From Liberalism to Labour
| Published date | 01 June 1967 |
| Date | 01 June 1967 |
| DOI | 10.1111/j.1467-9248.1967.tb01845.x |
| Subject Matter | Notes and Review Articles |
210
NOTES AND REVIEW ARTICLES
The results
are
unsurprising, and make much of what Marx said seem rather truistic, and much
else
seem unrealistic and false. But the fact remains that this approach does harmonize with
Marx’s avowed intentions and his avowed empiricism.
It
is difficult to make anything of the
1844 manuscripts except on the basis that they are Marx’s attempt to put economic stuffing into
Hegelian categories, to locate in the world of industrial change the conflicts which Hegel had
located in the world of Spirit. This process of maturation
is
after all just what we should expect
from the
man
who declared: ‘Philosophy stands in the same relation to the study of the actual
world
as
onanism to sexual love.’’
FROM LIBERALISM
TO
LABOUR
P.
M.
WILLIAMS
Nuffield
College,
Oxford
A
GOOD
deal
has
been written on the growth of the
Labour
Party, much less on the history
of
the Liberals. They tend, therefore, to
be
seen through the classconscious eyes of their rivals and
supplanters, who saw them
as
a
party of businessmen incapable of satisfying the workers’
demands. Gladstone and Bright did not try to do
SO;
Chamberlain did, but soon defected
to
the
other side; Lloyd George returned to the attempt too late, when the foundation and inexorable
advance of Labour had already doomed the Liberal Party. It lingered on between the wars only
to obstruct Labour’s progressive policies by its backward-looking commitment to private
enterprise.
This familiar interpretation
can
now be
reassessed
in the light of several recent books.2 Some
are
based on extensive work
on
unpublished papers, others-often more usefully-present the
available material
in
a
readable and coherent way. The two journalists write wholly from
published
sources.
Mr. Watkins provides
a
useful if slight contribution to the history of that
darkest of dark ages, the day before yesterday. Mr.
Cross
sometimes gives irritatingly brief and
over-simplified summaries of great issues, but his life of Snowden is
a
reliable and straightforward
account of the career, outlook and character of this powerful and puzzling politician (and of his
wife, by whose instructions all his papers were destroyed).
Dr.
Wilson,
an
Australian.
also
relies heavily on the press, and though he has used many private papers, he does not feel it
necessary to quote for quotation’s
sake.
His book presents
a
clear and convincing narrative
with vigour, clarity and judgement. It does not pretend to
be
the last word on the subject-
Liberalism in the constituencies gets scant attention-but it is
a
most readable and valuable
account.
Three
of the other four authors seem
to
suffer from the academic fallacy that unpublished
material constitutes
a
necessary and sufficient excuse for breaking into print. Professor Ausubel,
1
Quoted in Wilson.
To
The
Finland
Station,
p.
192.
2
THE
FORMATION
OF
THE
LIBERAL PARTY 1857-1 868.
By
JOHN
VINCENT.
(Constable.
JOHN BRIGHT,
VI(JT0RIAN
REFORMER.
By
HERMAN
AUSUBEL.
(John
Wiley
&
Sons.
JOSEPH CHAMBERLAIN.
RADICALISM
AND EMPIRE, 1868-1914.
By
PETER
WER.
THE
GREAT LIBERAL REVIVAL, 1903-6.
By
MCHAEL
CRATON
and
H.
w.
MCCREADY.
THE
DOWNFALL
OF
THE
LIBERAL PARTY 1914-1935.
By
TREVOR
WILSON.
(Collins.
PHILIP SNOWDEN.
By
corn
CROSS.
(Borrie
&
RockIifl
Pp. xii
+
356. 50s.)
LEFT
IN
THE CENTRE. THE INDEPENDENT
LABOUR
PARTY 1893-1940.
By
THE
LIBERAL DILEMMA.
By
ALAN
WATKINS.
(McCibbon
&
Kee.
Pp. 158.30s.)
Pp.
xxxv+381.42.)
Pp.
xvi
+
250.45s.)
(Cassell.
Pp.
xv+349.42s.)
(Hansard
Sociefy.
Pp. 47.7s.
6d)
Pp. 416.42s.)
ROBERT
E.
DOWSE.
(Longmans, Green
&
Co.
Pp. ix+231.42.)
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