Watching the English

THE MODERATION RULE

The phrase 'work hard, play hard' became popular in England in the 1980s, and you will still quite often hear people use it to describe their exciting lifestyle and their dynamic approach to work and leisure. They are almost always lying. The English, on the whole, do not 'work hard and play hard': we do both, and most other things, in moderation. Of course, 'work moderately, play moderately' does not have quite the same ring to it, but I'm afraid it is a far more accurate description of typical English work and leisure habits. We work fairly diligently, and have a modest amount of fun in our free time.

I will not be thanked for this rather dull portrait, so I should make it clear that it is not just an impression or subjective judgement: these are the findings not only of SIRC's own quite extensive research on work habits and attitudes, but also of every other study I could find on this subject. Nor are these rather staid, conventional, conservative habits confined to the middle-aged or middle-class. Contrary to popular opinion, the 'youth of today' are not feckless, irresponsible, thrill-seeking hedonists. If anything, both our own research and other surveys and studies have found that the young of all classes are more sensible, industrious, moderate and cautious than their parents' generation. I find this rather worrying, as it suggests that, unless our younger generation grows out of these middle-aged attitudes as they get older (which seems somewhat unlikely), the English will as a nation become even more ploddingly moderate than we are now.

If you think I'm exaggerating either the extent or the dangers of English youthful moderation, a few examples from the SIRC research might help to convince you:

Safe, Sensible, Bourgeois Aspirations

In our survey, when asked where they would like to be in ten years time, nearly three quarters (72 per cent) of young people chose the safe, sensible options of being 'settled down' or 'successful at work', compared with just 38 per cent of the older generation. Only 20 per cent of 16-24 year olds chose the more adventurous option of 'travelling the world/living abroad', compared with 28 per cent of 45-54 year olds. The older age group was also twice as likely as the youngsters to want to be 'footloose and fancy-free'. In focus groups and informal interviews, when we asked about their aspirations in life, almost all young working people wanted to be 'financially secure and stable'. Home ownership was a long-term goal.

Future Stability More Important Than Fun

Gosh, what a dull lot, I thought, when these results first came in. In the hope of finding some more imaginative and rebellious attitudes, I turned to the questions on 'fun'. I was disappointed to find that on the issue of 'having fun now vs thinking about the future', where one might expect the younger generation to be at least a bit less mature and responsible, the views of young people and their elders were more or less identical. Only 14 per cent of 16-24 year olds felt that 'at my age it's more important to have fun than to think too much about the future' - and about the same minority of 45-54s were also carefree fun-lovers.

Our focus-group and interview findings indicated that young working people's only major 'fun' indulgence is going out to pubs and clubs on Friday and Saturday nights, or perhaps a clothes-shopping spree. Many of our focus-group participants tried to make all this sound as 'wild' as possible, one proudly announcing that 'I spend most of my money abusing my body, really - going out to pubs and clubs, smoking' but essentially it boiled down to a quite tame routine of weekend drinking, dancing and shopping.

Industrious, Diligent and Cautious with Money

I was not much cheered by the next lot of findings, which showed that young people also seem to be more industrious than their parents' generation: 70 per cent of 16-24s believe that 'getting ahead in life is down to hard work and dedication'. Only 53 per cent of the older generation share this diligent attitude, with 41 per cent adopting the more laid-back view that success is a matter of luck, contacts or 'the right breaks'.

Not only that, but we found that young people are just as likely as their elders to be careful and responsible with money - in fact, the 16-24s put a larger proportion of their income into savings than the 45-54s. Our survey showed that young people are significantly less likely to get themselves into debt than the older group: only 44 per cent owe money on credit cards and store cards, compared with 66 per cent of their parents' generation.

The Dangers of Excessive Moderation

I felt like saying, 'Oh for heaven's sake, lighten up! Live a little! Rebel a bit! Whatever happened to "Turn on, tune in, drop out"?' All right, I did and still do, realize that many people will find these results reassuring. Even some of my colleagues felt that I was making rather an unnecessary fuss. 'Surely it is a good thing that most young people are being diligent, prudent and responsible?' they said. 'Why do you find this so depressing?'

My concern is that these largely commendable tendencies are also symptoms of a wider and more worrying trend: our findings indicated that young people are increasingly affected by the culture of fear, and the risk-aversion and obsession with safety that have become defining features of contemporary society. This trend, described by one sociologist as a 'cultural climate of pervasive anxiety', is associated with the stunted aspirations, cautiousness, conformism and lack of adventurous spirit that were evident among many of the young people in our survey and focus groups.

There has always, of course, been a significant degree of exaggeration and even invention in the standard laments and outcries about 'the youth of today', their fecklessness and irresponsibility. So perhaps our findings merely showed what has always been the case: that young people are rather more conventional and responsible than they are cracked up to be. Well, yes. And in their adherence to the moderation rule, the young people we studied were to some extent just 'being English'. Whether I like it or not, we are a deeply conservative, moderate people. But what worried me was that these young people were more conservative, moderate and conformist than their parents' generation, that there seemed to be a trend towards even greater excesses of moderation (if one can say such a thing). And although I am in many ways very English, I can only take so much moderation. Moderation is all very well, but only in moderation.