Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Britain in 1914 was as near to revolution as it has ever been in the 20th century.
A dispirited government, barely united and effetely led, groped its way between right-wing rebellion backed by military force in Ulster, and a militant
syndicalist Labour movement freed from respectable leadership. Three decades
later, a Labour party won a greater and more convincing electoral victory than
any working-class party has won before or since in Western Europe. Between
these two landmarks lies a period as yet scarcely charted by serious historiography: a period beloved by scrapbook historians and television raconteurs
the roaring twenties, skirts two inches above the knee, trial marriage, toothpaste inpowder out, the General Strike, Larwoods body-line action; 2 million
unemployed, the king who renounced a throne for love; committed poets, the
Oxford Union debate; the rise of Hitlet and the Loch Ness monster. Profound
historical developments and epiphenomenal trivia jostle together like cards in an
unshuffled pack. Sometimes we are dealt Victor Sylvester and crossword
puzzles, sometimes Stalinist purges and the Spanish civil war. But it doesnt
really matter what we are dealt; whatever the cards we hold in our hand, they
always add up, so we are told, to a composite picture of the twenties or the
thirties.
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The historian refrains from reflection, so the professional sentimentalist gratefully steps into the breach, touting assorted recollections
of the best-forgotten banalities of our forefathers. Gossip decks herself
out in all the trappings of history; so successfully that she finds herself
solemnly inscribed on university reading lists. And this situation is fair
enough whilst historians run away from the attempt to create any
serious historical dialectic. Yet until it is done, the peculiarly murky
contours of contemporary Britain will never be understood. These
years are littered with unsolved historical mysteries. So long as they
remain unsolved, it is unreasonable to expect any historian to present
this period as an historical totality. Nevertheless, any historian who
wishes to achieve real historical understanding of it, must confront and
illuminate four major and inter-related themes, which dominate this
entire epoch, and constitute the essential matrices of any interpretation
in depth. A. J. P. Taylor whose English History 191419451, has just
appeared as a contribution to the Oxford History of England, has
provided the first continuous and lucidly written narrative of the
whole period. But he, too, has failed to arrest the atrophy of any
conceptual schematization of modern British history.
The first of these inter-related themes concerns the attitude of the
ruling class towards the prospects of social democracy or perhaps more
remotely, socialism. It was not until 1918 that the propertied classes
were first fully confronted with the task of managing a strong and
coherent working-class movement in an arena of full political democracy. The situation was potentially dangerous. The Labour party vote
rose from 400,000 in 1910 to nearly 2,400,000 in 1918, and the end of
the First World War was accompanied by a crescendo of shop-floor
militance. Baldwins torpid prophylactics seem to have cast a spell over
the inquiring historian. Despite its moderate leadership, the Tory
party remained aggressively right wing throughout the 1920s and the
1930swhenever it broke away from liberal or Baldwinian moorings,
it waged crude and bitter class warfare (counter-revolutionary war
against the Bolsheviks in 1918, the Trades Disputes Act of 1927,
unemployment cuts in 1931 and Imperial preference in 193132). When
and how far the Conservatives accepted political democracy and how
this affected party strategy has never been seriously considered.
Indeed the various groupings within the Conservative party still
remain obscure. It is still not known for instance, except in the vaguest
of generalities, who supported Mondism and similar policies of class
collaboration, nor how far the character and social theory of the
Conservative party was modified by the infusion of Lloyd Georges
business elite. It is arguable that the ruling class was prevented from
provoking social war, more by accident than intention. The only
occasion when the Labour movement ever mustered enough self
confidence to look dangerous came in the four years after 1918;
precisely the time when the powerful lunatic fringe of the Unionist
party had been diverted by the brilliant opportunism of Lloyd George
into some comparatively harmless bloodletting in Ireland. After 1922
the heart went out of the Labour movement. The Triple Alliance
broke up, the post-war boom collapsed, wages fell, unemployment
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colonial industries (versus capital goods). Without some such examination, the rifts within the ruling class attitudes towards imperialism
which developed much more prominently after the Second World
War, will defy explanation. Taylor hardly mentions these problems. He
suggests that the British in India never recovered morale after Amritsar
which is probably true. There seems to have been some tacit agreement amongst the British ruling class in the 1920s that India would
have to goonly this can explain the extraordinary demise of Churchill
in 1930. But unless we care to interpret them, as simple idealist supporters of the Commonwealth, the question remainswhy and how
they changed their minds. The problem also involves explanation at
another level. The empire between the wars provided jobs for at least
20,000 administrators, from pro-consuls to military police. Family
traditions were also involved; a whole imperial culture had been
created, the British people were indoctrinated by an imperial ideology
from the cradle to the grave: by schools, youth organizations, the
press, triumphal processions, broadcasting, and the church. No detailed study has ever been made of this phenomenon. But it is difficult
to believe that it did not seriously affect the character of politics
between the wars: especially since the beginnings of Imperial crisis,
must in India and Egypt at least, have become discernible to all in the
1930s. No historian could write a history of modern Britain with the
Imperial factor omittedbut this is generally what has happened.
