Contemporary British History

Abstracts of articles in Issue 17.4

A War We Don’t Want’: Another Look at the British Labour Government’s Commitment in Korea, 1950–51 by Sean Greenwood

Assumptions have been made about the reasons for British entry into the Korean War in the summer of 1950. This article seeks to question some of these notions and to suggest that the British decision was based on quite limited and, in fact, faulty premises. What are often supposed to be reasons for intervention turn out to be the consequences of that involvement. The most serious and problematical of these was the need to control the hyperactivity of the Americans. In order to do this the British had increasingly to appease them. This caused some in the Cabinet to question the appropriateness of binding British policy quite so slavishly to that of Washington and pressed the need for a firmer line. A tough approach, however, was never systematically adopted.

‘A vulnerable point in the sterling area’: Private Kuwait in the 1950s by Simon C. Smith

The extraordinary expansion in Kuwait’s oil revenues in the 1950s presented Britain with a formidable challenge. Britain’s relative indifference to Kuwait before 1939 had allowed the Shaikhdom to develop a strong sense of independence, especially in the conduct of internal affairs. Local autonomy, however, conflicted with Britain’s determination to manage the economy of Kuwait in a manner which would bring maximum benefit to the sterling area, while minimising the potential damage which Kuwait’s sudden acquisition of oil wealth could inflict on sterling. Britain’s support for Kuwaiti independence from the late 1950s did not signify a decline in the value which Britain placed on the sterling area in general, or on Kuwait in particular. Instead, it reflected a belief that an independent Kuwait represented the best means of preserving British economic interests.

Lord Hinchingbrooke, Europe and the November 1962 South Dorset By-election by N. J. Crowson

This article explores the November 1962 South Dorset by-election when the intervention of an Anti-Common Market candidate split the Conservative vote and allowed Labour to win this previously safe Conservative seat. Party officials at the time sought to dismiss the outcome as a ‘freak’ result. For those opposed to EEC membership it suggested that this was the beginning of a groundswell of anti-Europeanism. Exploiting previously unused archival sources, this article argues that this by-election was not a vote against the EEC, given that there were too many local factors to have made it a mini-referendum; the Conservative campaign was ultimately at fault and lost Angus Maude the seat.

‘Her Rather Ambitious Washington Program’: Margaret Thatcher’s International Visitor Program Visit to the United States in 1967 by Giles Scott-Smith

In 1967 Margaret Thatcher, then Shadow Spokeswoman for Treasury and Economic Affairs, was invited to visit the United States as a participant in the US State Department’s International Visitor Program. Originating from the 1948 Smith-Mundt Act and offering each ‘grantee’ from another country an expenses-paid trip of several weeks to the United States, the Program aimed to acquaint up-and-coming and influential individuals from the political, economic, media and cultural worlds with American politics, society and opinion. The article describes the background to and details of what was her first visit to the United States, and assesses the significance of this visit to a country with which she would maintain much closer relations later on. Using the Third Statistical Account of Scotland to Expose a Major Gap in Scottish Historiography by Murray Watson One of the most glaring gaps in Scottish historiography is its failure to assign any significance whatsoever to the role played by English migrants to Scotland. This is especially surprising given that the English form, in absolute and relative terms, Scotland’s largest migrant community of modern times. This article reveals what the Third Statistical Account of Scotland has to say on the subject of English migration, and advances the argument that the evidence was there, in one of Scotland’s most widely used primary sources.

Abstracts of Issue 17.3

Britain's Commonwealth Dilemma: Discussions with Australia, Canada, and New Zealand and Transition of British Trade Policy, 1956–59 by Hiroyuki Ogawa

The transition of Britain's external trade policy leading to its first application to the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1961 was accelerated by its three bilateral trade discussions with Australia, Canada, and New Zealand held in the late 1950s. These trade discussions also indicated Britain's balancing act of moving away from the Commonwealth towards Europe but still trying to preserve as much Commonwealth trade as possible, and therefore foreshadowed the conditionality of the application of 1961.

Historians, the Penguin Specials and the State-of-the-Nation Literature, 1958–64 by Matthew Grant

In the late 1950s and early 1960s a spate of books, journals and articles began a debate about ‘the state of the nation’. Central to these works were the books in the Penguin Specials series, notably Michael Shanks’ The Stagnant Society (1961). This article examines the arguments of many of these works and how historians have used them in work on the period, in terms of the cultural climate of the time, the record of the Macmillan and Douglas-Home governments and as early commentators of ‘British Decline’.

Why is Cornwall Poor? Poverty and In-Migration since the 1960s by Malcolm Williams

Cornwall is arguably the most economically deprived area of Britain, yet since the 1960s it has experienced one of the highest levels of in-migration of any county in Britain. Migrants are mostly of working age and economically active, yet not only does a move to Cornwall appear to economically impoverish them, but large-scale in-migration has been associated with a declining economy since it began. This article examines the historic roots of poverty in Cornwall with particular reference to its unusual economic character and migration history.

Conservative Reform of Metropolitan Counties: Abolition of the GLC and MCCs in Retrospect (or Revisited) by Muhammet Kösecik and Naim Kapucu

This article examines the views of the Conservatives in London local government, and Conservative and Labour councillors outside London, during the abolition of the Greater London Council (GLC) and the Metropolitan County Councils (MCCs) in 1985. The official reasons of the Conservative government for the abolition are assessed, as well as the alleged political reasons causing the demise of these metropolitan tiers. It is argued that the views of the Conservative boroughs in London and the attitude of Conservative and Labour districts outside London created an environment in which the government could achieve its goal; the government’s official arguments for the abolition were based on assertion and assumptions rather than evidence or competent research; and the government was mainly motivated by party-political reasons or partisan advantage in this controversial policy.

Sir Henry Wellcome’s Archival Legacy and the Contemporary Historian by Adrian Steel and Lesley A. Hall

The Wellcome Library for the History and Understanding of Medicine, Euston Road, London has an international reputation in the fields in which it specialises. The Archives and Manuscripts Section of the Library, staffed by a team of fully qualified archive professionals, contains unique collections of original material of value to many types of researcher. This article will deal briefly with the life and work of the man whose bequest established the Library on its present footing, Henry Wellcome, and then with the archive material that is held by the Library. The emphasis of the article is on material of interest to the contemporary historian, and contemporary medical archives.

BOOK REVIEWS

Abstracts of Issue 17.2

‘Battlelines For Suez’:The Abadan Crisis of 1951 and the Formation of the Suez Group by Sue Onslow

The Abadan crisis was the initial phase of the protracted crisis in Anglo-Persian relations 1951–54, precipitated by Persia’s nationalisation of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in May 1951. For many in the Tory party, it provided the test run of British policy in the Middle East. It seemed to demonstrate what should be the appropriate British response to the challenge of indigenous nationalism to British strategic and commercial interests in the region: namely, a robust assertion of British interests by all means necessary, including the use of force. This article examines Conservative perceptions and behaviour during the Abadan crisis, as the experience proved a vital formative influence upon the later Suez Group, the vociferous Tory backbench pressure group which played a contributory role in the Eden government’s decision to confront Nasser in 1956. It seeks to show how the crisis contributed to the emergence of a clearly identifiable faction of imperial-minded Conservative MPs who cared passionately about Britain’s place in the world, and specifically in the Middle East. The article looks at the relationship between the Conservative leadership and the nascent backbench factio,; and considers whether Conservative front bench policy and behaviour in this crisis in any way contributed to the emergence of the Suez Group.

From Suez to Kosovo: British Political Parties on the Use of Force by Dan Keohane

This article examines the approach of the main British political parties towards the use of force in the post-war decades. It starts by elucidating how the parties approached the issue in the early part of the twentieth century and goes on to consider how the parties responded to the issue in four conflicts, namely Suez, the Falklands, the Gulf and Kosovo. In the case of Kosovo, the article finds persuasive evidence that both Labour and the Liberal Democrats have reversed their established approach of requiring UN Security Council authorisation for the use of force.

Selling Bradford: Tourism and Northern Image in the Late Twentieth Century by Dave Russell

The city of Bradford has been a pioneer of urban/industrial tourism since 1979, believing that, amongst other things, tourism would improve an image rooted in long-held notions about the unattractiveness of the industrial north and tarnished by a series of high profile social and economic problems. Although the strategy has had some success, the decision to place the city in the public spotlight has proved problematic. Representations of the city in a variety of media, including travel writing, have tended to reinforce and even develop new forms of northern stereotyping and thus circumscribe attempts at re-branding. The image of a city struggling to sell a somewhat less than convincing package is in danger of becoming the dominant one, pushing aside the more positive representations that the city hoped for.

The One Nation Group and One Nation Conservatism, 1950-2002 by Robert Walsha

The One Nation Group is principally noted for its contribution to the revival of the Conservative Party in the postwar years, and for an original membership that included, among others, Iain Macleod, Edward Heath and Enoch Powell. The group’s debut pamphlet, One Nation (1950) is one of the most celebrated Conservative postwar documents, and the orthodox view is of a group of backbenchers that enjoyed considerable behind-the-scenes influence until the mid-1970s. This article examines the group’s contribution to developing notions of One Nation Conservatism, and challenges many of the assumptions about the group over its first half-century existence, particularly in terms of the nature of its Conservatism and the influence it has held within the parliamentary party. In fact, even in its supposed glory days the group struggled to live up to its reputation. The pursuit of a corporate agenda was never easy to engineer; in part, this was a consequence of the variety of Conservative opinion within its ranks, belying simplistic notions of the group as historically and uniformly the embodiment of a paternalistic, left-wing Toryism supplanted by, and at odds with, Thatcherism. It is argued that to perceive the One Nation Group in this latter way is a misreading of its nature, composition and thinking.

