Watching Trump being sworn in and Obama disappearing into the distance aboard Marine One, the thought that crossed my mind was: what next? What will the next generation of politicians look like? We have left behind the generation of polished professional politicians. These supposed experts, many of whom studied at Oxbridge, have paradoxically lead to the popularity of outsiders such as Trump, UKIP and Corbyn, the very people these Spads, media managers and spin doctors were meant to protect us from. This outsourcing of political management to experts created an ‘elite’. One that the masses are now fed up of.

TV shows like The Thick of It capture perfectly people’s perception of politics, albeit in an exaggerated fashion. It shows a world of incompetent elites whose actions are, largely, meaningless. For example, policies are ditched at the beginning of an episode, then they are later resurrected, creating a media disaster. Even Malcolm Tucker, the infamous profanity-using spin doctor modelled on Alistair Campbell, has no actual choice or agency. He may strike fear into the hearts of every other character in the show, but he himself has no control over the direction of policy or the media cycle. Constantly reacting, he demonstrates how politicians and their staffers are actually doing nothing. In attempting to ‘stay in the loop’, politicians fail to offer coherent policies by pandering to media narratives.

What is the point of being in politics then? What is the point of politicians, aside from claiming expenses? Thoughts like this are inherently unhealthy for our politics, for they breed populism. The Thick of It may be comedically exaggerated, but it still highlights the way politics was perceived. It’s funny because the audience see a kernel of truth in it. Negative perceptions of the elite aren’t a product of TV shows, they are a product of the media-managed bubble politics of the last few years.

“Dubbed an “Oxbridge twat” by Malcolm, Ollie demonstrates the career path of a plethora of politicians: the Miliband brothers, George Osborne, David Cameron, Ed Balls, Douglas Alexander and Yvette Cooper.”

While Tucker caricatures one man, Ollie Reeder is a character who represents a whole generation of politicians. Reeder, a special advisor, is an accurate caricature of the ‘golden generation’ of politicians who have never had a job outside politics and jumped straight from Oxford or Cambridge into Westminster. Dubbed an “Oxbridge twat” by Malcolm, Ollie demonstrates the career path of a plethora of politicians: the Miliband brothers, George Osborne, David Cameron, Ed Balls, Douglas Alexander and Yvette Cooper. Their careers have solely been spent in politics, albeit sometimes with a short stint in a city law firm beforehand. As well as their backgrounds, they have all fallen from favour as the new populism sneaks in. Here’s some friendly advice to those who study PPE: sign up for a GDL, post-graduate scheme or a think tank, because your employer, the state, no longer needs, nor wants you. 

But the opponents of the ‘golden generation’, the ‘populists’, aren’t much better. Farage was a commodity broker and Trump is the richest man to ever take office in the White House. They have hardly got ‘life experience’ that makes them more in touch with the average person on the street. But they successfully portrayed themselves as outsiders to the bubble of Ollie Reeders, and it was this that has allowed them to shake the old order.

Mainstream media has failed. We’re in a new age of news

The issue isn’t careerist politicians in themselves. It isn’t just the fact that politicians have only been politicians. It’s this whole issue of a distant elite seen to live a separate existence. For example, if you’ve lived in Islington, Notting Hill, Cambridge and Oxford your whole life, that in itself sets you apart. You’ve existed in bubbles which are alien worlds to the rest of the country. The thing that most surprised me when I first set foot in Cambridge, even with its massive problem of homelessness, was how nice everything is. If you’d lived here forever, you would be forgiven for thinking that the recession wasn’t really a problem; that only a small number of people you could brand as racists were weary of immigration, and that whichever party could say “long-term economic plan” would most convincingly win every election.

Bubbles aren’t just a problem in politics. At one event I went to in Cambridge last term, a guest from one of the big international banks could not accept that globalisation might not be permanent, unending and good for all. They could not see that, outside of the financial capitals of Europe, people were potentially more than a little miffed. Whilst globalisation may connect cities across the globe, it can make these global cities more isolated from their own country.

“They could not see that, outside of the financial capitals of Europe, people were potentially more than a little miffed”

What is crucial is not whether these bubbles of prosperity really exist or are as elitist and different as I’m saying. What matters is that the public perceives them to exist. The politicians of the future need to understand that. They need to understand that people want politicians who represent them and work hard for them, and won’t simply jump to a nice V&A directorship when they don’t seem likely to get a powerful cabinet position in the near future. They cannot come from the top universities and assume they are the top one per cent with an automatic ability to lead. What matters is not how clever they are, but whether they can actually articulate what people want. If they don’t do that, they deserve far worse than a bad rep from TV shows