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Labour Between the Wars

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Democratic Socialism in Britain and Sweden

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Abstract

It was not until 1918 that the Labour Party unequivocally espoused socialism when it adopted a new constitution and programme in that year. This was remarkably late for a society as industrially advanced and with such a large industrial proletariat as Britain. The reasons for this late espousal of socialism and the way in which various individuals, groups, and organisations guided and coaxed a rather suspicious and reluctant labour movement in the direction of socialism, is a story which belongs to the period immediately before that with which this study is primarily concerned.1 The adoption of the 1918 Constitution and Programme, Labour and the New Social Order, however, owes a great deal to the impact of the war. By the end of the war the left wing within the Labour Party, and in this context ‘left wing’ means socialist, was able to achieve an ascendancy at a time when there had also been a swing to the left.

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Notes and References

  1. For the early period see Bealey and Pelling (1958); Beer (1940); Cole (1941); Pierson (1979), Pelling (1965); Poirier (1958); Reid (1955).

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  5. Even MacDonald at the Leeds convention in 1917 supported a resolution calling for the establishment of councils of workmen and soldiers’ delegates in order to coordinate working class action and secure the emancipation of international labour. Graubard (1956), p. 38.

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  7. For a discussion of this see Gallie (1984), pp. 237–41.

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  8. Cline (1975). The fact that they were prominent people of upper and middle class background did not, Cline argues, have any particular effect upon the party’s ideology or policies, as the recruits were divided themselves on such issues along the whole spectrum.

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  71. It is necessary to distinguish between those who supported a radical socialist programme at this time, but one to be implemented by normal parliamentary means without recourse to special powers and short of outright expropriation, on the one hand, from the more militant members and followers of the Socialist League, on the other. The term evolutionary socialists best describes the former, since the League leaned towards a revolutionary position.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Reading, UK

    Malcolm B. Hamilton (Lecturer in Sociology)

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  1. Malcolm B. Hamilton
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© 1989 Malcolm B. Hamilton

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Hamilton, M.B. (1989). Labour Between the Wars. In: Democratic Socialism in Britain and Sweden. University of Reading European and International Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-09234-5_3

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