Interview with Robert Jackson, MP, One Nation Group Secretary by Robert Walsha

Interview with David Willetts, MP, One Nation Group member by Robert Walsha

Review Article: Labour's Defence Intellectual: A Defence by John Callaghan and Mark Phythian

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 17.1

The ‘scum of London’s underworld’? British Recruits for the Royal Irish Constabulary, 1920-21 by David Leeson

Thousands of British ex-servicemen joined the Royal Irish Constabulary during the Irish War of Independence. Nicknamed ‘Black and Tans’ for their haphazard uniforms, these British recruits are notorious for their viciousness. Historians agree that the ‘Tans’ were somehow predisposed to violence. Some charge that the RIC deliberately recruited criminals, but most argue that the Black and Tans were the brutal products of a demoralising war. New research indicates that British RIC recruits were neither ex-convicts nor a British Freikorps, but rather they were fairly ordinary British workingmen, whose behaviour was caused, not by a violent disposition, but by a violent situation.

A Splutter of Musketry? The British Military Response to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Dispute, 1951 by Ian Speller

This article examines the British response to the crisis that resulted from the Iranian decision to nationalise the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company in 1951. The British government contemplated the use of military force from the outset of the crisis and a series of plans were developed. Unfortunately, in a manner similar to the Suez Crisis five years later, the military were unable to provide a suitable response until political considerations had made the use of force unattractive. Despite this, the Foreign Secretary, the Minister of Defence and the Chiefs of Staff continued to press for an armed response. This article uses newly released archival sources to examine the military plans and preparations and to analyse the way in which these interacted with political considerations to undermine the British position in Iran.

The Home and the Homeland: Gender and the British Extreme Right by Martin Durham

Discussions of the British extreme right, both in its pre-war and post-war manifestations, have tended to ignore the question of gender. A number of writers, however, have argued that, by definition, the extreme right should be seen as a highly patriarchal force. Closer examination casts doubt on this supposition, and suggests instead that for a movement organised around ultra-nationalism and resistance to the racial 'Other', but not around anti-feminism, gender has proved to be a matter of considerable debate.

‘The Record of the 1950s is irrelevant’: The Conservative Party, Electoral Strategy and Opinion Research, 1945–64 by Andrew Taylor

After 1945 the Conservative Party endeavoured to understand the reasons for defeat and how they might return to government. Central to Conservative understanding of the electoral environment was the party’s adoption of opinion research in 1949, techniques which became integral to electoral strategy. Opinion research was used to understand electoral behaviour, target voters and identify the reasons for Conservative success and decline. Despite the importance attached to them, Conservative strategists remained sceptical about what these techniques could achieve, which lead to a review of their utility in 1960. By 1964 polls were an established part of Conservative electoral strategy.

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 16.4

The Limits of Tawney’s Ethical Socialism: A Historical Perspective on the Labour Party and the Market by Jim Tomlinson

This article attempts to place Tawney’s ethical socialism in the broad context of the development of (Old) Labour’s traditional ideological hostility to the market. It suggests that a key period in the solidification of that hostility was the 1920s, and that Tawney’s ideas played an important role (along with Fabianism) in entrenching anti-market attitudes in the party, defeating the more nuanced approach of Hobsonian ‘liberal socialism’. The core of the article is a critique of Tawney’s approach to the market, especially his failure to deal with the key ‘pro-market’ argument of the benefits of the operation of the invisible hand. It also argues that Tawney’s hostility to markets was allied to a wholly negative and unreasoning rejection of the developing field of economics.

Voluntarism and Conservative Pluralism: Reconsidering Jewish Refugee Assistance on the British Home Front 1939–44 by Joe Bord

This article reassesses the treatment of Jewish refugees by the state in the context of a structural analysis of the ‘corporate bias’, or conservative pluralism underpinning administrative practices in mid-twentieth century Britain. Forms of segmented management are diagnosed, where conscious prejudices and ideological convictions concerning Jews are elusive. The analysis focuses on the mechanisms of income support and other maintenance assistance. The conservative interaction between government departments and voluntary bodies is identified as crucial in the management, control and concealment of Jewish refugees.

No Friend of Democracy: The Socialist Vanguard Group 1941–50 by Ray Douglas

The Socialist Vanguard Group (SVG), publisher of the journal Socialist Commentary, has conventionally been regarded as one of the principal architects of social-democratic ‘revisionism’ within the Labour Party during the 1940s. In fact, in its ideology and early history the SVG was profoundly hostile to democracy in all its manifestations. As one of the earliest, and most secretive, ‘entryist’ bodies successfully to infiltrate the Labour Party, the SVG aimed at converting key policy-makers to the anti-majoritarian ideas of a German political philosopher, Leonard Nelson. Only after the failure of this covert campaign did the group ultimately reconcile itself to the pursuit of its objectives within the democratic system. The SVG’s efforts to encode Nelsonism in ‘revisionist’ language, however, left a distinct impression upon the modernisation project of Labour’s right wing in the 1940s, and constitutes a significant though largely unappreciated element in the party’s post-war theoretical development. ‘Loquacious... and pointless as ever?’ Britain, the United States and the United Nations Negotiations on International Control of Nuclear Energy 1945–48 by Susanna Schrafstetter

This article re-examines the position of the British government in the negotiations for international control of atomic energy during the period 1945–48. These negotiations are generally associated with the ‘Baruch plan’, a US proposal to place nuclear energy under the control of an international development authority. The article argues that Britain was far from merely reacting to US initiatives: by March 1946 the Labour government had its own ‘Baruch plan’ ready to present to the UN. It explores to what extent British hopes for continued close cooperation and the passage of the US Atomic Energy Act influenced British policy towards nuclear control. Most importantly, this article shows that previous claims that the British government did not take the negotiations seriously cannot be upheld.

A Guide to Planning and Conducting Research in Contemporary British History on the Internet by Ted R. Bromund

The internet is now a useful research tool for historians of contemporary Britain. This article reviews on-line resources that can aid in planning research and in conducting research on-line in post-1945 British history. It offers resources that will be helpful to scholars, and emphasises especially on-line information for Americans and other foreign scholars travelling to Britain. It concludes with speculation about the likely future usefulness of the commercialised internet in this field of history

REVIEW ARTICLE

The Changing Face of British Government by Alasdair Blair

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 16.3

Special Issue: Poor Health. Social Inequality before and after the Black Report

Edited by Virginia Berridge and Stuart Blume

Introduction: Inequalities and Health by Virginia Berridge

The Black report has become a symbol of political suppression. The report was intended for the Labour government rather than for a Conservative one committed to reducing public expenditure. But members of the committee could not agree on their recommendations. A key intellectual divide was between the social medicine and health service tradition represented by Jerry Morris and the approach espoused by Peter Townsend. Medical and scientific civil servants urged the committee on, aware of the impending political change. The committee, however, was more concerned to get its analysis right. The Health Divide follow-up report of 1987 provoked a further confrontation with government. Black in particular was a case study of the issues around scientific advice to government, not least the way in which events were played out in and through the media.

BRITAIN BEFORE THE BLACK REPORT

The Dimensions of Inequality: Height and Weight Variation in Britain, 1700–2000 by Roderick Floud

A survey of the development of anthropometric history – the study of historical changes in human height, weight and body mass – is followed by an analysis of inequalities in British adult heights and weights. The data, though flawed and difficult to interpret, show that differences in height by socio-economic group have been pervasive since at least the eighteenth century and that the upper and middle classes have been consistently relatively tall; in addition, there were substantial differences between occupations even within the manual working class. Differences in height by region within Britain have also existed for the whole of the period, but the distribution has changed substantially, with Scots initially tall and recently short.

Health, Class, Place and Politics: Social Capital and Collective Provision in Britain by Simon Szreter

Historical demographic evidence is presented to show that social class inequalities and health differentials have had a long relationship with place, both in terms of local residential environments and the regional distribution of the working and middle classes. The last two centuries have seen the demographic ‘rise of the North’ and an associated but delayed rise in the collectivist policies of ‘opting in’, peaking with the wartime national commitment to full employment. However, the Welfare State did not significantly alter the nation’s divisive class structures and patterns of social capital, resulting in the paradoxes of widening health differentials and a return to a popular politics of ‘opting out’ after the 1970s.

From Social Structure to Social Behaviour in Britain after the Second World War by Dorothy Porter

In the inter-war years of the twentieth century European and American medical intellectuals attempted to transform a set of ideals about the prevention of disease and the promotion of health into a new academic discipline called social medicine. The aim of social medical reformers was to create a political role for medicine by turning it into a social science. A central focus of medicine as a ‘science of the social relations of health’ and as an international political practice was the study and elimination of inequality. This contribution outlines the interwar international debate on social medicine and then evaluates whether its political mission to tackle health inequalities survived once it became institutionalised within the medical academy in early post-war Britain. How did the influence of post-war developments in social theory effect socio-medical research, and did the goals of socio-medical reformers in Britain change in the 1950s? What were the implications of these developments for health citizenship in Britain towards the end of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first century?

