Social Democracy's Muted Revival

After a long malaise, social democracy is making a muted revival. What is the place of social democracy in the political and economic order that is emerging from the Covid-19 pandemic, and the economic crisis that has followed in its wake? Patterns have begun to emerge across the party family that are indicative of how social democracy is defining itself for the period to come. This article briefly surveys the revival of social democracy in three countries that have been historic bastions of the creed: Germany, Britain and Australia. It considers three particularly potent trends in this social democratic moment that reveal the movement's current character and the challenges it faces: building an ongoing coalition amid changing electorates; seeking transformation in an era of constraint; and a lack of ideological coherence. It considers what this muted resurgence suggests about the prospects for the centre-left.