“We need to remake the argument all over again for the right values in our politics,” he said, while noting that the cultural change catalyzed by globalization is moving “too fast” for some people to keep up with.
Cameron noted that Western countries need to “course correct” their immigration policies to help their populations feel more secure. That course correction should not necessarily include building physical “walls” like Trump’s much-discussed barrier along the Mexican border, said Cameron, because “most immigration doesn’t happen at borders.
“Restoring faith in borders and in immigration is part of restoring faith in diversity,” said Cameron. “In celebrating diversity, we should be celebrating what we’re trying to achieve: Countries that are strong and integrated. We should be seeing just how meritocratic our societies can be. The Left needs to get behind immigration control.”
Scapegoating immigrants and other minority populations works against the strengths of modern capitalist democracies, said Cameron. “We need to oppose divisive and destructive identity politics. We’ll never evolve if we keep trying to exploit people for political gain.”
In particular, Cameron pointed out that both Left-wing and Right-wing political causes are exploiting unrest in the Middle East, Islam and Islamism for their own purposes without addressing the danger of Islamism itself.
“The Right seems to think the problem is Islam. Full stop,” said Cameron. “They believe that Muslims, Christians and Hindus cannot live together, that there’s an inevitable clash of civilizations and that is the reason behind country travel bans and immigration controls.”
The Left believes Islamic extremism is caused by poverty, or a failure of Western policies, he said, but many terrorists had middle-class upbringings, were educated in the West, and many of the worst terrorist attacks occurred long before the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“We will win when we demonstrate that our values are the best ways of delivering the peace and prosperity that all people on earth crave,” said Cameron.
The economic causes underlying populism should not be addressed by what Cameron calls “the counsel of despair,” which may call for increased government spending in hopes of stimulating economic activity, or for no changes in political or fiscal behavior in hopes that an external source of prosperity may be found at random.
Cameron says that the best solution for the record deficits and stifling debt he encountered at the beginning of his term as prime minister ended up being to “live within our means and pay our way in the world” through a series of deep cuts to government spending, followed up eventually with corporate tax cuts. The changes resulted in higher levels of employment, a burst of new business development, and growth that outpaced the rest of the European Union combined, said Cameron.