Investigating Inequalities in Health before Black by Charles Webster

This contribution draws attention to the long prehistory of discussions of inequalities in health and health care. It points to a polarisation of attitudes that was rooted in the work of Chadwick and Engels. Since that date, the issue of inequality periodically assumed a high profile. This paper examines the main characteristics of the debates on inequalities that took place during the Edwardian period, during the inter-war depression and during the 1970s. It is suggested that these represent distinct phases in the argument, each being characterised by a response from the public health bureaucracy that was conditioned by the political circumstances of the time. It is concluded that the renewed concern over inequalities in the 1970s reflected the general radicalisation of opinion that occurred at this period of acute economic crisis.

THE BLACK REPORT

Comment

The Black Committee on Health Inequalities (1977–80): A Personal View of its Work by Stuart Blume The Origin of the Black Report: A Conversation with Richard Wilkinson by Virginia Berridge 00 Dispelling the Myths of the Black Report: A Memoir by Patrick Jenkin

Witness Seminar

The Black Report and The Health Divide edited by Virginia Berridge

AFTER THE BLACK REPORT

The ‘Second Black Report’? The Acheson Report as Another Opportunity to Tackle Health Inequalities by Mark Exworthy The Acheson Report was published 18 years after the Black Report, but both show similarities. The Acheson Report provides a contrast to the Black Report as it illustrates the difficulties of tackling health inequalities despite apparently favourable conditions. This contribution traces the background to the Acheson Report, the deliberations of the inquiry team, its reception and critiques; it also provides a summary of policy initiatives to tackle health inequalities and concludes by drawing on policy models to assess the likelihood of longer-term change as a result of the report and government policy.

Before and After the Black Report: Four Fallacies by Sally Macintyre

Several commonly expressed assumptions about the Black Committee are described: that it first discovered socio-economic gradients in mortality, there was a blight on research on inequalities between 1980 and 1997; that the term ‘variations’ rather than ‘inequalities’ endorsed a lifestyle view of inequalities; and that explanations for inequalities are essentially competing rather than complementary. All these are fallacies. Evidence of health inequalities was widely reported before and after 1980; terms other than inequalities did not necessarily signify acceptance of a lifestyle stance; and explanations for inequalities may be complementary rather than competing.

REVIEW ESSAY

Poverty, Inequality and Health: An International Perspective by Bernard Harris

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 16.2

On the Causes of British Railway Nationalisation: A Re-examination of the Railway Question between 1866 and 1921 by D.C.H. Watts

This article examines public debate over the proper relationship between railways and the British State (the railway question) between 1866 and 1921, and challenges the argument that their later nationalisation was the inevitable outcome of long-run economic and political tendencies. It outlines the socio-economic context for the emergence of the railway question. Contemporary responses to it are then examined, and it is argued that they form three distinct perspectives on the railway question. Lastly, the 1921 Railways Act is interpreted as shaping the railways in accordance with a perspective on the railway question which opposed their nationalisation.

The British People, the Press and the Strategic Air Campaign against Germany, 1939–45 by Mark Connelly

This article sets out to explore the way in which the RAF’s wartime strategic bombing campaign against Germany was presented to the British people. It seeks to understand the flow of information about Bomber Command activities and the manner in which the media reacted. The essay also seeks to question the idea that there was widespread discontent and unease with British operations, arguing that though the media coverage fell short of explaining the true nature of the British campaign, most people had guessed what it entailed from the information presented to them and supported it.

Anglo-American Differences over the UN during the Cold War: The Uniting for Peace Resolution by Dimitris Bourantonis and Konstantinos Magliveras

This article examines the Anglo-American discord generated by the United States’ decision in 1950 to introduce a resolution to the fifth session of the United Nations General Assembly, known as the Uniting for Peace Resolution. It is argued that the ensuing conflict between the American and the British views on the Uniting for Peace Resolution was a manifestation of the differing perceptions of the two close allies on the UN’s role in 1950. The United States wanted to turn the UN into a coercive instrument of collective security against aggressive acts, while the British believed that the UN could not play such a role. It is also argued that the British had serious reservations about the adoption of the Uniting for Peace Resolution because, with a circumscribed veto, it would have placed them in a less advantageous position in the United Nations.

The Macmillan Government, British Arms Exports and Indonesia by S.J. Ball

This article outlines the process behind Britain’s 1958 decision to export Fairey Gannet aircraft to Indonesia. The decision has not previously attracted scholarly attention. The decision to export arms to Indonesia is of particular interest because of its complexity. Britain had difficult relations with the Indonesian government that led to ‘Confrontation’ in 1963. This relationship was further complicated by the United States’ volte-face in its relations with Indonesia and the emergence of the Soviet Union as the Indonesians’ major arms supplier. The article is a contribution to the literature on the Macmillan government that concentrates on a detailed technical issue rather than on grand strategy. It concludes, nevertheless, that the dictates of diplomacy rather than commerce governed decision-making. The article draws on documents detailing the role of the inter-departmental machinery for regulating arms exports based in the Ministry of Defence and those relating to the involvement of the prime minister in the decision-making process.

Labour and Education: Secondary Reorganisation and the Neighbourhood School by Nirmala Rao

The adoption of a comprehensive schools policy by the Wilson government in 1965 aimed to end selection at 11-plus and to bring about a more uniform system of secondary schools. This article traces the development of the comprehensive movement, examines the key debates within the Labour party, and identifies some unintended consequences of a neighbourhood schools system that were overlooked in the framing of Circular 10/65. The article focuses on the ways in which the neighbourhood school could exacerbate social inequalities and the incentives that such a system provided to parents to move to better-served localities or opt for private education. As some commentators pointed out at the time, the comprehensive schools policy, far from creating ‘opportunities for all’, simply created a different pattern of inequality.

Anarchy, Pop and Violence: Punk Rock Subculture and the Rhetoric of Class, 1976–78 by David Simonelli

The punk subculture and its music helped change the way people talked about social stratification in Britain in the late-1970s. Punk reintroduced working-class and youth values of rebellion into British culture, exposing the wider public to the privations of youth in the economic climate of the era. Punk values were promoted through rhetoric both old and new – for example, with the repeated use of words like ‘anarchy’, ‘pop’ and ‘violence’. Other texts included political affiliations, connections to older art movements, fashion and attitude. These texts acquired attention through the outrageous songs and actions of bands like the Sex Pistols, which were covered widely in the tabloid and music presses. But the subculture’s efforts to protest the professionalisation of British society were doomed to failure because the musicians involved could not help becoming professionalised themselves. Young people came to appreciate less iconoclastic versions of punk, especially ‘new wave’ music. Thus the punk subculture, for all its rhetoric, ultimately failed to create a ‘revolution’ in British culture.

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 16.1

Contemporary British History: A Personal View by Peter Catterall

This editorial offers a series of trenchant observations on the development of the field of contemporary British history since the journal was founded in 1987, highlighting changing issues and approaches, neglected areas and the effect of modes of historical research on the discipline.

British Policies towards Axis Reprisals in Occupied Greece: Whitehall vs SOE by Tom Dyson

This article has two purposes. First, by means of archival and interview research it contributes an original empirical investigation of British wartime policy on an issue that has been neglected in the literature. The article sheds light on the way in which the difficult moral issue of reprisals was handled in Whitehall. Second, it seeks to compare four different interpretations of the way in which this policy developed. These models are drawn from fundamentally divergent accounts of how states make policy. The article uncovers a dominant realist paradigm in Whitehall whose influence is reflected in the explanatory power of the models of bureaucratic politics and symbolic politics. At the same time Special Operations Executive (SOE) officers sought to inject a sense of moral obligation into policy by acting as policy entrepreneurs. However, structural factors were ultimately crucial in shaping British policy. The conclusion identifies the implications of this approach for further research.

Winning the Peace: British Communists, the Soviet Union and the General Election of 1945 by Neil Redfern

During the last two years of the Second World War the Communist Party of Great Britain developed a new reformist and nationalistic strategy. The twists and turns of its development and its content show that even after the dissolution of the Comintern British Communists still looked to the Soviet party for inspiration and guidance. The Labour Party played a key role in the CP’s new strategy. Though Communists argued that national unity was necessary for post-war reconstruction, they were adamant that only a Labour-led government could prevent a return to pre-war conditions and commence the transition to socialism. The widely-held belief that the party entered the general election campaign of 1945 calling for a continued coalition government is false.

A Party in Three Pieces: The Conservative Split over Rhodesian Oil Sanctions, 1965 by Mark Stuart

The article details and analyses the motivations behind the Conservative three-way split over Rhodesian oil sanctions on 21 December 1965 in the wake of Ian Smith’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI). Supporters of Harold Wilson’s sanctions policy included both progressive Conservatives committed to maintaining the bipartisan decolonisation policy begun under Harold Macmillan’s second administration (1959–63) and more traditional Conservatives who were anxious to maintain British sovereignty over the issue. The opposing wing of the Conservative Party largely comprised those who believed that sanctions could not be made to work, but also included a cohesive group – the Friends of Rhodesia – who were convinced that Harold Macmillan had betrayed the Central African Federation by breaking a series of assurances. The bulk of the Conservative Party, under the new leadership of Edward Heath and Chief Whip William Whitelaw, abstained, resulting in an embarrassing three-way split. Despite annual Conservative opposition to the renewal of the oil sanctions order in Parliament throughout the rest of the 1960s and during his own period in government (1970–74), and support for Ian Smith organised by the Monday Club at successive Conservative Party conferences, Heath maintained the bipartisan policy with Harold Wilson over Rhodesia. Although Rhodesian rebels on the Tory right were not necessarily those rebelling in the House of Commons on issues like Europe, immigration and capital punishment (though a small number were), throughout his years as Leader of the Opposition and in government, Heath struggled to establish his authority as leader of the Conservative Party. The article therefore challenges the argument put forward especially by Norton that poor leadership was largely responsible for the frequent Conservative backbench rebellions during Heath’s government. In reality, the right caused trouble for Heath from the minute he became leader in 1965.

