A Tory toast to politics as entertainment

A little British row is rolling about this summer, waiting for its time to become – or to fail to become – a scandal. A television documentary is planned, to be aired some time before the next general election, on the Bullingdon Club, a champagne and window-smashing resort of Oxford toffs to which David Cameron, leader of the Conservative opposition, George Osborne, his shadow chancellor, and Boris Johnson, the Conservative mayor of London, all belonged. There are sensitivities that too vivid an exposure might undermine Mr Cameron's determined rebranding of his party.

Yet the Tory worry may not just be overdone, but actually quite wrong. The Bullingdon Club excesses in which Mr Cameron, Mr Johnson and Mr Osborne reportedly partook may have been a vital rite of passage to power. As one of their college contemporaries, the writer Toby Young, put it in the Daily Mail newspaper: "They grasped that the theatrical element of Oxford's secret clubs and societies, the fact that so much of their activity seemed designed to dazzle and mystify bemused onlookers, is precisely what makes them such ideal training grounds for British public life."

Entertainment is a growing part of politics. Tony Blair knew it: the former prime minister demonstrated this when he and his wife did a little number for The Sun newspaper before the last election on how many times they made love of a night, and again when he did a skit, using the catchphrase "Am I bothered?" with the comedian Catherine Tate, to great praise. In the US, Barack Obama was prefigured in the hit television series The West Wing by the figure of Democratic (and Hispanic) presidential contender Matthew Santos – a character created after consultation with David Axelrod, now the president's strategist. Nicolas Sarkozy has, in one presidency, reversed the French elite's habitual detestation of publicity by putting selected scenes from his private life on display. But of course, Silvio Berlusconi, Italian prime minister, septuagenarian, lover and for many Italians a real mensch, is the man who points most firmly to the future. He knows it works.

If Mr Berlusconi is the patron saint of politics as a show (even though he has said, with trademark modesty: "I'm no saint"), the movement also has its Machiavelli. Drew Westen, the American psychologist, has written that "the political brain is an emotional brain". This has been interpreted by political operatives to mean: make them laugh, make them cry, make them go "How awful!" But above all, keep them entertained. Politics' Faustian pact with television has, of course, a yawning gate of hell beneath it: the flick of the remote button.

Most people do not know much about most events most of the time. The media bombard them with entertainment and have, in the past two decades or so, made politicians a large part of that. Politicians must enter into the spirit, appearing on the chat shows and demonstrating that they can take a joke.

They must also emote in public, though they must be careful to get the tone right. For a shift of emotional sensibility has occurred. Where we once admired discipline, restraint and emotional disguise, we now prefer the opposite: Princess Diana wrote the primer for this. The undisciplined, unrestrained and emotionally open persona is prized: and the sinner may be pardoned, even embraced, if he or she does it, with some style, on television.

This shift means that many feel more comfortable with politicians such as Mr Berlusconi. A man of show business, he has injected its values deep into politics. He has certainly started a trend that crosses the political divide: Beppe Grillo, Italy's most famed comedian and blogger – whose show is a brilliant rant against the Italian political class – has announced that he will stand for the leadership of the Democratic party, the main party of the left.

We cannot hope to have a British Berlusconi. But our last prime minister had an instinct for show business and future ones may take it further – for close behind Mr Cameron treads a master entertainer. Mr Johnson is much cleverer than his dishevelled appearance and "What ho, Jeeves!" humour make him appear. He also has the comic's ability to hide it, and to appeal to our love of a laugh. Labour's ablest successors to the prime minister – David Miliband, foreign secretary, and James Purnell, the former work and pensions secretary – are policy wonks, disciplined, cerebral and publicly serious, not fun.

Mr Berlusconi spent his early manhood crooning on cruise ships. A misspent youth? Per niente! He may, even then, before making his fortune and crafting his political career, have grasped something most did not: that the world he would make his own was not just the Republic of Italy, but also the Republic of Entertainment. That republic has since expanded its borders to take in a great many states and pose their politicians the question: can you dance, sing, tell and take a joke? No? Thank you, we'll let you know. Next!

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