Jeremy Corbyn wins the Labour leadership election in a revolution of party members overthrowing the party establishment

Jeremy Corbyn MP speaks at anti-drones rally in 2013. Photograph: By stopwar.org.uk (license)(cropped)

Jeremy Corbyn has been elected leader of the Labour Party with 59.5% of the vote in the first round of voting. In a contest where over four hundred thousand people voted, no other candidate achieved over 20% of the vote and Corbyn won in every party category, including 49% of established party members and 57% of trade union members.

In the build-up, Tom Watson was also announced as the winner of the deputy leadership contest. The MP, who led the campaign to hold the media to account after accusations arose of  illegalities, promised in his acceptance speech to back the new leader and help them to unite the party.

Whether or not the new leadership can unite the party is the big question that will come out of this contest. The remarkable rise of Jeremy Corbyn exposed a rift between the Labour Parliamentary Party and the party's wider membership and supporters.

The contest had been initially dominated by the more right-leaning Blairites and and centrist Brownites, in the form of younger generation candidates like Chuka Umunna, Tristram Hunt and Liz Kendall and older generation members like Andy Burnham and Yvette Cooper.

Yet there was a sense that the party's Left needed to be represented in order to have a substantial debate. That was only accomplished with the assistance of MPs 'lending' Corbyn their nominations. And yet those 'lent' nominations opened a floodgate. The popular appeal of Corbyn seemingly gave the Labour Left the confidence to come out in numbers and chance a return to the mainstream.

The future of the Labour Party from here may well have a lot to do with how it organises going forward.

In the run up to today's announcement, with the defeat of the followers of Brown and Blair seemingly imminent, there began to be suggestions that the two groups should unite themselves into a strong 'moderate' faction. United and organised, they would represent a formidable pressure group, pushing Corbyn to adopt pragmatic policies - and there are already signs of ranks closing with members of the shadow cabinet resigning.

The Left-wing faction, over which Jeremy Corbyn has effectively become leader in the last few months, has shown that it is strong in the party, but it remains firmly a parliamentary outsider. Its numbers are spread out across the country, in trade unions and constituency parties.

Against the strength of the self-appointed 'moderates', who will still have great strength in parliamentary numbers, the Left will need new methods to support its approach. Following its supporters, that will likely mean shifting the power of policy-making away from MPs and out to activists in the community.

One very notable and troubling issue is the absence of a successful female nominee for either leadership position, with Yvette Cooper coming third in the leadership contest and Stella Creasy coming second in the deputy leadership race. That will need to be addressed. One option would be to appoint a female chancellor. But that will be something to delve into deeper as Corbyn announces his shadow cabinet in the coming days.

Today though, the story is that the mainstream pragmatists have lost control of the party to Corbyn and his more idealistic, popular, Left-wing supporters amongst the party membership. In his acceptance speech as the new Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn spoke of wanting to build a better society. For all progressives, it can only be positive and exciting to hear a leader, elected on a huge mandate, championing a challenge to inequality and poverty.

References

Patrick Wintour's 'Leadership result shows dramatic shifts within Labour party'; in The Guardian; 12 September 2015.

Paul Mason's 'Jeremy Corbyn’s victory and the new party he leads'; from Channel 4 News; 12 September 2015.

Laurie Penny's 'What the Corbyn moment means for the left: At long last, the left is asking itself whether power without principle is worth having'; in the New Statesman; 12 September 2015.

Leo Panitch's 'Can Jeremy Corbyn Redeem the Labour Party?'; in Jacobin Magazine; 11 September 2015.

Stephen Bush's 'Tom Watson elected as Labour's deputy leader'; in the New Statesman; 12 September 2015.