LASKI, HAROLD JOSEPH (18931950), British left-wing socialist

and political theorist. Born in Manchester, he was the son of

Nathan *Laski. At the age of 18, Laski eloped with a non-Jewish
woman eight years older than himself. He was educated at Oxford
and was recognized as a brilliant scholar from his youth. Laski
lectured at McGill University, Canada, from 1914 until 1916, when
he taught at Harvard, there forming a close friendship with Oliver
Wendell Holmes, the U.S. Supreme Court justice. In 1920 he
became a lecturer at the London School of Economics and was
made professor of political science in 1926. He held this post until
his death and greatly contributed to the increase in standing of
that institution.
During the interwar years Laski played an important part in public
administration in Britain as a member of the industrial court, the
departmental committee on local government, and the committee
on legal education. He also sat on the lord chancellor's committee
on delegated legislation, which examined the accusation made by
the lord chief justice, Lord Hewart, that the administrative system
was no longer bound by the rule of law. Laski was a member of
the national executive of the British Labor Party from 1936, where
he represented the left intelligentsia. In 1945 he became
chairman of the party and was the chief target of conservative
propaganda at the general election of that year. Following the
Labor victory at the polls, however, Laski's influence waned, with
Prime Minister Clement Attlee telling him that "a period of silence
from you would be welcome" after he tried to intervene in policy
following the 1945 election. Nevertheless he had a profound
effect on the development of British socialism and was an
outstanding figure in the British Fabian Society. Laski was also one
of the founders and directors of the influential Left Book Club. His
writings include A Grammar of Politics (1925, 19384), in which he
set out his concept of the pluralistic state and The State in Theory
and Practice (1935) in which he adopted the Marxist doctrine of
the state being an instrument of economic power. His other works

include Parliamentary Government in England (1938), The

American Presidency (1940), and The American
Democracy (1949). For a considerable time he played no part in
Jewish life, but he helped Weizmann change the provisions of
Passfield's *White Paper (192930). The Nazi persecutions
aroused his interest in the Jewish problem. He denounced
antisemitism and began to take a deep interest in the Zionist
struggle. In 1943, he replied to a Labor Party resolution on the
Jewish question saying "The executive recognizes, and I as a Jew
in the fullest sense of the word claim, absolute equality of status
in political, social, and economic rights with any other people in
the world." At the end of the war Laski clashed with Bevin over
the Palestine problem and he declared himself in favor of a Jewish
commonwealth in Palestine. He welcomed the establishment of
Israel and was sympathetic to the work of the Po'alei Zion
movement and the "Friends of the Histadrut." Laski's last years
were clouded by his unwise involvement in a libel suit against an
allegedly antisemitic newspaper editor, which he lost after a
highly publicized trial. He died of bronchitis at the age of only 57.
Harold Joseph Laski (30 June 1893 24 March 1950) was a
British political theorist, economist, author, and lecturer. He was
active in politics and served as the chairman of the British Labour
Party during 19451946, and was a professor at the London
School of Economics from 1926 to 1950. He first promoted
pluralism, emphasising the importance of local voluntary
communities such as labour unions. After 1930 he shifted to a
Marxist emphasis on class conflict and the need for a workers'
revolution, which he hinted might be violent. [1] Laski's position
angered Labour leaders who promised a nonviolent democratic
transformation. Laski's position on democracy came under further
attack from Winston Churchill in the 1945 general election, and
the Labour party had to disavow Laski, its chairman. [2]
Laski was Britain's most influential intellectual spokesman for
Socialism in the interwar years. Particularly, his teaching greatly

influenced men such as Jawaharlal Nehru who later become

leaders of new nations in Asia and Africa as the British Empire was
dissolved. He was perhaps the most influential intellectual in the
Labour Party, especially for those on the left who shared his trust
and hope in Stalin's Soviet Union.[3] He was distrusted by the
Labour politicians who were in charge, such as Prime
Minister Clement Attlee, and never was given a major government
position or a peerage. With a keen commitment to human liberty
and equality for the working classes, he never resolved the
tension between his support for liberalism and Socialism. The
tension left him increasingly pessimistic about the future of
democracy.
Early life
Harold Laski was born in Manchester on 30 June 1893 to Nathan
Laski and Sarah Laski (ne Frankenstein). He had a disabled sister
named Mabel. His elder brother was Neville Laski while a cousin
was the founder of the Royal Court Theatre and father of the
author and publisher Anthony Blond.[4] Nathan Laski was a Jewish
cotton merchant and a leader of the Liberal Party.
Harold did his schooling at the Manchester Grammar School. In
1911, he studied Eugenics under Karl Pearson for six months. The
same year he met and married Frida Kerry, a lecturer of Eugenics.
His marriage to Frida, a gentile and eight years his senior
antagonised his family. He also repudiated his faith in Judaism,
claiming that Reason prevented him from believing in God. In
1914, he obtained a degree in History from New College, Oxford.
He was awarded the Beit memorial prize during his time at New
College. He failed his medical eligibility tests and thus missed
fighting in World War I. After graduation he worked briefly at
the Daily Herald under George Lansbury. His daughter Diana was
born in 1916.[5]
Academic career
In 1916, Laski was appointed as a lecturer of modern history
at McGill University and also started lecturing at Harvard
University. He also lectured at Yale in 191920. For his outspoken

