It’s funny how quickly and unexpectedly things can move. I’ve obviously thinking of the MPs’ expenses scandal, which seems to spiraling out of control. It’s also hard to know how to act in these situations. In one sense the obvious “thing to do” is to try to deepen this crisis of legitimacy (of MPs and of parliament) into a crisis of governance — linking this crisis with economic crisis, climate crisis, etc. But how? But perhaps these linkages are already obvious. Perhaps that’s exactly why this scandal has become a crisis. There’s also the risk that you say or suggest something only to discover that the Daily Telegraph or the Taxpayers’ Alliance has already said it. Strange bedfellows indeed. But that’s exactly why the crisis is interesting and, to some extent, why it’s out of control. Because it may carry the Telegraph and its readers (and us) to some very unexpected places, places they (and us?) are not at all comfortable being in.

I’ve been away for the past week and not keeping up. But I woke up yesterday to discover that, not only will Gordon Brown probably be ousted as Labour party leader and prime minister (wholly expected), but also that senior Labour party figures (including Brown’s likely replacement) are talking seriously about replacing the present “first-past-the-post” electoral system with some form of proportional representation. What?! Outfits such as Charter 88 have been going on about this for ages — since 1988 — and it’s never seemed remotely likely. Why would either Conservatives or Labour give up a system that so clearly works in their favour? But now, it seems, the political class reckons offering such a radical constitutional change is necessary in order to appease an angry population. I’m no big fan of PR, of course, and I’m certainly not suggesting The Free Association transforms itself into a political party and stands a candidate at the next election. But a lot of political groups will stand candidates. This and debates around constitutional change may well open up space — space that might quickly get closed down, just as the very offer of PR is itself an attempt to limit some unknown potential that may or may not exist at the moment, but space that might take us to other space and other places.

I’ve been reading Subcomandante Marcos’s Conversations with Durito and I came across this lovely insight, which suggests — amongst so many other things — the double-articulation of social movements:

Scratched on the other side, a mirror stops being a mirror and becomes a piece of glass. Mirrors are for seeing on this side, and glass is for seeing what’s on the other side.

Mirrors are for scratching.

Glass is for shattering… and crossing to the other side…