Few political observers were surprised when Jeremy Corbyn was announced as the new Labour Party leader on Saturday morning. His stunning victory in the first round of voting was impressive, but his victory had been predicted for several weeks. When his name was initially added to the leadership ballot, it was done almost as a form of intellectual exercise. Those MPs who backed his candidature were not necessarily fans of Corbyn, but were keen to see the debate expanded beyond the limits that the other three candidates would have placed on it. No one seriously expected Corbyn to be elected leader, although the UNITE union pledging their support to Corbyn really signalled a sea change in the ballot.  His impeccable left-wing credentials made Corbyn the perfect candidate for many within the Trade Union movement, keen to exercise the union power within the party and attempt to preserve, and possibly extend, the power of unions within society. This 66 year old, left-wing stalwart now occupies the same position as the Labour greats – Attlee, Gaitskell, Wilson, Kinnock, Smith, Blair. Like them, he will have now have to sell his brand of Labourism to the wider party and his success or failure could be determined by how success he is in drawing supporters to his cause. These supporters will have to extend far beyond those who voted for him in the leadership contest. He will have to appeal to the Parliamentary Labour Party, and more importantly, to the British public, who have not elected a Labour Prime Minister since 2005, and have not elected a left-wing Prime Minister for considerably longer that that.

One of the problems of modern day politics is that the public seem to dislike politicians. There are obvious reasons for this – the expenses scandal, the indelible stain of sleaze which was attached to the Conservative Party in the mid-1990s, the privileged, out of touch position of politicians, some of whom are keen to tell the public to ‘do as they say, not as they do’. However, there is another issue, which is related to the appearance of politicians, both physical and more abstract. Politicians are seemingly getting younger, slicker, more media-savvy. These individuals are often accused of lacking political weight, certainly in terms of their ideological views, a criticism that seems unfair as it is often driven by their youth, appearance and ability to deal with the media successfully by dodging questions. Some of these individuals seem to appear in the public consciousness as fully developed politicians, with high-ranking supporters.  Individuals such as David Cameron, for example, earned their early political stripes at the Conservative Research Department, stalking the darkened corridors of the intellectual wing of the Conservative Party, before being appointed as special adviser to Norman Lamont while he was Chancellor. This PPE educated, well-dressed, well-rehearsed type of politician is both popular and unpopular due to the fickle nature of the electorate.  

Jeremy Corbyn is the opposite of this brand of politician. He is a conviction politician, a man whose views have remained constant regardless if societal change and political fashion. He is a man who has long-held, often-unpopular views, a man who has rebelled against his own party leadership over 500 times during his career in the Commons. He has conviction, but is his conviction likely to be popular outside the Labour movement?

The balancing act of party leadership, regardless of which party is being led, is to combine the moral and philosophical attitudes of the party with a brand of policy which will appeal to the electorate. Blair, for all his faults, was an expert at this. He was able to take Labour party policy and present it to different groups in different ways, in order to ensure that as many voters as possible felt they were being benefited by a Labour government. Blair was able to do this because of the desperation within the Labour Party by the mid-1990s. The party was willing to be ideologically flexible in order to gain power, as they realised that policy without power is largely meaningless. While the purists might argue that a party with as strong an ideological base as Labour should not sully itself by finessing or adapting policy to suit the electorate, without such change the Labour party would never have entered government again, standing instead on the side lines, removing themselves effectively from the game.

So, what will Jeremy Corbyn do now he is leader? How will he attempt to win over his party while remaining true to his own beliefs? Who will he appoint to help him, especially when his support from the Parliamentary Labour Party was so low and several high profile MPs have refused to join the Shadow Cabinet? Corbyn has tried, in his first Shadow Cabinet appointments, to reflect some continuity and unity while stamping his own brand onto the leadership. Rosie Winterton remains as Chief Whip, an extremely tricky job given Corbyn’s own lack of loyalty to previous leaders. Defeated leadership candidate Andy Burnham has been appointed Shadow Home Secretary, an appointment that Burham will be hoping keeps his leadership aspirations on life support should the Corbyn leadership hit stormy waters, as many predict it will. Hilary Benn, not a left-wing individual himself but a man who is clearly well versed in left-wing thinking, has become Shadow Foreign Secretary. In other appointments Angela Eagle, Diane Abbott and Heidi Alexander have all been appointed, ensuring that while there are no women in the key positions, Corbyn is able to fulfil his promise of creating a Shadow Cabinet which is 50% female. Perhaps the most telling appointment is the new Shadow Chancellor, John McDonnell. McDonnell shares Corbyn’s left-wing ideology and it will be his job to put flesh on the bones of Corbyn’s anti-austerity economic policy.

Despite his massive mandate within the Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn has just entered the fight of his political life. It is a fight that has been fought before by some very talented individuals. He follows in the footsteps of the Bevanites, the Bennites, leaders like Michael Foot. These party giants were not able to convince the electorate, or even their own party in some instances, that what was needed was more socialism, a move to the left. Corbyn now takes on that challenge, but the odds are stacked against him.  Assuming that this conviction politician remains true to his existing policy views, how will he be able to convince the British public that leaving NATO, abandoning Trident, printing more money in a new wave of quantitative easing, working more closely with Putin at the expense of the US-UK Special Relationship and increasing taxes for the middle classes is in their best interests? It was a message that led to one of Labour’s worst election results in 1983. Will Corbyn’s new policy package, which looks a lot like the old policy package of the Labour left wing, fair any better?

Victoria Honeyman is Lecturer in British Politics at the University of Leeds. She tweets @vhoneymanleeds.

Image: Chris Beckett CC BY-NC-ND