support of the Boston Police Strike of 1919 Laski received severe

criticism. He was briefly involved with the founding of The New
School for Social Research in 1919.[6]
Laski cultivated a large network of American friends centred at
Harvard, whose law review he had edited. He was invited often to
lecture in America and wrote for The New Republic. He became
friends with Felix Frankfurter as well as Herbert Croly, Walter
Lippmann, Edmund Wilson, and Charles A. Beard. His long
friendship with Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes was
cemented by weekly letters, which have been published. [7] He
knew many powerful figures, and claimed to know many more.
Critics have often commented on Laski's repeated exaggerations
and self-promotion, which Holmes tolerated. His wife commented,
he was "half-man, half-child, all his life." [8]
Laski returned to England in 1920 and began teaching
government at the London School of Economics (LSE). In 1926 he
was made professor of political science at the LSE. Laski was an
executive member of the socialist Fabian Society during 1922
1936. In 1936, he co-founded the Left Book Club along with Victor
Gollancz and John Strachey. He was a prolific writer, producing a
number of books and essays throughout the 1920s and 1930s. [9]
While at the LSE in the 1930s, Laski developed a connection with
scholars from the Institute for Social Research, more commonly
known today as the Frankfurt School. In 1933, with almost all the
Institute's members now in exile, Laski was among a number of
British socialists, including Sidney Webb and R.H. Tawney, to
arrange for the establishment of a London office for the Institute's
use. After the Institute's move to Columbia University in 1934,
Laski was one of its sponsored guest lecturers invited to New York.
[10]
Laski also played a role in bringing Franz Neumann to join the
Institute. After fleeing Germany almost immediately after Hitler's
takeover, Neumann did graduate work in political science under
Laski and Karl Mannheim at the LSE, writing his dissertation on
rise and fall of the rule of law. It was on Laski's recommendation
that Neumann was then invited to join the Institute in 1936.

Ideology and political convictions

Laski's early work promoted pluralism, especially in the essays
collected in Studies in the Problem of
Sovereignty (1917), Authority in the Modern State (1919),
and The Foundations of Sovereignty (1921). He argued that the
state should not be considered supreme, because people could
and should have loyalties to local organisations, clubs, labour
unions and societies. The state should respect these allegiances
and promote pluralism and decentralisation. [14]
Laski became a proponent of Marxism and believed in a planned
economy based on the public ownership of the means of
production. Instead of as he saw it, a coercive state, Laski
believed in the evolution of co-operative states that were
internationally bound and stressed social welfare. [15] He also
believed since the capitalist class would not acquiesce in its own
liquidation, the cooperative commonwealth was not likely to be
attained without violence. But he also had a commitment to civil
liberties, free speech and association, and representative
democracy.[16] Initially he believed that the League of
Nations would bring about a "international democratic system".
However from the late 1920s his political beliefs became
radicalised and he believed that it was necessary to go beyond
capitalism to "transcend the existing system of sovereign states".
Laski was dismayed by the Hitler-Stalin pact of August 1939 and
wrote a preface to the Left Book Club collection criticising
it, Betrayal of the Left.[17] Between the beginning of World War IIin
1939 and the attack on Pearl Harbor which drew the United States
into the war in 1941, Laski was a prominent voice advocating
American support for the allied powers, becoming a prolific author
of articles in the American press, frequently undertaking lecture
tours in the US, and influencing prominent American friends
including Felix Frankfurter,Edward R. Murrow, Max Lerner and Eric
Sevareid.[18] In his last years he was disillusioned by the Cold
War and the communist takeover of Czechoslovakia.[5][9][16] George
Orwelldescribed him as "A socialist by allegiance, and a liberal by
temperament".[8]

