Politics
The House Article | “Thought-provoking”: Lord Howell reviews ‘Prophecy in Politics’
1935: Winston Churchill (left) in the grounds of Chartwell with Ralph Wigram / Image by: Fremantle / Alamy
4 min read
A valiant attempt at understanding why accurate predictions so often fail to cut through
“One inch ahead is total darkness”: so goes the Japanese proverb. In times like now of global uncertainty, it seems a suitably appropriate dictum to caution the army of prophets, forecasters and poll interpreters, all ready to fire off a take, their visions of the future hedged in a string of qualifications and suitably Delphic in style.
The interesting question is whether any of this kind of activity, from the white-bearded biblical type or the hard-nosed corporate analyst (self-proclaimed or otherwise) in the internet age of total and instant connectivity, has any market or appeal at all.
A thought-provoking booklet appears, published by Haus Curiosities, which makes a valiant attempt to disentangle all the different types of futurology which surround us. From the lofty certainties to the entertaining guesses, and how on earth to evaluate them.
The author of this little volume, an academic and former defence analyst, Kenneth Weisbrode, employs the clever device of focusing on one very memorable instance when a person warned about oncoming world events in the 20th century – and one which, with hindsight, proved to be deadly and tragically right.
The name of this brave character was Ralph Wigram, a middle-ranking Foreign Office official who could see the huge conflagration ahead as Germany re-armed in the 1930s under the belligerent Nazi leaders, but with a generally complacent bien pensant outside world looking on and broadly assuming that it just could not happen again.
The information streams have all become avalanches
How and why did he, among the growing noise of opinions, get heard? Answer: by supplying a flow of detailed and reliable facts (he had been in Berlin and had plenty of German friends and contacts) to a few carefully selected and influential individuals – who in turn had the ear of the public. Top of his list was none other than Winston Churchill.
To me, this makes Churchill as well as Wigram the real prophets in this classic 20th century compound of forecast and prophecy – eventually borne out in the full horror of a Second World War. Wigram peered ahead and saw the facts. Churchill was the magician with language, had the courage to speak out endlessly against prevailing wisdom (or worse, disinterest).
Could any of this most celebrated saga have occurred in today’s information-soaked world?
I reckon not. The information streams have all become avalanches. The iPad and the mobile have connected billions and turned most people into mini-authors and home-made prophets. The cult of transparency, lauded by accountability crusaders, has left little in free societies to expose. The hunters after the truth have found their paths blocked by crowds of truth-seekers with their own different truths. Uncertainty is everywhere and there is talk of people turning back en masse to mysteries larger than the human mind and akin to new religions.
Are eye-catching prophesies and predictions therefore now to be left to who will win the 3.30 at Cheltenham or to financial stock pickers?
No, I think there will always be a market for the most plausible and original analysis – the cautious wisdom that sees just a few inches ahead, even if the message from the future is not a cheerful one, or all that clear.
Is the individual who can lead in performing this miracle of rallying and purpose – who can perceive the world trends and give them a prophet’s coherence and momentum – already in the political forum, or at least just there in the wings? Who knows? It is, after all, an age of deep uncertainty. Radio gurus are telling us every morning that the digital and AI age has rewired our brains as well as our emotions. It looks as though today’s prophets need to do some rewiring, too.
Lord Howell of Guildford is a Conservative peer
Prophecy in Politics: Or, the Wigram Aspect
By: Kenneth Weisbrode
Publisher: Haus Publishing
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