Top Ten Books to Understand Labour Conference

26.09.25

Philosophy Football's Mark Perryman selection makes sense of a party in trouble

The 04.07.24 landslide seems like a lifetime ago in the lived experience of this Labour government and attendant party.  A Prime Minister elected on a record-breaking low share of the vote, 33.7%. A victory secured by the split in the right's vote between the Conservatives and Reform UK. Further aided by the unwritten pact that meant Labour effectively withdrew from seats where the Liberal Democrats were best placed to oust the incumbent Tory MP, and where Labour best placed the Lib-Dems doing likewise.

Once victory secured however, what has been dubbed the 'loveless landslide' could, should, have been turned into an era to inspire and give hope. But nothing of the sort has appeared, instead Keir Starmer is achieving record lows in polls measuring favourability. Meanwhile Reform UK has such a big and consistent lead in the polls Nigel Farage as the next Prime Minister has moved from a nightmare to realistic possibility.

As Labour meets for its annual party conference how might we make sense of a party in such trouble? My selection finds the top ten books to help in this venture.

The Starmer Symptom : Mark Perryman 

OK I have to declare an interest here ...  Nevertheless, The Starmer Symptom written in the year since the landslide is the first book to account for how those twelve months have shaped Labour's prospects. This is a collection of essays, edited by me, with a foreword by Clive Lewis MP, the collective thoughts infinitely more incisive than anything I could have come up with on my own. Comprehensive too, mapping the 2024 vote, measuring the fallout for the parties, a critique of Labour's response to the key issues facing it in government, and an outline of the alternatives to a party in impasse.

The Starmer Symptom from here

The Most Dangerous Man in Britain? : Tony Benn

Labourism has a terrible habit of always looking backwards rather than forwards. But a modernisation so intent on appearing forward-looking at the expense of learning everything from the past is every bit as bad, if not worse. In the early to mid 1980s 'Bennism' was a hugely popular movement in and around the Labour Party, never dominant, its rise bitterly contested by the Labour Right it was nevertheless part and parcel of Labour, and a wider left. Benn however wasn't just a leader, a thinker too, this new collection of his political writings testament to that. Agree or disagree with Benn's thinking there are few Labour figures who have matched him since for his boldness and originality including the one figure from that Bennite left to lead the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn.

The Most Dangerous Man in Britain? from here

Run Zohran Run!: Theodore Hamm

Looking for a sign of present-day hope? While the Green Party under Zack Polanski show all the signs of a party with the potential to repeat their successes winning inner city seats off Labour in Brighton andBristol and the civic-nationalism of the SNP and Plaid Cymru continue their revival those who have promised a left alternative to Labour, Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana offer only that well-worn experience of the internecine and the warfare. Hopeless? Theodore Hamm's book is a gripping account of how Zohran Mamdani defeated his party's machine from within to win the Democrat's nomination for November's New York Mayoral Election. If he proves victorious in the election itself an addition for Andy Burnham's bookshelf, and all who'd back him to win the Labour leadership. 

Run Zohran Run! from here  

Gaza The Story of a Genocide :  Fatima Bhutto and Sonia Faleiro  

Beyond the looking-glass world of Westminster politics and the ups, or mainly downs, of Labour's poll ratings Gaza has provided the basis for a generational shift. In much the same way as Hungary in '56, Vietnam in 1968 and Iraq in 2003, Gaza since the murderous Hamas attack in 2023 followed by Israel's deadly assault on Gaza which is now internationally recognised as genocidal,  is a conflict that has come to define the current era. 1956 had dire consequences for the Communist Party but was hardly an issue to affect Labour. Vietnam, despite the huge pressure to do so, Harold Wilson refused to send British troops. Iraq damaged Blair, deservedly so, yet his 1997 landslide recorded a huge 43.2% of the vote,  which meant unlike Starmer he had a sufficient cushion to ride the declining support for Labour in 2001 and 2005 to victory. Fatima Bhutto and Sonia Faleiro's collection is a wide-range of cultural responses to Gaza a hugely imaginative breadth of anger, and hope. A testimony to a shift that a tin-eared Starmer seems almost entirely oblivious of and Labour will pay the price for.                

Gaza The Story of a Genocide from here

The Next Crisis - What We Think About the Future : Danny Dorling

The latest from the extraordinarily prolific Danny Dorling, and like all his other writings this book doesn't disappoint, anything but. Combining empirical analysis with originality of insight is Danny's style, together they make for a convincing argument, but does he have the ear of a government minister, or two?  He should! Across key issues, including the cost of living, immigration and the climate crisis, the book digests polling data to uncover a range of universally powerful anxieties that don't fit either the conventional picture we have of voters or the limited range of responses politicians choose their responses from. An essential read to map out any kind of Labour recovery.

