The cooperation of America and Britain has had thousands of years’ antiquity that started with America as the colony of Britain. Historical studies prove that the relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom stems from their coalition in the second world war, especially their victory over Hitler. The cultural as well as social similarities of both the countries have merged together, and it is clear with the participation of both the countries in matters of their concern. British premiership and the United States presidency have often ruled hand in hand, and an overview of Bill Clinton’s influence on Tony Blair discloses most of these precisions that Blair was much influenced by Clinton in various fields. It varies in fields like politics, international affairs, democratic campaigns, the Third-way concept, and so on. One can find the seeds of mutual influence lie in the freemasonry of the two countries in various sectors. Some of the biographers could find Clinton’s personal influence on Blair. The words of Clinton are explanatory when he wrote about Blair’s commitment towards him regarding international matters. Clinton writes about Blair, “Tony listened to my advice graciously but ignored it completely by immediately accepting a new job as Middle East envoy for the Quartet.” This paper is an attempt to find out the influence of Clinton on Blair in various fields and how they affected the social and cultural development of both America and Britain.
Bill Clinton’s influence on Tony Blair in international affairs
The United States and the United Kingdom have collated in many national and international affairs. This collation was clearly visible in different issues like Iraq, Iran, and Afghanistan. An online article reviews the role of Blair in the Iraq issue, making comparisons with Clinton and it writes,” Like his American counterpart, Bill Clinton, Blair favored innovative solutions over rigorous ideology, and he counted among his successes a revived economy, a reasonably sturdy peace in Northern Ireland, and a successful military campaign against Slobodan Milosevic in Kosovo.”
Other examples can be cited out for U.S. and UK collation. In the Iraq invasion of America, the support from the Tony Blair administration was immense, and it ended with the fall of Iraq. It was at the time of Clinton Blair’s rule, they threw away the old conservative ideas, and they planned to adopt a charming reformist future, leaving the “old left” and “new right”. Some of the political thinkers are of the view that during their rule, the socialist concepts were totally ignored, and the concepts of “community” entered. During their rule, “collectivism” was replaced by “solidarity”. It has often been viewed that “at its best, Blairism, like Clintonism, was always a brilliant balancing act.”
Bill Clinton’s Democratic Campaign
For the Democratic Party, Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign was an important turning point. Bill Clinton had served as the Chairman of the Democratic Leadership Council. He had taken many steps for the development of his country. As the rich people were getting richer and politicians were considering them only, Clinton had made the rich pay tax for their property and stopped the middle-class people from paying tax. Bill Clinton had supported the people for better education and also provided good training for all the workers, so they got better knowledge and attained high talent. He had also struggled with various trade laws and the development of technology. The middle-class people in America had many wrong concepts about various things like they believed that everything would be lost if they suffered from any illness, and Bill Clinton changed this wrong concept by bringing a new American health care plan. Through these types of plans, he made people more aware of things and gave them better knowledge. Bill Clinton helped the people who were poor and illiterate. To overcome poverty and illiteracy, he provided jobs and education to the people. He gave priority to people’s problems rather than his own problem. Bill Clinton generated a Rebuild America Fund, and these funds were used for the development of the country, like to create the most excellent transportation, environment protection, education, health, etc.
About democratic campaign and strategies
The campaign for president of the United States was held in the year 1992. It paved the way for the formulation of the Democratic Party. Bill Clinton succeeded in that campaign and was against George W Bush. Clinton had chosen Al gore which was an American Environmental activist, and he had worked under Bill Clinton from 1993 to 2001, and Al gore had served as the 45th vice president of the United States. There is a remarkable quotation from a brochure named ‘Bill Clinton for President 1992 Campaign Brochures’ which shows America’s miserable condition that prevailed at that time. It remarks, “America is in trouble. Our people are hurting. The rich keep getting richer, and the politicians just seem to be taking care of themselves.” America should stand strong enough at home so as to compete with the world. National security should begin at home.
In his campaign, he had accepted an exact blend of informality with specific goals, which in fact, helped him to succeed in that campaign. Bill Clinton put into practice so many effective strategies to boost the economic development of America. Firstly Bill Clinton introduced an economic plan to compete with the world economy. He again introduced a new plan for improving the health of Americans. Bill Clinton realized the need for education, and he offered a creative plan for ensuring world-class education. Putting people first is the important strategy of national economic strategy and which guides the administration of America. In early America, the wealthiest Americans grew richer, and the middle class had to work harder and pay higher taxes to the government. The government failed to create proper job situations, world-class education, effective healthcare, safe streets. Analyzing this issue, one can see that the implementation of a proper national economic strategy was necessary to find a solution for this problem. Putting America to work was also considered an important strategy.