The New Commanding Height: Labour Party Policy on North Sea Oil and Gas, 1964–74 by Richard Toye

This article examines the origins of the Labour Party’s proposal, implemented by the 1974–79 Labour government, for ‘majority public participation’ in the development of North Sea oil and gas. It explores the activities of the party’s North Sea study group in the late 1960s, and then looks at how party policy subsequently evolved in opposition, especially in reaction the 1973 fuel crisis. It is argued that the final policy, as enacted after 1974, had not been anticipated in detail by previous party discussions, yet the new government was constrained by the broad commitment to ‘majority public participation’, and had to come up with a detailed policy that at least appeared to conform with that promise; although the result was largely a facade.

Thatcherism, Majorism and the Collapse of Tory Statecraft by Christopher Stevens

The article offers a radical interpretation of the ‘Tory statecraft’ model, set out by Jim Bulpitt in 1986. It suggests that governments seek to organise their own core values into and their opponents’ core values out of the political domain, thereby mobilising bias in their favour. Whereas, given the institutional structures on which the UK system of government is based, the Conservative Party has been overwhelmingly successful here, it is argued that by the 1990s, the conflict between policy needs and political pressures had become an obstacle to the exploitation of traditional Tory statecraft strategies. It is further argued that although the Major Government of 1992–97 saw the final demise of the Thatcherite statecraft strategy, the seeds of the breakdown were sown in the aftermath of the 1987 election.

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 15.4

Tell me chum, in case I got it wrong.What was it we were fighting during the war?’ The Re-emergence of British Fascism, 1945–58 by Nicholas Hillman

This article examines the persistence of right-wing extremism immediately after the Second World War. It considers what sort of people supported fascism after 1945 and argues that those who remained active were part of a continuous ideological thread linking the nascent fascism of the 1920s, the British Union of Fascists and the plethora of neo-fascist groups formed between the 1950s and the 1990s. During the 1940s and 1950s the Far Right was fragmented and it was less successful than in other periods. Possible reasons for this failure are assessed and it is concluded that the authorities played a greater role than has previously been acknowledged.

Harry S. Truman’s International Religious Anti-Communist Front, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the 1948 Inaugural Assembly of the World Council of Churches by Dianne Kirby

Religion has not been given serious consideration in examining Harry S Truman’s conduct of the Cold War, yet throughout his administration the President sought to construct an international anti-communist religious front. This article examines Truman’s approach to the World Council of Churches in Formation in 1948 as a means of examining a currently contentious area in Cold War historiography, the role and significance of religion. Marxist atheism provided a window of vulnerability, the Achilles’ heel of communism from the West’s religio-political perspective. It was hardly surprising, therefore, that Christianity was appropriated by Western propagandists and policy-makers for their anti-communist arsenal. Ironically, however, Truman’s Cold War scheme was essentially defeated by the much older religious cold war between Catholic and Protestant. Nonetheless, Truman’s intervention in the religious realm had profound repercussions for ecclesiastical relations and also on the course and nature of the burgeoning Cold War.

Reappraisal and Reshaping: Government and the Railway Problem 1951–64 by Charles Loft

This article discusses the thinking behind the programme of railway closures set out in the 1963 report, The Reshaping of British Railways. The report’s author, Dr Richard Beeching, has been criticised for looking at the railways in isolation from transport as a whole, for examining them in purely financial terms and for ignoring the social consequences of closures. This article argues that such criticisms ignore the background to the report, which should be seen as part of a reasoned attempt to bring logic to the relationship between government and the nationalised industries, and as an attempt to provide for what were reasonably believed to be the nation’s future transport requirements. The Beeching period represented an improvement on the railway policies that ministers had pursued during the 1950s. The article begins with an account of the railways’ slide into bankruptcy during the 1950s before discussing the two key developments underlying the policy associated with Beeching: Treasury thinking on transport policy and the relationship between government and the nationalised industries.

‘Playing by the Book’: Success and Failure in John Major’s Approach to Prime Ministerial Media Management by Tim Bale and Karen Sanders

Both the Thatcher and the Blair governments have been accused of politicising the Prime Ministerial press operation. This article asks whether it is possible to maintain a constitutionally clearer demarcation between the expressly political and the strictly governmental, and at the same time still pursue a successful communications strategy. Based on semi-structured interviews with both national journalists and government and party media managers, it uses the example of the Major governments to illustrate that it is not. But it also argues, using the same example, that, unless we insist on a simplistic and outmoded conception of ‘prime ministerial power’, there is no simple correlation between, on the one hand, success and professionalised political control and, on the other, failure and what is termed here a ‘civil service’ approach.

The Imperial System of Weights and Measures: Traditional, Superior and Banned by Europe? by Menno Spiering

Since the 1960s the British imperial system of weights and measures has gradually been replaced by the metric system. Aided by large sections of the press, various action groups, sporting names such as ‘the Metric Martyrs’, frequently claim that ‘Europe’ is to blame, as it has forced metrication upon the British by means of a string of EU directives. This interference is regarded as reprehensible, not only because the imperial system is seen as better than the metric one, but also because it is acclaimed as ancient and traditional, and therefore inextricably linked with British national identity. This article aims to chart and then to assess these claims about European interference, British identity and imperial superiority.

ARCHIVE REPORT

Major Accessions to Repositories in 2000 Relating to Politics (Twentieth Century) by Katherine Williams

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 15.3

Special Issue: The British Left and the Cold War

Edited by: John Callaghan

The Cold War and the March of Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy by John Callaghan

Thirty years after the Bolshevik Revolution a Cold War began which forced the British Left to take sides. But during those thirty years a great deal had already been written and said about the Soviet state and Britain’s relationships with it; sides had already been taken, repeatedly. Though the impact of the Bolshevik upheaval was small in Britain when compared to the institutional splits which it caused in France, Germany and Italy, the socialist Left was never able to quarantine revolutionary Russia. Attitudes towards it were conditioned by a volatile mix of domestic considerations, foreign policy issues and ideology. As the USA began to take its first steps away from isolationism, and thus greatly increase its own capacity to divide opinion within the Labour Party, the Soviet Union approached the zenith of its popularity in Britain. It became, moreover, the real dynamo of the socialist movement during and immediately after the Second World War, and retained its salience for the activist Left well after the moment of its greatest popularity had passed. Until the 1980s the British Left remained divided in its estimation of the nature of the Cold War, and disagreement about the character of the Soviet state remained a central feature of the argument, just as it had been in Lenin’s day.

‘The Bitterest Enemies of Communism’: Labour Revisionists, Atlanticism and the Cold War by Lawrence Black

This article explores how Labour revisionists like Denis Healey, Hugh Gaitskell and Tony Crosland viewed the Cold War. It evokes the world of Labour during the Cold War and offers a political anatomy of revisionism. In explaining why revisionists felt there were legitimate reasons for Labour to be committed to the Cold War, it assesses Atlanticism and American influences and the involvement of revisionists in shadowy bodies like the Bilderberg Group. Rather than question how socialist Labour’s policy was, like much traditional historiography, this article investigates Labour’s policy in the context of its claims to be the people’s party. It is argued that rather than marking a rupture in Labour thinking, revisionist responses to the Cold War can very much be seen in a traditional light.

The Left and the ‘Unfinished Revolution’: Bevanites and Soviet Russia in the 1950s by John Callaghan

This article looks at the Labour Left’s perceptions of the Soviet Union in the 1950s and examines one of the most important sources of hope about its future evolution. It shows that for many socialists the Soviet Union was a contradictory phenomenon, at once profoundly repellent and yet capable of exercising an immense attractive force throughout the decade. For the progressive features of the system to finally dominate and overcome the many-sided backwardness of Russia, the argument was heard that the Soviet Union needed time and above all peace. This contention was taken seriously because the dynamic, modernising forces in Russian society were considered to be rooted in the socialist bases of its economy. It was an economy characterised by planning and nationalised property, and in the factional struggle which divided the Labour party in the 1950s, these were the key components of the Left’s faith. By the end of the decade and the beginning of the 1960s both the old Bevanite Left and the technocratic centre-left drew inspiration from the progress of the Soviet economy.

The Phoney Cold War in British Trade Unions by Nina Fishman

This article examines the Cold War in British trade unions, focusing on the period 1947–9. It considers the pressure to initiate an anti-Communist offensive exerted on the TUC General Council from various sources, including American union leaders and the Labour Party. The response was belated and cautious, and the article enumerates the countervailing pressures on the General Council to moderate their anti-Communism. Though they were committed to supporting the Labour Government, the General Council were unwilling to break with pre-war practices. Instead of opting for confrontation and a resulting split in the trade union movement, they acted to secure the continuation of a united front in which political differences were subordinated by both left and right in the interests of preserving union strength.

British Communists in the Cold War, 1947–52 by Willie Thompson

As a result of the onset of the Cold War the British Communist Party lost the degree of relative acceptance and tolerance which it had enjoyed since the Second World War; was forced into political isolation and regarded with grave suspicion among the general public. This article examines the nature of perceptions and thinking within the party leadership as they struggled to cope with developments (which they badly misjudged), the constantly deteriorating situation with which they were confronted, and the search for a strategy to bring the party out of its isolation and enable it to influence the direction of British politics.