Appeasement constitutes the third major problem of the period. Here
Taylor is on home ground, and is able to conduct a skilful and well
documented defence of his own highly idiosyncratic interpretation of
British foreign policy and the causes of the Second World War.
Recently there has been a large amount of research into European
diplomatic archives. Yet, in the course of unearthing a welter of
minutiae, most of these historians have blurred the salient points of
international relations between the wars. Perhaps the greatest distortion has occurred in the treatment of Soviet Russia. Most diplomatic historians and Taylor himself, seem to consider that ideological
considerations will always be subordinated to diplomatic realpolitik.
However ingeniously this is worked out, the shortcomings of this
interpretation remain obvious. On the simplest plane it takes no
account of Revolutionary Communism and international appeal; there
is considerable evidence that the red bogey disturbed the equilibrium of
many of the most perfectly trained civil service minds. British Imperialism thought itself particularly affected. The beginnings of the
Russian Revolution were regarded with equanimityat last the
Tsarist threat to the Indian frontier would be removed, indeed some
suggest that the British take advantage of the situation and advance
into Turkestan. But contrary to expectation the Revolutionary
government maintained itself intact, and added to traditional fears of
tsarist expansion, were the more intangible fears of an export of subversive ideology. There were constant scares in the 1920s (without
much justification) that the British working class might turn towards
Communism; there was also the more real fear that revolutionary
agitators might infiltrate the imperial domains. India was thought to be
particularly vulnerable to the incursion of sinister agents of the
Comintern. The natural course of British foreign policy was anti51
Bolshevik, and it was quite logical in the early 1930s to welcome the
strengthening of Nazi Germany as a bulwark against Russia. In their
attitude to Mussolini the National Government politicians showed
little equivocation. MacDonald carried on a long and amicable correspondence with Il Duce; Churchill wrote eulogistic articles about the
Great Dictator in the press, and Austen Chamberlain even spent his
family holidays with him. Their policies in Spain and Abyssinia gave
the strongest possible indication of their pro-Fascist tendencies. This
does not mean that they necessarily approved of Hitlers policy in the
years immediately before the Second World War. Hitler posed as great
a threat to British interests as to those of Russia. But it did mean that
their anti-Communist ideology prevented them from taking the one
step that would make their guarantees worth more than the paper they
were written on. Whatever the calculations behind Stalins foreign
policy, Communism was seen as a hostile ideology, just as Nazism
was, and it was this rather than diplomatic misunderstandings or
purblindness that lay at the root of British indecision. Taylor suggests
that the bulk of the British people only came to regard the Soviet
Union as less wicked than Germany after Hitlers attack on Russia.
But this presupposes an articulated attitude to Russia which in the
1930s hardly seems to have existed. What is striking about popular
British attitudes to Russia in the 1930s is their ill-informed confusion.
Opinions swayed quite arbitrarily from the purge-ridden dictatorship
to the workers state, from the giant with feet of clay to the steam
roller. After the first two years of the War, however, pro-Russian
enthusiasm reached a pitch which was not really extinguished until the
later years of the Labour Government. Britain and Russia, it was
thought, were both fighting a peoples war. This helps to explain the
fierce retrospective hatred for the old diplomacy that played such a
large part in the 1945 election. Munich had not merely been a blow to
national pride, it had also been the apotheosis of a decade of reactionary
raison d tat.
Lastly any historian who confronts modern British history must reflect
upon the impact of two world wars on the structure and mythology of
modern Britain. The British people were able to see themselves as the
one nation that had successfully fought two major wars from start to
finish. Victory in both cases affected left a lasting mark on Britains
attitude to itself as a nation. The effect of the two wars were quite
distinct, and between them, they shaped the fate of British society.
The First World War changed the whole concept of war, and with it,
the whole concept of society. This was true for all classes. 19th century
moral certainties of imperial mission never recovered from the shellshock that they received on the Somme. War no longer meant the
parading of flags on remote frontiers, manned by hard-core professional armies. It had been brought home with singularly traumatic
effect. This was not only apparent in the work of the war poets. It
marked the first decisive estrangement of the literary intelligentsia from
the ethical raison dtre of imperialism. No other country produced a
comparable efflorescence of war literature. But in no other country had
the nexus between the middle class and the military elite been so loose.
To a large extent the empire had been policed by Scots and Irishmen.
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less than capitalism seemed unable to explain, let alone control the
economic process. The characteristic reaction was a feeling of impotence which revealed itself in mass apathy. The war after 1940
presented an intensely dramatic contrast to the inertia of capitalist
economy. Issues and choices became cleareven stark. The British
people no longer felt hostage to events beyond their control and even
beyond their comprehension. Threat of annihilation brought a
moment of existential truth; and the result was a feeling of historical
liberationthis was the paradox of Dunkirk and the summer of 1940.
