First published in 1990. What had been left out of Left thought? What had allowed the Left to substitute nostalgia for programme and action, and to continue to address itself exclusively to labouring men, despite insistent demands for inclusion from others – notably women – who recognised themselves as belonging to the Left? What’s Left?, a feminist challenge to the male-dominated ideology of the Labour Party, took shape under the pressure of two crucial events: the third successive election defeat of Labour by the Conservative Party, and the death of Raymond Williams....

First published in 1977. The New Left, as an organised political phenomenon, came – and went – largely in the 1960s. Was the Movement that went into precipitate decline after 1969 the same New Left that had developed a decade earlier? Nigel Young’s thesis is that the core New Left, as it had evolved by the mid-1960s, had a unique identity that set it apart from other Old Left and Marxist groups. He believes that this was dissipated in the later developments of the black and student movements, and in the opposition to the Vietnam war. By 1968 – the watershed year – an acute...

First published in 1988. This collection of essays examines aspects of labour and industrial relations history in the textiles sector of Northern England during the mature phase of industrialisation before World War One and the period of retrenchment during the interwar economic recession. There are chapters on wool, worsted, silk, cotton spinning and weaving, and cotton finishing. The volume includes contributions by historians interested in employers’ organisations and management strategies, labour, trade union and women’s history. As such it provides a broader framework in which...

First published in 1984. This volume brings together many of the foremost French and North American specialists on the French working class movement. Although they differ substantially in their theoretical and ideological orientation, they share a left perspective. Their original essays provide a coherent and comprehensive analysis of the history of the movement, focusing on the constraints and opportunities created by the economic crisis of the 1970s and the political change ushered in by the Socialist Party’s victory in 1981.

First published in 1992. The collapse of communist rule in Eastern Europe has led to a widespread view that socialism is a dead, or at least dying, force. Labour’s Utopias argues that this assumption is based on the popular conception that socialism’s various traditions are simply different means to a common end. The author looks at three strands of socialism – Bolshevism, Fabianism and German Social Democracy – in order to assess whether this argument is justified, concluding that in fact each has a distinct vision of an ideal future.

This study will appeal to...

First published in 1978. Britain’s unions were blamed by many people for the country’s post-war economic decline. Portrayed as greedy wreckers who wanted to run the country, they had become scapegoats for the state of the nation. This anatomy of Britain’s diverse and complex trade union movement sets out to question that widespread opinion.

The main argument advanced in the study is that unions in Britain were too weak, not too strong. From the 1940s until the 1970s, Robert Taylor believes, they had failed to achieve the constructive influence over British society that union...

First published in 1983. This book combines a case study of class relations, politics and voting in Sweden with a comparative analysis of distributive conflicts and politics in eighteen OECD countries. Its underlying theoretical theme is the development of class relations in free-enterprise or capitalise democracies. This title will be of interest to students of history and politics.

First published in 1988. In a few short years during and just after the Great War, the Labour Party and the trade unions established themselves firmly at the centre of the British political and industrial scene. But at the same time, the politics and organisation of both Labour and unions were reshaped.

This is a grass-roots study of a key period in the building of Labour’s political and industrial base. It is a study of how unions and Labour were organised and motivated to seize their moments of destiny – and of how a new political industrial movement was limited by the...

First published in 1982. To study Tillett’s career is to study the modern British labour movement in its formative stages. His rhetoric and activities cast light upon some of the most important periods in labour history. In this book, not only the career of this remarkable and mercurial man is analysed, but our knowledge of the wider scene in which he played so major a role is increased. This title will be of interest to scholars and students of political history.

First published in 1985. The essays in this book pull together the diverse strands of research to give a comprehensive picture of the Labour Party, which strived to carve out for itself a niche within an existing political framework. The first part of the book examines the composition, the national, local and regional organisation of the party, and its relations with the working classes, the TUC and the Liberals. In the second part the contributors discuss the party’s stand on the main political issues of the day: education, the suffragettes, Ireland and other major areas of concern in...