Radical Writing S.
1 total work
At the end of the 1990s, there is much talk in Britain about Blair's New Labour and the "third way" between capitalism and socialism. These debates resonate strangely in Australia, where for 13 years the Labour governments of Bob Hawke and Paul Keating tried to implement a similar programme. This text explores the fate of the labour movement's promises in a postmodern world by examining the cultural revolutions of the 1980s and 1990s. McKenzie Wark argues that any social democratic project that requires electoral majorities has to make its peace with the aspirations of the people as they are expressed in popular media. Wark explores the culture of the Labour years through some of its more popular celebrities - from Kylie Minogue and Peter Garrett to Hawke and Keating themselves. The price paid for the success of the economic reforms of the Labour years was the break-up of the culture of the majority that kept it in power. Cyberspace is revolutionizing cultural experience and Wark argues that Labour must re-imagine its policies.