CND’s Cold War by Mark Phythian

This article examines the context within which CND evolved and the campaign’s analysis of key developments in the Cold War from its founding in 1958 to the late 1980s. In particular, it focuses on the usually neglected period from 1963 to the early 1970s. Not only does it examine the ways in which CND viewed the Cuban Missile Crisis, its critique of NATO and advocacy of positive neutralism, but it also examines debates surrounding the Vietnam War and China’s development of atomic weapons. It goes on to consider CND’s revival during the ‘Second Cold War’, the decline of the second wave, and CND’s place in Cold War history.

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 15.2

Creating Jobs, Manufacturing Unity: Ulster Unionism and Mass Unemployment 1922–34 by Christopher Norton

The inter-war recession and resultant mass unemployment presented a serious problem for the new Northern Ireland government. Having weathered republican attempts to destabilise the state, the Unionist government found its credibility questioned by a core element of its own support: the Protestant working class. In its efforts to galvanise support and ensure Unionist unity the government resorted to a series of strategies to alleviate the unemployment problem. The pursuit of these strategies created tension and division within the Unionist cabinet. What became apparent was that Unionist unity could be secure not by the appeal of sectarianism but only by the appearance of competence.

Deconstructing Harrod: Some Critical Observations on ‘The Life of John Maynard Keynes’ by Scott Newton

For over a generation Roy Harrod’s Life of John Maynard Keynes (1951) was respected as a reliable source of information about the great economist’s life. The work of Skidelsky in particular has placed a question mark against Harrod’s account when it comes to discussing Keynes’s sexuality and his conscientious objection in The First World War. Now it appears that Harrod’s account of Keynes’s politics and views about international economic policy are also highly misleading. The real Keynes was more radical and unconventional than the figure which emerges from Harrod’s portrait, an exercise distorted by personal prejudice and cold war politics.

Employer Resistance to the Fordist Production Process: ‘Flawed Fordism’ in Post-War Britain by Ian Clark

The Flawed nature of Britain’s Fordism in the post-war period and its consequent impact on post-Fordism in the British economy appears clear-cut and incontrovertible. Craft-dominated trade unions controlled the shop floor and prevented management from introducing Fordist methods of work organisation and an associated pattern of regulation for the labour process. The argument of this paper contends that as descriptors of British industry in its various stages of post-war development, the utility of terms such as ‘Fordism’, ‘Flawed Fordism’ and ‘post-Fordism’ is strictly limited. The status of these terms as analytical and empirical categories is controversial, yet they remain significant in the literature on contemporary history and economic decline. Documentary, empirical and historical material illustrates that the introduction of mass standardised production on the Fordist model was less than successful during the post-war period yet as this paper argues employee resistance appears less significant than employer resistance and the structural impact of British markets.

The History of NHS Charges by John Eversley

Health Service charges have been a feature of the National Health Service (NHS) since it was established in 1948, though they form only a small part of NHS revenue. This article looks at why they have been levied and argues that the arguments for them primarily lie outside the NHS in foreign and defence policy and above all general management of the economy. The article suggests that the reasons given for charges do not withstand close scrutiny but they are Treasury orthodoxy. There is consistency across Conservative and Labour Governments, and across the decades of the NHS, in the substance and language of the arguments. The article concludes that the arguments about health service charges have wider implications for arguments between spending departments and the Treasury about economic management.

Whitehall, the National Farmers’ Union and Plan G, 1956–7 by Ted R Bromund

The premises of the British government’s proposed limited free trade area in Europe (Plan G) were contradicted by the 1947 Agriculture Act and by its simultaneous negotiations in 1956 with the National Farmers’ Union over long-term assurances for British agriculture. These negotiations resulted in the 1957 Agriculture Act, which further reduced Britain’s chances of concluding an agreement with Europe. The government’s refusal to chose between conflicting interests, combined with the confusion attending the elaboration of the Plan, led it to deny Europe agricultural compensations for accepting Plan G.

John Nott and the Royal Navy: The 1981 Defence Review Revisited by Andrew Dorman

Even after 20 years, many myths still surround the 1981 Nott Review and it remains a subject of some sensitivity within naval circles. This article establishes how the various polices were formulated, highlighting the role of the different groups within the Ministry of Defence and elsewhere, and the degree to which the various policies were actually implemented. It suggests that the review was the outcome of various hands competing for scarce resources within the MOD and that the belief that the navy would have been destroyed if the Falklands War had not occurred is false.

Abstracts of Issue 15.1

‘The Secularized Sabbath’ Revisited: Opinion Polls as Sources for Sunday Observance in Contemporary Britain by Clive D. Field

With due recognition of their methodological limitations, commercial public opinion polls conducted among quota or random samples of adult Britons are used to chart changes in attitudes to, and in activities taking place on, Sunday during the late twentieth century. Although principally conceived as a guide to the raw data, the article takes William Pickering’s notion of ‘The Secularised Sabbath’ as the conceptual backdrop against which these changes are measured. Some evidence is found for the loss of the distinctive character of Sunday, both in religious and socio-cultural terms. In part this is attributable to the progressive legislative deregulation of Sundays and to altered patterns of employment. However, for the majority, if no longer the whole, of the population Sunday still remains a day set apart from the remainder of the week, by an emphasis on family, rest, relaxation and pleasure.

Modernising the BBC: Wilson’s Government and Television 1964-1966 by Des Freedman

The relationship between British government and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is once more under scrutiny as both the BBC’s funding mechanism and its entire mission are to be reviewed in the next few years. This article examines the attitude of the Labour governments of Harold Wilson towards the BBC in the run-up to the 1966 White Paper on Broadcasting and asks whether Wilson’s commitment to modernise British institutions extended to the BBC. Using archive material from government sources and the BBC, the article argues that government policy was affected by Wilson’s contradictory approach to the BBC as well as by the deteriorating state of the British economy which led the government to apply constant pressure on the licence fee. Reflecting on the implications for television policy in the future, the article concludes that the Wilson governments’ legacy towards the BBC was one of electoralism and pragmatism rather than innovation or transformation.

Identity Questions in Contemporary Scotland: Faith, Football and Future Prospects by Graham Walker

This article considers questions of religious and ethnic identity in contemporary Scotland and the continuing debate about the extent and significance of sectarianism. It does so primarily through a discussion of recent scholarly writing on the Catholic community and on Catholic-Protestant tensions, and it highlights issues such as education and in particular football. It is argued that much of this writing takes insufficient account of recent socio-cultural and political changes in Scotland, and it is suggested that more attention has to be paid to the less studied and apparently more ambiguous terrain of Protestant identity and attitudes. The article also speculates briefly on the ways issues pertaining to religious identity might manifest themselves in the context of the new devolved Scottish parliament.

Baldwin and Scotland: More than Englishness by Gabrielle Ward-Smith

This article explores the role of the Conservative and Unionist party leader of Great Britain – Stanley Baldwin – in relation to Scotland, the Scottish Unionist party and the Scottish electorate. During the inter-war period, Unionism was aggressively challenged by both socialism and Scottish nationalism. Baldwin was aware that his party needed to present itself as both the natural party of England and as the natural party of Scotland if it was to survive. Although generally considered to be the archetypal Englishman, Baldwin cleverly re-created himself for the Scottish political constituency, a self-portrayal which allowed him to be accepted by Scottish audiences as one of their own. He successfully followed a line of appeal that contended that Unionist values were inherently part of the historical and cultural inheritance of Scotland; if Scots wanted to retain and develop their distinct national identity, Baldwin argued that Unionism was their only possible form of political expression.

‘Unfinished Business’: The Land Question and the Scottish Parliament by Ewen A. Cameron

This article notices the recent revival of debate on the Scottish land question in post-devolution Scottish politics. The aim is to place the ideas which have arisen in recent times in their historical context, and to contrast the contemporary approach to land reform with earlier approaches. The first section of the essay examines the importance of the land and the land question to Scottish History and culture prior to an examination of the history of the Scottish land question in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The final section analyses in more detail some of the contemporary episodes which have helped to bring the land question to the fore and the ideas which the Labour party have advanced as a potential programme of land reform which the Scottish parliament will be asked to implement. A necessarily speculative conclusion raises some of the problems and prospects for the land question in the newly contextualised Scottish politics.

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 14.4

A Question of Leadership: Lord Salisbury, the Unionist Cabinet and Foreign Policy Making, 1895–1900 by T G Otte

This article examines the role of the Cabinet in the making of foreign policy during Lord Salisbury’s third and last administration, 1895-1900. During his earlier premierships, which he always combined with the office of Foreign Secretary, Salisbury’s ascendancy over Britain’s external affairs was largely unchallenged. Under the impact of the changes in international politics in the course of the late 1890s, however, a group of Cabinet ministers emerged who were increasingly critical of Salisbury’s conduct of foreign affairs. Three crises in the geo-strategic periphery of European politics helped the foreign-policy outlook and agenda of the Prime Minister’s critics gain coherence and consistence, eventually undermining Salisbury’s grip on foreign affairs. The underlying clash of ideas between the Prime Minister and his Cabinet colleagues also anticipated some of the elements of the crisis of the Edwardian Conservative party.

Ministers Matter: Gaitskell and Butler at Odds over Convertibility, 1950–52 by Scott Kelly

This article challenges the established view that there was a cross-party consensus on the aims and methods of economic policy in the post-war period. Convertibility policy offers one of the most striking examples of the absence of consensus between the parties. The differences matter because the crucial decisions were taken by Ministers rather than civil servants. Hugh Gaitskell, in common with other Labour ministers, doubted if convertibility was desirable even as a long-term objective. Conservative ministers, on the other hand, had no doubt that convertibility was a desirable objective; debate centred on whether convertibility should be at a floating rate and also on the timing of the move. An analysis of Hugh Gaitskell’s role in the European Payments Union negotiations and of Rab Butler in the ROBOT crisis illuminates both the fundamental differences in policy and the fact that Ministers took the lead.