The Next Crisis from here

Eviction - A Social History of Rent : Jessica Field 

For many voters the number one issue will be housing. The lack of, rising cost to rent, treatment by landlords. Labour's response is build, build, build! Yet almost entirely absent from that project is the issue of ownership. A party more identified than any other council housing, where ownership lies with the local state instead of the weasel word language of 'affordable housing' and 'social ownership.' Jessica Field mixes the historical with the personal to document the central social conflict in contemporary Britain, tenant vs landlord. Council housing was never perfect but it remains the only way to inject a democratisation founded on accountability into that relationship because it isn't founded on the profit motive but a social objective. This is the book on which to found such a switch.

Eviction from here  

Radical Abundance - How To Win a Green Democratic Future : Kai Heron, Keir Milburn and Bertie Russell 

Ed Miliband is one of the Cabinet Ministers who it could be said doesn't fit the Starmerite yes-man, or yes-woman, mould. He has made arguments around energy and climate change  very much his own as the 'Green New Deal' morphed into 'Great British Energy'. But despite those best efforts none of this can amount to much so long as the government's one word response to all matters economic is, growth. And never mind the consequences for, the climate. 'Radical Abundance' is the answer the authors of this wonderfully engrossing book offer. Not hair-shirted socialism but a flourishing of pleasurable possibility via the democratic control of the green means. Framed by actually-existing examples of how, this is a handbook for a new economy, and society. 

Radical Abundance from here

Between the Waves - The Hidden History of a Very British Revolution 1945-2016 : Tom McTague

Keir Starmer was only elected as an MP in 2015, prior to that with his responsibilities as Director of Public Prosecutions any involvement in the Labour Party would have been minimal. Despite this, and not being a 'Corbynite' he was trusted by Jeremy Corbyn post the 2016 Referendum with steering Labour's response to Brexit. A 'steer' which he successfully directed in the direction of Remain, to be enabled by a second referendum. Alongside positioning himself as the Corbyn continuity candidate it was this which helped him win the 2020 Labour Leadership Election.  The break with the Corbynite pledges has been widely noticed. Much less so the breach with Remain, a far more awkward switch for many of his supporters. Tom McTague's book is a brilliantly-written explanation of why despite Keir Starmer's worst efforts, and the 'Lexit brigade', this is an issue that won't disappear, nor should it. A history of a present the Prime Minister would prefer didn't exist.

Between the Waves from here   

Friends in Common - Radical Friendship and Everyday Solidarities : Laura C. Foster and Joel White

Freed from the limits of Labourism, outside the conference hall stage-managed politicking, in nooks and crannies of civil society there are disparate forces seeking to re-imagine how we 'do' politics. The late 1970s book Beyond the Fragments: Feminism and the Making of Socialism remains the key text for those engaged in this almighty endeavour, it is superbly fitting that one of the book's authors, Lynne Segal, is quoted on the back cover welcoming this latest addition to the literature towards that end. How can friendships framed by political co-operation become the foundation for ever-expanding and dynamically inclusive communities? And in the process reinventing an old value 'solidarity.' Friends in Common, a most welcome handbook of audacious ideas.

Friends in Common from here

FIVE STAR CHOICE 

How to Defeat the Far Right : Nick Lowles

Whatever happens at Labour conference, however good the speeches, wherever the votes end up (not that these have any impact on Labour policy whatsoever nowadays) one thing is certain. Reform UK will still lead the opinion polls, Nigel Farage will remain a credible contender to lead his party to winning the next General Election, and 'Tommy Robinson' will continue to whip up a tidal wave of popular racism.

Nick Lowles has form in stopping all of this.  A combination of undercover work exposing the murderous intent of neo-nazi grouplets, the huge effort to defeat Nick Griffin's credible effort to win Barking in the 2010 General Election, research, surveys and community-based initiatives to challenge the far right in the localities they would seek to lead. 'Hope not Hate' a campaign like no other, and all the better for that. Free of the placard-waving and name-calling in order to make a difference. This book should have been given to every Labour conference delegate, Keir give up his party leader's slot for Nick to address conference, campaign workshops replace the rituals of resolutionary labourism. For this is an emergency.
 

In the absence of any of that grab yourself a copy, it might just be our last chance to prevent a nightmare becoming a reality.

How to Defeat the Far Right from here

Special Offer 30% off The Starmer Symptom  quote coupon code Starmer 30 from here  

Note No links in this review are to Amazon when purchasing, if you can, avoid giving money  to billionaire tax-dodgers.

Mark Perryman is the co-founder of the self-styled 'sporting outfitters of intellectual distinction' aka Philosophy Football