Epic simplification did not last out the course of the war, but enough
remained to inspire the result of 1945.
Unlike the First World War, there was very little tension caused by any
imbalance between military and civilian contributions to the war
effort. Again, unlike the First World War, Britain emerged with a
thoroughly discredited ruling class. Appeasement had become a dirty
word associated with it, and has remained so, ever since despite
desperate attempts at reinterpretation. Despite Churchill, and despite
appeals to vote national, a decisive mandate was given for the first
time to a Labour Government. 1945 or rather 1947 marked the end of
an epoch in British history. The Labour Government maintained its
impetus in its first two years of office. But its legislative achievements
were really no more than the confirmation of victories which had
already been won by the Labour movement during the war. After 1947
the cold war, a renewed offensive of the ruling class called new
conservatism and the ideological stasis of the Labour leadership
ushered Britains epic moment out. The clashes of the inter-war years
were moribund, opposing classes had entrenched themselves in new
positions, which have more or less dominated British society ever
since.
No serious attempt to interpret 20th century Britain can avoid taking
some position on these four related themes. But with the exception of
his analysis of appeasement Taylor nearly succeeds in doing so.
Mr Taylor is a master of narrative history and his contribution to the
Oxford history makes compelling reading. In particular his account of
both world wars is the most succinct and well written yet to have
appeared. He is at his best when he is discussing the manoeuvres of
pure power politics. Like Beaverbrook he feels an especial affinity for
Lloyd George. This is not surprising. Lloyd George after 1918 was
very much a politicians politician. Questions of principle were
sacrificed to brilliant opportunism. Here Taylor is in his element. No
awkward ideas. Politics temporarily became diplomacy. Again,
particularly in his description of the First World War, Taylor is able to
produce a sparkling distillation of the factional conflicts between the
politicians and the generals. Almost as good, is his discussion of
allied strategy during the Second World War. There is no one better at
analysing the fatuities of military theory: at conveying the connection
between backbiting behind the scenes and the direction of the war.
But most of the major themes of British history in the 20th century are
not really susceptible of such treatment. Taylor describes his historical
method as, continuous narrative . . . with occasional pauses for
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widely discussed than ever before. Yet with it all was a feeling that
these great happenings had no more connection with real life than
those seen every night in the cinema palaces . . . facade became reality
for a generation . . . The perceptions concentrated into these few
pages are worth more than all the well turned epigrams which act as
surrogate interpretation throughout the rest of the book.
His analysis of class is particularly facile. National loyalty, he writes,
transcended class consciousness except for a small minority, and it is
possible in this period to write the history of the English people
rather than the history of the exploiting classes. Paradoxically however, a few pages earlier, since creeds had ceased to divide, class stood
out the more sharply. How are these two judgments to be reconciled?
The two statements, in fact, refer to different bodies of material. On the
one hand: accent, eating and drinking, a caste system of education and
the distribution of property. On the other hand: the development of
womens clothing, the universality of cigarette smoking, democracy,
the servantless house, the demise of the idle rich. But if national
loyalty transcended class, this was hardly recognized at the time. On
the contrary, men thought that they were living in a disintegrating
society. All these statements contain elements of truth. But Taylor
never makes any attempt to construct systematic phenomenology of
class in the 1920s, and these bold and random statements conceal the
absence of any attempt to define class at all. On the face of it, Taylor
comes to two opposed conclusions about class and leaves the reader to
take his pick. At the level of narrative however, Taylors assumption of
class attitudes are quite firm, and differ yet again from what might be
called his conceptual analysis. A firm image emerges, which is strongly
reminiscent of popular press attitudes to class. The working man is
primarily interested in a cup of tea when he comes home from work
and a pint of beer with his mates; abstractions such as class and
politics could be left to the TUC and the politicians. In the General
Strike, they were loyal to their unions and their leaders, as they had
been loyal during the war to their country and to their generals. They
went once more into the trenches, without enthusiasm and with little
hope. Again in 1931, electors responded to the appeal for disinterested sacrifice, as the young men had done over Belgium in 1914.
Whatever the party calculations of politicians behind the scenes, the
country put country before class. They voted against the depression
with their feet. But class is not a hobby like football which can be
taken up or ignored. Class is a relationship, not an option. It is arguable
that the period 1910 to 1926 is the most bitter period of class warfare in
modern British history. From 1922 onwards the workers were defeated and subdued in one industry after another. The General Strike
was the majestic but pathetic epitaph to their struggle. Taylor considers that, the General Strike, apparently the clearest display of class
war in British history, marked the moment when class war ceased to
shape the pattern of British industrial relations. He further considers that this had been teleologically foreshadowed in the early
1920s. According to him Bevin and Thomas were industrial leaders of
a new type, no longer merely concerned to resist and who never
forgot that compromise was their ultimate aim. The miners on the
other hand, were almost anachronistic. They fought the class war and
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