‘Wilsonism’ Reconsidered: Labour Party Revisionism, 1952–64 by Ilaria Favretto

The focus of this article is on Labour’s revisionism in the years 1952–64; its scope is a reassessment of the intellectual debate preceding the Wilson years and of some consolidated assumptions on the theoretical premises which lay behind Labour’s return to power in 1964. The main argument is that ‘Wilsonism’, understood as a set of policies, was something more than a number of rhetorical devices developed to put an end to internal party power-struggles, and, as it is usually presented, the result of a compromise between Croslandite revisionism and traditionalism; in fact, the ‘modern socialism’ championed by the Centre–Left Technocratic Group, which rallied around Wilson, profoundly differed both from the kind of Keynesian socialism of centre-right revisionists and the traditional socialism of the ‘Old Left’ (Bevanites).

Gosplanners v. Thermostatters: Whitehall Planning Debates and their Political Consequences, 1945–49 by Richard Toye

This article explores the impact of civil service debates on economic planning on the economic policy of the post-war Labour government. It challenges Jim Tomlinson’s claim that there were no ‘Gosplanners’ in Whitehall, and delineates the nature and extent of this group’s challenge to the more moderate policy of the ‘Thermostatters’. It assesses the impact of this conflicting advice upon the leading economic ministers. Finally, it explores the way in which Stafford Cripps, in the early days of his Chancellorship, continued to promote some aspects of the Gosplanners’ agenda. It concludes that the Attlee government’s transition from socialist planning to demand-management was a slower and more closely disputed process than has generally been recognised.

No Ordinary Foreign Office Official: Sir Rober Makins and Anglo-American Atomic Relations, 1945–55 by Saul Kelly

Less information has been released on atomic energy than on any other subject in the British and American archives. Yet the whole question lay at the heart of the Cold War and, consequently, became the most important issue in Anglo-American relations in the decade after the Second World War. Based on material to which the author was granted special access by the Cabinet Office, this paper proposes to take a fresh look at the troubled period of Anglo-American relations between 1945–55 from the perspective of the British official most closely concerned with them, and most trusted by Attlee and Bevan, namely Sir Roger Makins.

Considering New Developments in History in the 1950s and 1960s by Jim Obelkevich

The ‘new history’, best represented by Past and Present and by social history, remains the most important advance in historical study in the post-war period. This article traces its origins, outlines some of its main characteristics and considers the ways in which it was influenced by such things as the social sciences, the Annales school and the work of historians in the United States. Criticisms are offered of the widespread view that the new historians ignored gender and culture. There are brief observations on their social profile, their links with older historiographical traditions in Britain, their opponents, and the wider significance of their work. (This is a revised version of the introductory paper prepared for the witness seminar on the subject that took place in April 1998. A transcript of the discussion is published in this issue.)

Witness Seminar: New Developments in History in the 1950s and 1960s edited by Jim Obelkevich

Review Article: Constitutional History by Peter Catterall

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 14.3

Introduction: Twentieth Century Perspectives by Peter Berberis

Labour and the English Regions: Centralised Devolution? by Janet Mather

The Labour Party has expressed an ambivalent attitude towards regionalism. On the one hand, it has shown an interest in devolving powers. On the other hand, Labour’s terms of office have usually been either tenuous or temporary or both, often in an inclement economic climate, and this has mostly discouraged the party in government from trying too hard to devolve powers only recently obtained and uncertainly held. While Labour Party thought has always contained elements of both state-centred and devolutionary philosophies, in practice central planning has been the basis for action. A comparative examination of Labour Party policy in the 1960s and 1990s demonstrates this ambivalence. The article concludes, however, that for several reasons the prospects for effective devolution in England at the end of the 1990s are slightly brighter than those of the 1960s.

From Sunningdale to the Good Friday Agreement: Creating Devolved Government in Northern Ireland by Jonathan Tonge

The 1998 Good Friday Agreement has been described as ‘Sunningdale for slow learners’, in that it uses many of the ideas originating in that 1973 agreement. This article examines what historical lessons have been learned from Sunningdale and applied to the Good Friday Agreement. Three items are considered: the similarities and dissimilarities of the two agreements; the evolution of attitudes within the Labour party, in government and opposition, to the prospect of a return to devolved government for Northern Ireland; and the changed political context within which the agreements were constructed. The article argues that the most crucial difference between the Sunningdale and Good Friday agreements is the inclusivity of the latter, while acknowledging that other important variations exist.

Devolution and the End of Britain? by James Mitchell

Labour politicians have asserted that devolution will strengthen the union, while nationalist politicians assert that devolution is a stepping-stone to independence. This article argues that Scotland’s future constitutional status will depend on a variety of factors. Devolution alters the balance between Dicey’s three ‘watchwords’ – unity of government, equality of political rights and diversity of institutions – and that it is the relationship between these allied with the expectations that Scots have of the new constitutional arrangements, including most notably how the centre behaves, that will determine whether devolution is an end or the start of the process of the break-up of the state.

The One Nation Idea and State Welfare: The Conservatives and Pensions in the 1950s by Paul Bridgen

The Conservatives’ 1959 earnings-related pension scheme has rightly been dismissed by historians as an exercise in financial retrenchment. However, the debate that preceded its introduction has been ignored. This, it is argued, involved the first concerted attempt by ‘One Nation’ Conservatives to construct a social policy different both from the Conservative right’s rigid adherence to laissez-faire government and Labour’s uncritical statism. The state would guarantee and regulate greater private pension provision, but would only provide pensions as a last resort. The Treasury and the Conservative right blocked these proposals in 1957–58, but similar ideas continued to inform debates on pensions policy after this date.

Rise and Fall of the Alternative Economic Strategy: From Internationalisation of Capital to ‘Globalisation’ by John Callaghan

The Alternative Economic Strategy was the focus of the British left’s thinking for more than a decade and formed the basis of the Labour party’s plans for the economic renewal of Britain as recently as the general election of 1983. It originated both as a response to the crisis of the British economy, which deepened in the 1970s, and to the perception of its growing porousness as economic activity became increasingly internationalised. The demise of the AES is undoubtedly related to the fragmentation of the Labour left after 1981, especially in the wake of the general election defeat of 1983. But some of its earliest advocates began to see that the AES was in need of major revision in the light of considerations that became evident well before 9 June 1983. The fact that these doubts were expressed by some of the more radical and creative contributors to the AES is evidence of a serious reappraisal of what the programme could achieve in the changing circumstances of the early 1980s. But while the radicals turned to the advocacy of a trans-European strategy, the Labour party did not.

‘Worlds Apart’: The British Embassy in Moscow and the Search for East–West Understanding by Michael F Hopkins

For most of the period since 1945, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union were ideologically ‘worlds apart’. The British Embassy in Moscow pursued three main goals: to provide information about Soviet domestic and foreign policy; to promote British trade and develop scientific and cultural exchanges; and to seek to influence Soviet foreign policy on wider international issues. The opportunities for doing this were limited by the cold war, as well as by the longer legacy of rivalry dating back to the Bolshevik revolution and, indeed, the Tsarist era. The embassy managed to overcome the confining nature of diplomatic life in the Soviet Union and was able to give the government in London an accurate portrait of the main features of Soviet life – though it failed to predict Soviet collapse. It succeeded in maintaining trading and cultural links. Its exercise of influence, however, was restricted to a brief period in the 1990s. While this phase passed, it did constitute a watershed. Thereafter, despite continuing disagreements, there is no longer a fundamental gulf between Russia and the West.

Witness Seminar: The Role of HM Embassy in Moscow edited by Gillian Staerck

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 14.2

Special issue

Amateurs and Professionals in Post-war British Sport

Edited by: Adrian Smith and Dilwyn Porter

Amateur Football in England 1948–63: The Pegasus Phenomenon by Dilwyn Porter

In the early 1950s Pegasus AFC, drawing its players from Oxford and Cambridge Universities, became a major force in English amateur football. The club was important not just for what it achieved on the field but because, as Geoffrey Green observed, it was ‘amateur in the truest, bluest sense’. Its success, and the style with which it was achieved, brought hope to those who regretted the demise of the gentlemanly amateur and were anxious to halt the drift to rugby in schools. At the same time it encouraged the Football Association (FA) to continue its campaign against ‘shamateurism’, then rife among senior amateur clubs. The demise of Pegasus in 1963 coincided with a growing realisation that it was no longer practicable, or even desirable, to maintain a distinction between amateur and professional footballers.

‘Time Gentlemen Please’: The Decline of Amateur Captaincy in English County Cricket by Stephen Wagg

This essay examines the convention, sustained in English first class cricket to the early 1960s, that the captain of the team should hold amateur status. It focuses especially on the 20 years or so after 1945 when, the resilience of amateur captaincy notwithstanding, it became increasingly difficult for county clubs to sustain a style of leadership that had once been taken for granted. The tradition of amateur captaincy declined because fewer amateur cricketers were available, because county players became more insistent that places in a side should be earned on merit, and because the cricket authorities wanted to present a more modern face to the world.