Laski was always a Zionist at heart and always felt himself a part
of the Jewish nation, although he viewed traditional Jewish religion
as restrictive.[19]
Laski tried to mobilise Britain's academics, teachers and
intellectuals behind the socialist cause; the Socialist League was
one effort. He had some success but this element typically found
itself marginalised in the Labour Party. [20]
Political career
Laski's main political role came as a writer and lecturer on every
topic of concern to the left, including socialism, capitalism,
working conditions, eugenics, woman suffrage, imperialism,
decolonisation, disarmament, human rights, worker education,
and Zionism. He was tireless in his speeches and pamphleteering,
and was always on call to help a Labour candidate. In between he
served on scores of committees and carried a full load as a
professor and advisor to students.[21]
Laski plunged into Labour party politics on his return to London in
1920. In 1923, he turned down the offer of a parliament seat and
cabinet position by Ramsay MacDonald, and also a seat in Lords.
He felt betrayed by MacDonald in the crisis of 1931, and decided
that a peaceful, democratic transition to socialism would be
blocked by the violence of the opposition. In 1932, Laski joined
the Socialist League, a left-wing faction inside the Labour Party.
[22]
In 1937, he was involved in the failed attempt by Socialist
League in co-operation with the Independent Labour Party and
the Communist Party of Great Britain to form a Popular Front to
bring down the Conservative government of Neville Chamberlain.
During 193445 he served as an alderman in the Fulham Borough
Council and also the chairman of the libraries committee.
In 1937, the Socialist League was rejected by the Labour Party
and folded. He was elected as a member of the Labour Party's
National Executive Committee, of which he remained a member
until 1949. In 1944, he chaired the Labour party conference and
served as the party's chair during 194546. [14]

Declining role
During the war, he supported Prime Minister Churchill's coalition
government and gave countless speeches to encourage the battle
against Germany. He suffered a nervous breakdown brought
about by overwork. During the war he repeatedly feuded with
other Labour leaders, and with Churchill, on matters great and
small. He steadily lost his influence. [23]
In 1945 general election campaign Churchill warned that Laski
as the Labour Party chairmanwould be the power behind the
throne in an Attlee government. While speaking for the Labour
candidate in Nottinghamshire on 16 June 1945, Laski said "If
Labour did not obtain what it needed by general consent, we shall
have to use violence even if it means revolution". He was replying
to a question planted by Conservatives hoping to get exactly that
response. The next day accounts of Laski's speech appeared and
the Conservatives attacked the Labour Party for its chairman's
advocacy of violence. Laski filed a libel suit against the
Conservative Daily Express newspaper. The defence showed that
over the years Laski had often bandied about loose threats of
"revolution." The jury found for the defendant within forty minutes
of deliberations.[24]
Clement Attlee gave Laski no role in the new Labour government.
Even before the libel trial Laski's relationship with Attlee was a
strained one. Laski had once called Attlee "uninteresting and
uninspired" in the American press and even tried to remove him
by asking for Attlee's resignation in an open letter. He tried to
delay the Potsdam Conferenceuntil after Attlee's position was
clarified. He tried to bypass Attlee by directly dealing
with Winston Churchill.[9] Laski tried to preempt foreign policy
decisions, laying down guidelines for the new Labour
government.
Legacy
Deane has identified five distinct phases of Laski's thought that
he never integrated: pluralist (19141924), Fabian (19251931),

and Marxian (19321939). There followed a 'popular-front'

approach (19401945), and in the last years (19461950) nearincoherence and multiple contradictions. [27] Laski's long-term
impact on Britain is hard to quantify. Newman notes that, "It has
been widely held that his early books were the most profound and
that he subsequently wrote far too much, with polemics displacing
serious analysis."[14]
However Laski had a major long-term impact on support for
socialism in India and other countries in Asia and Africa. He taught
generations of future leaders at the LSE, most famously, his prize
student, V.K. Krishna Menon. According to John Kenneth Galbraith,
"the center of Nehru's thinking was Laski" and "India the country
most influenced by Laski's ideas".[16] It is mainly due to his
influence that the LSE has a semi-mythological status in India. He
was steady in his unremitting advocacy of the independence of
India. He was a revered figure to Indian students at the LSE. One
Indian Prime Minister of India said "in every meeting of the Indian
Cabinet there is a chair reserved for the ghost of Professor Harold
Laski".[28][29] His recommendation of K. R. Narayanan (later
President of India) to Jawaharlal Nehru (then Prime Minister of
India), resulted in Nehru appointing Narayanan to the Indian
Foreign Service.[30] In his memory, the Indian government
established The Harold Laski Institute of Political Science in 1954
at Ahmedabad