Bill Clinton’s political influence on Tony Blair
When analyzing the views of political dogmatists, one can find a considerable influence on Mr. Blair’s general operational policies and political ideologies. Both of them have developed the political view based on friendliness and antagonism. A natural conversationalist, great intellect, and a peerless diplomat Bill Clinton fixed his name as a great politician in his own age. At the time when Tony Blair reached the throne, his faction was mere reproduction of Bill Clinton’s political and ideological dogmatism. The web article entitled A comedy of errors: Tony Blair and America by Godfrey Hodgson express his readiness to support Clinton’s influence on Tony Blair. The author remarks, “Tony Blair, it is said with Clinton’s explicit encouragement, set out to achieve as close a relationship with the new president as he had with the old.” After a detailed analysis, a reader can find that Blair’s gullible implementation of US-flavored laws and policies is not only the result of ignorance of America but also a craze for his own country. With the result of its strong influence on Scandinavian democracy and Clinton’s principle, Blair changed his policies and programs. This helped Blair to modulate his labor party to face new challenges such as environmental issues, globalization, and other social issues. Marketing influences of political behavior was one of the effective strategies adopted and successfully implemented by Clinton in the 1992 U.S. Presidential election. The same had a deeper impact on Blair, and it prompted him to implement it in the British parliamentary elections in the following year. It helped them to generate a new political approach based on broad, coordinated, and delivery-oriented techniques.
Third-way concept
Tony Blair was a former prime minister of the United Kingdom and served as a leader of the labor party. He always had a good rapport with Bill Clinton, who was a former president of the United States. The word “Third Way” is popular in its recent use. It was created in 1992 by a group of consultants. This policy was implemented in the United States in 1992 by Bill Clinton, and Tony Blair was inspired by this policy and that was executed in the United Kingdom. Tony Blair considered that it is very necessary to accept new challenges of economic globalization. This policy blends between traditional and social democracy and liberalism in some of the main areas of social improvement. Social reform was required in so many areas such as governance, the welfare state, education, political culture, and job creation in a new economy. “In Europe, the emerging discussion on the Third Way revolves around the Tony Blair success story and its foundations.” Tony Blair’s own genuine project has created a lot of confusion in its different layers and dimension. But he amazingly applied a three-layer revolution in a very short span of time. The most important quality of Blair’s version of the Third Way was its base on essential principles. These values mechanically involved certain structural and institutional obligations such as pluralism, civil rights, and social equality. In the outline of these basic principles, Tony Blair anticipated that at the policy level, conventional disagreements such as nationalism, and internationalism, human rights and responsibilities, poverty, and bias would be overcome. Blair considered his approach on Third Way was always right, and he barely admitted that it would require a lot of time to fulfill this project. In addition, Tony Blair was faithful to the devolution of the United Kingdom’s political system, to an improvement of the nation’s educational method, and to a more productive contribution of the United Kingdom in the European Union.
Labor party
There are two main political parties in England, namely the labor party and the conservative party. The Labor party is the important leftist party in England. They came into power in England at different times. The Labor party had a tremendous victory in 1997 under the leadership of Tony Blair. The Labor party had the slogan that they always stand for the principle of socialism. Tony Blair was elected as the leader of the labor party in 1994. He changed the old concept of the welfare state and introduced new policies. When Blair became the party leader, he introduced one vote for one person, and it was a great success. He succeeded in convincing the party’s character to its members, and it was based on the principle of socialism, that is, the redistribution of wealth and the centralized ownership of the means of production. Labor party had a tremendous victory in 1997 under the leadership of Tony Blair, with the majority of 179 seats out of 659 in the House of Commons. His stand was more conventional towards Europe. His foreign policies were followed by different national leaders. Blair’s labor party won the election in 2001, and it was the first time in the party’s history to complete its second full term. After the terrorist attack in America on September 11, 2001, he offered his full support to the US and sought support from other countries against terrorism in America.
When the labor party came into power in 1997, Tony Blair introduced policies for the weaker section and took measures to curtail the poverty of children. He introduced the national minimum wage, controlled inflation, brought down the crime rate, providing employment opportunities to the people, increased the literacy rate, and introduced policies in the education and health sector, policies for children and elders, policies in the business field, and other welfare measures.
Conclusion
To conclude, one can infer that Bill Clinton’s influence on Tony Blair has had various phases. The prominent one is his influence on international affairs. It includes their collation in different invasions and peace talks. Among them, the Iraqi invasion of the Americans, the Gulf war, and so on assumes greater importance. The notable thing regarding this collation is that both the American as well as the British administrations joined hand in hand under the leadership of Clinton and Blair. Clinton’s Democratic campaign had a tremendous influence on the social and political scenario, and it also strengthened the American social setup. Clinton’s Democratic campaign was favorable for the poor. He introduced a tax on the property of the rich. As part of the campaign, Clinton promoted better education for the poor that later attracted the attention of Blair, and the same acted as a motivating factor for Blair. Bill Clinton’s political influence on Tony Blair was too much, which could bring changes in the political field of both countries. The political power and ideologies of Clinton helped Blair in the formation of the operational activities and in handling international political issues. The concept of Clinton and Blair was different regarding peace and mutual cooperation. They diverged from Bush’s ways of attack and invasion, and it is clear with Blair’s acknowledgment in matters concerned with Iraq and Afghan issues. The third-way concept was the other attraction of their rule, and this policy joined traditional and social democracy with liberalism in some of the main areas of social improvement. Thus one can say that the different policies of Clinton have attracted Blair individually and as the British prime minister in executing national and international affairs.
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