‘Big Money’: The Tournament Player and the PGA, 1945–75 by Ray Physick and Richard Holt

This article examines the growing division within professional golf between club professionals and tournament players in the context of the rapid post-war commercialisation of the sport. Frustrated by the hierarchical structure and deferential ethos of the Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) and spurred on by new commercial opportunities and the advent of television, the tournament players increasingly challenged the authority of the PGA until they achieved effective autonomy. Access to the PGA records permit an account of how a defensive artisan organisation run by a small ageing elite was gradually modernised and restructured during a period of rapid economic expansion and social change.

‘The Amateur Rules’: Amateurism and Professionalism in Post-war British Athletics by Martin Polley

The tensions between administrators and athletes in post-war British athletics are explored in the context of the sport’s belated adjustment to rapidly changing social and economic conditions from the early-1950s onwards. Commercial pressures and individual aspiration are key factors in British athletics’ gradual, often painful, transition to a genuinely open sport by the 1990s – a change of status which created as many problems as it solved.

Still Crazy after All Those Years: Continuity in a Changing Labour Market for Professional Jockeys by Wray Vamplew

Sunday racing and the development of all-weather courses have increased employment opportunities for jockeys, but, as in the nineteenth century, the labour market is one of vast oversupply. Income distribution is still heavily skewed and jump jockeys still earn considerably less than their flat-race counterparts. Weight watching remains a professional necessity, though minimum weights are now higher and scientific methods of weight reduction are more common. Eating disorders, alcoholism and accidents continue as occupational hazards. Insurance schemes have developed to supplement the charitable funds to which Victorian riders had to resort, The Jockeys Association has emerged as a potential countervailing power within the racing industry but riders still have no voice in the controlling bodies of the turf.

Civil War in England: The Clubs, the RFU, and the Impact of Professionalism on Rugby Union, 1995–99 by Adrian Smith

Rugby union became open in August 1995, responding to commercial pressures, not least the impact of satellite television on the broadcasting of sport. This essay examines the impact of professionalism upon rugby union in England, and the wider consequences elsewhere in the British Isles. In particular, it identifies the tension generated by the conflicting demands of international and senior club rugby. It also explains the deep differences within the Rugby Football Union in the second half of the 1990s regarding the future direction of the game.

Abstracts of Issue 14.1

Introduction: Town Planning, Housing and Politics in Britain by Mark Clapson

Civic Leadership and Education for Democracy: The Simons and the Wythenshawe Estate by Andrzej Olechnowicz

Manchester Corporation’s Wythenshawe estate was famous in the 1930s, and its fame was largely due to the efforts of Sir Ernest Simon, a prominent Liberal businessman. This article examines how his developing ideas of leadership and civic responsibility in a democracy shaped his judgement of Wythenshawe. In the 1920s, he regarded Wythenshawe as a triumph of imaginative municipal leadership in the face of the indifference of central government. By the 1930s, however, he saw Wythenshawe as, potentially, a danger to democracy. The estate was a one-class area of people with no spontaneous commitment to democracy. They were, in fact, vulnerable to the mass appeal of fascism. This had to be guarded against by the promotion of education in citizenship in schools and community centres. As a consequence, Simon’s assessment of Wythenshawe’s success or failure was determined as much by the ideological conviction, common in his class, that the working class were not fit citizens, as by the quality of life made possible by the estate.

The Reconstruction of Blitzed British Cities, 1945–55: Myths and Reality by Nick Tiratsoo

Fifty years after the process began, many are critical about the way that blitzed British cities were rebuilt. The problem, it is alleged, was ‘the planners’. They acted like dictators, and simply imposed their ‘New Jerusalemist’ ideas regardless of public opinion and national priority. Local populations were therefore betrayed on the alter of a profession’s half-baked utopianism. This article takes issue with such an interpretation, and shows why it is almost completely misconceived. Most planners were mild reformers, who wanted to work as far as possible in harmony with the citizens they served. However, planners were only one set of participants in a complex equation. Other forces shaped much of the reconstruction process. Most importantly, what occurred cannot be understood without reference to national government policy and the largely conservative aspirations of ordinary people.

The Reconstruction of Portsmouth in the 1940s by Junichi Hasegawa

This article explores some important political issues and local difficulties facing planners during the 1940s in Portsmouth, a city which suffered considerable bomb damage. It is a local study which deals with some of the general points raised in Nick Tiratsoo’s article in this volume, and which emphasises the contextual constraints which operated firmly against, or in modification of, the Portsmouth plan.

Creating New Communities: The Role of the Neighbourhood Unit in Post-War British Planning by Andrew Homer

The use of the neighbourhood unit concept was a key element in the majority of the first ‘mark one’ new towns constructed following the New Towns Act of 1946. The neighbourhood unit represented an attempt to reverse the perceived breakdown of ‘community spirit’ during the inter-war years. The concept was also used by the 1945 Labour government as a means to eradicate class divisions, and thus make society more cohesive. This article traces the rise and rapid decline of the neighbourhood unit policy from its American origins to its ignominious disappearance in the face of opposition from town planners, architects and sociologists. It evaluates the successes and failings of this policy and argues that the concept reveals much not only about the governance and planning of Britain in the immediate post-war period, but also raises issues about class and social ‘cohesion’ in British society.

Planners and the Public: British Popular Opinion on Housing During the Second World War by Tatsuya Tsubaki

During the Second World War, the British public played a significant part in helping to shape the design and style of post-war housing. Public consultation in housing formed part of the democratic planning process, as extensive post-war housing provision became a necessity. This article explores the nature of popular opinion on housing and how it may have intersected with the ideas of architects and planners. The results of several opinion surveys suggested that the public held varied, even contradictory, views on the question of housing. Nevertheless, there was a strong demand on its part for better housing affording greater privacy. This was clearly acknowledged by some experts, who tried to take note of these views to produce plans for post-war housing in tune with the public’s needs and tastes.

‘This is Magnificent!’: 300,000 Houses a Year and the Tory Revival after 1945 by Harriet Jones

The Rise and Fall of the Conservatives’ ‘Grand Design for Housing’, 1951–1964 by Peter Weiler

When they returned to power in 1951 the Conservatives aimed to restore the dominance of the market in housing and property and by early 1953 Harold Macmillan, the Minister of Housing, had put forth a ‘grand design’ to achieve that goal by phasing out rent control, making council housing a residual social service only for those in need, and thus further encouraging home ownership. But, as the Conservatives had feared from the start, the various steps they took to achieve this goal proved unpopular. As rents and land prices rose in the property boom of the early 1960s, Conservative housing policies became widely associated with profiteering and homelessness. The Rachman scandal of 1963 put the Tories even more on the defensive and forced them to retreat from what were widely seen as the unacceptable consequences of an unrestrained market in housing and land.

The Suburban Aspiration in England Since 1919 by Mark Clapson

In contrast to the pervasive anti-suburbanism of English intellectual culture, this article suggests that the suburbs have made a generally favourable contribution to English society since 1919. This is because suburban living has been pursued and enjoyed by millions of people from different class and ethnic groups. The article also demonstrates that the attractions of the suburbs stemmed in no small part from the influence of garden city and garden suburb experiments in early twentieth century England.

Abstracts of Issue 13.4

‘The Secret Battalion’: Communism in Britain during the Cold War by Phillip Deery

This article argues that the Attlee Labour government’s depiction of communist influence within the trade union movement and, particularly, on the docks in the late 1940s, was neither as irrational nor deluded as many historians have alleged. When Attlee’s response is understood within the context of Cold War developments, the Communist party emerges not as the innocent victim of government smears, but as a contributor to Labour’s fears. The article explores the interplay between domestic and international concerns, and the nexus between local subservience to Moscow and the embrace of hard-line sectarianism, and an aggressive Soviet foreign policy. The article also explores the role of the security services in sharpening Attlee’s apprehensions about communism in Britain.

Reconstruction, Development and the Entrepreneurial State: The British Colonial Model, 1939–51 by L J Butler

The British colonial state was transformed during the Second World War, and adopted a new commitment to economic and social development funded by the United Kingdom. Designed to pre-empt international and colonial critisism of colonial rule, this policy was affected by wartime debates within Britain on post-war social and economic reconstruction. Wartime collectivist ideas were selectively adopted into Colonial Office thinking and justified as a means of promoting faster development and appeasing colonial critics of expatriate business. The implementation of these ideas exposed the post-war colonial state to charges of exploitation, damaging the reputation of public enterprise and reaffirming the importance of private enterprise in the colonial context.

Profession Identity and Organisation in a Technical Occupation: The Emergence of Chemical Engineering in Britain, c. 1915–30 by Colin Divall, James F Donnelly and Sean F Johnston

The emergence in Britain of chemical engineering, by mid-century the fourth largest engineering specialism, was a hesitant and drawn out process. This article analyses the organisational politics behind the recognition of the technical occupation and profession from the First World War through to the end of the 1920s. The collective sense of professional identity among nascent ‘chemical engineers’ developed rapidly during this time owing to associations which promoted their cause among potential patrons. ‘From the Crinoline to the Boilersuit’: Women Workers in British Shipbuilding during the Second World War by Hugh Murphy This article considers the under-researched topic of the employment of women in private British shipyards during the Second World War. In looking at the numbers of women employed, which were low in comparison to other sectors, historians have often overlooked the shipbuilding industry. The roles of women in manual occupations in these shipyards, on balance, were pretty much limited, however, this article will take a holistic approach in examining why this was in fact the case.

