THE battle lines are being drawn for the next general election — but guess what? There is no real battle.

The British people are living through a masterclass in the nature of bourgeois democracy — that is, a system with democratic forms but capitalist-class rule.

Such a regime can only allow choices within fairly limited parameters: the needs of capital accumulation and the maintenance of the rate of profit push all governmental decisions in one direction.

That is not to say that competing parties offer no choices at all. Priorities can be reshuffled within limits, and occasionally strategic questions — like Britain’s membership of the European Union — are thrown up for decision.

But the imperatives of the Establishment are, at any one given time, firmly set. Capitalists hate unpredictability more than almost anything else, and so a major change of course at the will of the electorate every few years cannot be countenanced.

There are constraints of course, but they lie within the dynamics of the system, as Liz Truss found out a year ago.

She was undone by the international money markets which swiftly concluded that with Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng in Downing Street, no-one’s capital was safe.

The interesting thing to note is that this effective veto on government policy of unfunded, unscrutinised tax cuts came from within the organic workings of the system and is therefore seen as in itself unremarkable.

Contrast with Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party. Corbyn’s plan for government represented a radical break from the zombie neoliberalism prevailing since the crash of 2008. It was an unacceptable intrusion by the people into the sacred rites of power.

The Establishment deemed that entirely unacceptable from the outset and fought a vicious, protracted and ultimately successful campaign to bring the aberration to an end.

So to today, when radical social democracy and intransigent market fundamentalism have both been placed out of court — the first because it threatened class relationships, the second because it destabilised the markets.

As a result, at the next general election, there will be no change in the main lines of government economic and social policy. Call it “Stunakerism” if you think this beast — public austerity in search of privately profitable growth — deserves a proper name.

Rishi Sunak has steadied the capitalist ship following the Truss squall; Keir Starmer has pledged that his Labour government will neither spend nor raise any more money.

There will be neither impositions on the rich nor relief offered to the poor. As for public ownership of anything, that is out of the question. No capitalist horse will be even slightly scared.

So the argument will be over “competence.” Who will be the best managers of the collective interests of the capitalist system? At a time when schools are closed overnight because of structural safety issues known about for years, Tory incompetence may seem like a winning line of attack for Labour.

But it is flawed. It is not self-evident that Rachel Reeves is more competent than Jeremy Hunt, nor even Starmer than Sunak. Yvette Cooper may score over Suella Braverman, but bars do not come any lower.

And Labour too will be found, in time, to have its own Chris Graylings and Gavin Williamsons.

This is politics as the ruling class likes it: a job interview for the most capable manager.  An exercise where the most dangerous quality is hope.

This mandates that the people have to effect their own changes in their circumstances and look to politicians for no more than subsequent ratification. Bourgeois democracy is a box that demands to be thought outside of.