With a glittering CV and three books out this summer, the MP is tipped for a brilliant career, even being the first black Tory cabinet minister
'If I want to read a book, I write one," said Benjamin Disraeli, the first political "outsider" to become Tory prime minister. Few of those to follow Disraeli into the House of Commons over the last century and a half can have taken that Victorian lesson to heart as strongly as Kwasi Kwarteng. That the new MP will have no fewer than three books coming out in the space of a month, just a year and a half into his parliamentary career, suggests that this self-styled "black Boris" (as in Johnson) also sees scribbling as a route to the top of the greasy pole.
Kwarteng is often said to be a very different type of Tory, though this is almost entirely due to his Ghanaian parentage. In most respects, his background is as traditional as it gets, his path from Eton through Cambridge resembling the histories of the imperial administrators whom he sketches in his new book Ghosts of Empire, to be published by Bloomsbury next month.
Kwarteng's father was educated in what was then called the Gold Coast, in a leafy Anglican school emulating the English public school, down to its Winchester-educated English headmaster, becoming an administrator of post-imperialism as a Commonwealth Secretariat economist. Kwasi, born in London, was sent away to board at prep school at eight. "Probably too young, but I loved it," he has said.
As his book revisits the Victorian confidence which made the empire, its author has rarely been thought short of confidence himself. "Scholars' house at Eton was a competitive intellectual hothouse," said one contemporary. "But everyone said that probably the greatest brain of the lot was the guy with the extraordinary name." Kwarteng's interview at Trinity College, Cambridge, became the stuff of an oft-retold Eton school legend. A relatively young tutor ended a slightly nervy interview by mentioning that this was his first time interviewing entrance candidates. "Oh, don't worry, sir, you did fine," smiled the 18-year-old Kwarteng reassuringly.
He proved less unflappable as a University Challenge contestant two years later, swearing: "Oh fuck, I've forgotten" after buzzing in. Somehow it was missed by the production team. Cue viewer complaints and a starring role for Kwarteng in a "Rudiversity Challenge" news story on page three of the Sun no less. It proved a very minor glitch. Kwarteng's friends were not surprised when the college quiz quartet ended the series as national champions, another accolade for this habitual acquirer of school and university prizes. But Kwarteng's reputation was as a rather personable swot, enjoying arguments over the dinner table, combining charm with the impression of being better read than everybody else.
After a masters as a Kennedy scholar at Harvard, and a Cambridge PhD in economic history, he went to work as a fund manager, but the scholarly bug still bit. Ghosts of Empire seems unlikely to join a recent fashion for historical pro-empire boosterism. Kwarteng is billed to speak in a London debate this autumn against the motion that "Britain's former colonies should stop blaming the empire for their ills", the Tory MP taking what would traditionally be the left's line. Kwarteng's instinctive position is on the fence of such a polarised debate, less interested in "good thing" versus "bad thing" polemics about empire and more in the value of studying how we became the societies that we are today.
"This is his first book," says Bloomsbury's jacket and publicity material preparing for the 15 August launch. But it may take a photo-finish to verify that. In its riverside offices last week, rival publisher Biteback received the first copies of another Kwarteng tome, Gridlock Britain, a wonkish polemic about Britain's transport problems. Kwarteng, a member of the transport select committee, believes in markets rather than integrated planning and demands road pricing on the eyecatching ground that tax-funded free roads represent the last gasp of "socialism".
On the very same day that his other new book was winging its way to Kwarteng, the MP's office was submitting, just a few days late, the manuscript of After the Coalition, a book with which seven members of the Tory class of 2010 will seek to make the party conference weather this autumn. He has been a key player behind the book, alongside Liz Truss MP; he pitched the book for publication and has been the point man in its co-ordination.
Kwarteng is economically "dry", but his politics are less clearly defined than others in the group, such as the independent-minded rightwinger Priti Patel or the formidable lawyer Dominic Raab. (Charlie Elphicke, Brandon Lewis and Chris Skidmore, another historian, complete the group). Unusually, all seven MPs will claim joint responsibility and do not plan to reveal who has written which chapter, in an attempt to pitch a coherent manifesto.
It is a calculated gamble. Those who present themselves as the voice of a new generation must have plenty to say. They want to talk to their own party about the radical reforms they might attempt without those pesky Lib Dems to placate, though Kwarteng will be among those keeping an ambitious eye on the Downing Street reaction.
There is nothing new about a non-white Conservative MP. In 1895, Sir Mancherjee Bhownagree won Bethnal Green with a strongly pro-empire pitch. But it took a century to elect his successors. Beyond Nirj Deva's brief spell in Parliament after 1992, it took two Conservatives of Asian origin breaking through in 2005 to diversify the all-white benches. David Cameron has been eager to promote proof that the party has changed, but MPs worry about being pigeonholed by tokenism. The answer to this conundrum has been strength in numbers. After the 2010 election, there are no longer two non-white Tory MPs but more than a dozen, liberated to be able to strike a wide variety of approaches in engaging (or not) with race, and the range of issues that motivated each of them to enter politics. The declining novelty value may dampen the tendency to hail any black politician as our first black prime minister in the quest to identify a "British Obama".
Kwarteng cannot complain that his selection as a Tory candidate was reported with references to the "black Boris", since his own campaign team had enthusiastically propagated the label, his friendship with his fellow old Etonian featuring in his pitch to a "primary" selection meeting of 400.
Strength in numbers brings its challenges too. The Tory class of 2010 ? with nearly 150 new MPs ? is a great competitive hothouse, especially once MPs start thinking about boundary changes that will shrink the Commons.
Kwarteng has a little work to do to stand out in this highly talented cohort. Despite his multiple volumes, foreign affairs specialist Rory Stewart appears the most academically gifted, a mixed political blessing, while Louise Mensch has been the loyalist with the highest media profile.
Many new Tory MPs are remarkably confident in disdaining the traditional route of leadership loyalty. Few now see getting a junior ministry in an overcrowded coalition as a way to win definition in the party. Kwarteng has been a confident Commons performer, though some thought him a little too eager to assist the whips with helpful questions. More than a quarter of the class of 2010 have already rebelled against the whip, though Kwarteng has yet to blemish his loyalty copybook.
Is the "black Boris" tag that apposite? He is a more diligent character, keener on the library than the Bullingdon. "He reminds me more of Ken Clarke than Boris, with a confidence to argue any point in the Commons, whether you feel he believes it or not," says one MP.
Other contrasts may prove to Kwarteng's advantage too. Johnson has thrived as a directly elected London mayor but, like Ken Livingstone, struggled in the Commons, having been famous before he arrived.
Kwarteng has built an impressive reputation, trusted on the inside, though remaining off the radar of a surprising number of Westminster players. His habit of being seen in the tea rooms with grandees and senior MPs reminds one colleague of the quiet, assiduous networking of John Major. He is thought to have his eyes on the whips' office too, though publishing books is not the usual route in.
With such a crowded field wanting to be noticed as the voice of this Tory generation, a name to remember won't do any harm.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2011/jul/31/observer-profile-kwasi-kwarteng
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