party as hoary and clannish, with no creative agenda beyond nationalist scaremongering about the euro and asylum seekers. Voters didn't go for it, just as Germans have turned away from the periodic Euro-skeptic and anti-immigrant noises made on the right. The center-right's lurch toward nationalism has disheartened libertarians who believe the free movement of people and capital are core conservative principles. And corruption scandals in numerous countries have damaged conservative credibility.

The center-right is bleeding. But its wounds need not be fatal. In recent years strategists within the conservative movement have debated two options for recovery: veering left in a bid to reclaim the center ground, or pursuing a new, bolder identity. To survive, the center-right will have to do both. Distancing itself from the far right and projecting an image of inclusivity and compassion — as George W. Bush and Spain's José María Aznar have done with success — would be a start. But if conservatives intend to provide an alternative to the center-left, they will also have to try a little radicalism. And that might best come in the form of a concerted campaign to rethink, reform and scale back a European welfare state that is in danger of collapsing under its own weight.

There's one problem with that approach: in the short term, it won't win the right many votes. "I'll be crucified," Hague said at the suggestion he push for free-market alternatives to the National Health Service and the failing education system. And yet a serious effort to downsize the public sector would at least give conservatives a farsighted program to fight for, and one they can believe in. At this point, they have nothing left to lose but their convictions.