Book Review: Jonathan Tonge, Máire Braniff, Thomas Hennessey, James W McAuley and Sophie A Whiting, The Democratic Unionist Party: From Protest to Power
| Author | Henry Jarrett |
| Published date | 01 August 2016 |
| Date | 01 August 2016 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/1478929916645707 |
| Subject Matter | Book ReviewsBritain and Ireland |
473
twentieth century who failed to ascend to the
a man of enormous passions whose legacy
top of the greasy pole or the leadership of a
continues to loom large in British politics.
political party. Yet despite the attention he has
already received, Nicklaus Thomas-Symonds
Mark Klobas
argues that there is a need for yet another
(Scottsdale Community College)
examination of Bevan’s life and career. Seeking
The Author(s) 2016
to chart a course between Michael Foot’s laud-
Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav
atory two-volume work published over four
DOI: 10.1177/1478929916645702
psrev.sagepub.co
decades ago and John Campbell’s critical 1987
study, he offers a new assessment of Bevan’s
achievements, one that asserts his significance
The Democratic Unionist Party:
for Britons today.
From Protest to Power by Jonathan
At the centre of Thomas-Symonds’s inter-
Tonge, Máire Braniff, Thomas Hennessey,
pretation of Bevan is his view of Bevan not as
James W McAuley and Sophie A Whiting.
the rabble-rousing rebel of popular imagina-
Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. 247pp.,
tion but as a politician who understood power
£55.00 (h/b), ISBN 9780198705772
and worked to attain it to effect his agenda.
Thomas-Symonds sees this as the explanation
From its formation in 1971, the Demo-cratic
for why Bevan turned from unionism to poli-
Unionist Party (DUP) has risen from a small
tics in the 1920s, believing that the political
party on the fringes of politics to be the larg-
arena offered the best means of addressing his
est political force in Northern Ireland. This
community’s needs. Bevan was one of the
book aims to chart this transformation and
many Labour politicians of the era for whom
explain how a party traditionally opposed to
the Second World War proved pivotal to their
political agreements entered into a power-
rise in Parliament, and his stature as a leading
sharing deal with its staunch...
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