Party versus Order: Ulster Unionism and the Flags and Emblems Act by Henry Patterson

The Flags and Emblems Act has been seen as symbolising the sectarian and anti-nationalist essence of the Northern Ireland ‘police state’. In fact the Act was introduced against the advice of the Inspector General of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. The pressure for it came from the fears of Sir Basil Brooke’s government that an ‘anti-appeasement’ campaign by loyalist ultras was threatening Unionist party hegemony in Protestant politics. The basis for the campaign was the fact that Brooke and his Minister of Home Affairs, Brian Maginess, had attempted to accommodate the new challenges of a welfare state and an international environment seen as more sympathetic to anti-partitionism.

Witness Seminar: The Intelligence Services in the Second World War edited by Christopher Andrew and Richard J Aldrich

Review Article: The Atlantic Alliance at 50: The Origins and Transformation of NATO by Beatrice Heuser

Book Reviews

Index to Volume 13

Abstracts of Issue 13.3

Themed Issue

Management in Post-War Britain

Edited by: Nick Tiratsoo

Management History: An Introduction by Edward F L Brech

The pursuit of management history can be interesting and valuable just as the acquisition of knowledge. There is, however, a far more significant objective in learning from our past. The story of the evolution of Britain’s ‘management movement’ over the past century has demonstrated recurrent failure on the part of the practitioners (directors and managers alike) to understand and implement their inherent professional responsibility for the economic well-being of the community. The following article demonstrates and illustrates this thesis through selected items of historical significance.

Management and Engineering Education in the 1950s and 1960s by Peter Catterall

The career destiny of many graduate engineers is in industry. Quite how well prepared they were for that career became a matter of political importance in the late 1950s and early 1960s as the issue of Britain’s relatively poor economic performance grew in salience. This article looks at this preparation with particular reference to management training. It examines the attitudes towards this of those parties most interested in engineering education – the government, industry, the engineering institutions and the educators themselves. All of these saw management training as being part of the formation of at least a portion of professional engineers at some stage in their career. But there was no general agreement between them about what this should consist or when it should be provided. At the same time broader changes in engineering education were taking place which cut across and to some extent militated against attempts to enhance the role of management training. The result, it is argued, is that by the end of the 1960s little progress had been achieved.

British Economic Decline: Blame It on the Consultants? by Matthias Kipping

This article examines dissemination of 'work study' from the1920s to the1960s in Britain and Continental Europe, and shows that semi-public or associative institutions were more efficient 'carriers' of these new methods than management consultants. The predominant role of consultants in the British case therefore resulted in much lower rates of adoption compared, for example, to Germany. It also highlights the absence of trust and trust-creating mechanisms as a major reason for the failure to establish institutional channels for the diffusion of management innovations in Britain.

Killing Off the Father: Social Science and the Memory of Frederick Taylor in Management Studies, 1950–75 by Michael Roper

This article focuses on the politics surrounding the memory of Frederick Taylor in order to explore the post-war development of management studies in Britain and the USA. It argues that the shift in the discipline from practitioner-based to social science knowledge was a paradigmatic one, in which the theme of generational revolt was central. The article outlines the rise of the new management studies in Britain and the framing of the debates between social scientists and practitioner-theorists as a struggle between fathers and sons. This theme is explored in relation to the contest over the memory of Taylor, and then examines the reaction of the British management intellectual Lyndall Urwick to the conflict. By analysing both the institutional and personal dimensions of the paradigm shift, and focusing on its generational meanings, the article seeks to illustrate how management history can be enriched by cultural approaches.

Management and the Introduction of Computing in British Industry, 1945–70 by Richard Coopey

In the 25 years following the Second World War the computer underwent a radical transition, from being a large-scale military-scientific technology, to one with widespread applications in industry. Britain was at the forefront in the first part of this process, but fell behind rival economies in the second – particularly when compared to the USA. This article traces the level and type of computer usage in Britain during this formative period and re-examines some contemporary analysis in order to assess the extent and effect of this ‘computing gap’. The article outlines the costs and difficulties inherent in early computing, and stresses the importance of linking the level of computer usage to firm structure and environment. It also suggests ways in which managerial cultures in Britain shaped computer usage, and the impact, in turn, which computerisation had on these cultures.

Conceptualising Cost: The Analysis of Management Information on Britain’s Railways, c.1935–56 by Roy Edwards

This article describes how the demand for management information in an accounting format developed on Britain’s railways. From the turn of the twentieth century concern had been expressed over the relationship between cost and the efficiency of operations. While internal systems of management information had been in place for many years, they did not reflect accounting terminology or practice. It was with the desire of government to co-ordinate transport undertakings that the demand for such data developed. With nationalisation, the managers of Britain’s rail network became much more concerned with the presentation of information within this format. The article concludes that regulation, as much as de-regulation, is likely to provide a stimulus for accounting information.

Accountants v. Engineers: The Professions in Top Management in Britain since the Second World War by Derek Matthews

Accountancy in Britain has been highly successful in promoting its professional qualification as a general management training. Accountants in turn have been more successful in reaching the top rungs of the managerial hierarchy than any other profession including the engineers. Moreover, recent research by Barry et al. argues the superior managerial performance of accountants compared to engineers. This article explains why this situation has come about by contrasting, in the historical context, the training and experience of accountants with that of engineers as a suitable preparation for management.

Cinderellas at the Ball: Production Managers in British Manufacturing, 1945–80 by Nick Tiratsoo

For much of the post-war period, production managers were the ‘Cinderellas’ of British industry, lacking in status and power. Production was obviously a vital part of any manufacturing enterprise, yet most directors seemed oblivious to this, and instead privileged ‘gin and tonic’ specialisms like marketing and accountancy. Such behaviour was regularly criticised – the lack of focus on production caused considerable problems, especially as regards quality and delivery issues – though without much success. The problem was the particular nature of British corporate culture, which downplayed the need for strategic direction and technical competence. In this sense, production’s subordination says much about the larger issue of why British manufacturing so often struggled to compete on a world stage.

British Management and British History: Assessing the Responsibility of Individuals for Economic Difficulties by Ian Glover

This article is concerned with the character of managers and management in the UK in the last half century. It describes and offers an explanation for the weaknesses especially apparent in the 1970s, when public concern with manufacturing and general economic performance was at its height. The explanation draws on economics, history, sociology and international comparisons of management. It goes on to discuss historical arguments and evidence in some detail, and in making all of the relevant comparisons, it draws on and to an extent adopts the highly critical and policy-oriented stance used in the 1970s by its author and colleagues. With a more experienced and detached standpoint, it offers a ‘consolidated view’ of UK history, in which long-term success and shorter run difficulties are compared and contrasted. The nature and the effects of the sea change in higher education of the last 35 years and in the educational, professional and occupational character of UK management are considered and portrayed, with reservations, as favourable. The conclusion emphasises the need to distinguish between the roles of management in general and those of managers in particular in economic performance, as well as the imminent, unpredictable and at times kaleidoscopic character of the influences on performance.

Recasting the Visible Hand? Strategy, Structure and Process in UK Manufacturing, c.1970–97 by Alan McKinlay

Contemporary changes in corporate strategies and structures have been determined by market forces and the administrative heritage of specific firms. In particular, the partial ‘Americanisation’ of British corporate structure in the 1970s was crucial in shaping the shift to financial control regimes in British big business. The principal effect has been to expose both front line managers and the shopfloor to more continuous and intense corporate surveillance.

Abstracts of Issue 13.2

Special Issue

Whitehall and the Suez Crisis

Edited by: Saul Kelly and Anthony Gorst, University of Westminster

Alternatives to Nasser: Humphrey Trevelyan, Ambassador to Egypt by Michael T Thornhill

One of the questions which remained unanswered after the opening of the files of the British government on the Suez Crisis in 1987 was what regime should replace that of Nasser if military action was successful. This article helps to asnswer this question by assessing the often divergent reports of Trevelyan and his embassy officials on possible alternatives to the Nasser regime. It details Trevelyan's political input in the military planning (especially on the use of oil sanctions and psychological measures). It demonstrates how the Cairo embassy's attitudes on these issues shaped the advice being received in London during the diplomatic phase of the crisis. The article also details the direct involvement of British 'diplomats' in subversive activities against Nasser's government. Humphrey Trevelyan emerges from the account as a wise man who understood the limits of military force and the pitfalls of political intervention.

'A Modern Major General': General Sir Gerald Templer, Chief of the Imperial General Staff by Anthony Gorst

Templer was an enthusiastic supporter of Eden's desire to use military force to solve the Suez Crisis. This enthusiasm resulted in Templer, who was the dominant figure on the Chiefs of Staff Committee, and to a lesser extent the other chiefs (the Chief of the Air Staff, Sir Dermot Boyle, and the First Sea Lord, Lord Louis Mountbatten) accepting a political war aim, the toppling of Nasser, which was militarily unachievable and which contributed to the constant changes in the military plan in August and September 1956. This article disentangles the role of Templer in policy making during the crisis and highlights the lesson that the CIGS drew from MUSKETEER, that future military interventions needed to be taken quickly and decisively in pursuit of a realistic war aim.

'Playing the Role of a Cassandra': Sir Gerald Fitzmaurice, Senior Legal Advisor to the Foreign Office by Lewis Johnman

This examination of the role of Fitzmaurice and the general legal debate within the British government over the use of force reveals the determination of Eden to topple Nasser without declaring this as an aim of policy. Thus, the extreme narrowing of the advisory and policy channels threw much of Whitehall into confusion. The Suez 'insiders' (Eden, the Egypt Committee and a small number of senior officials) blocked or ignored any advice which did not suit their purposes and utilised entirely inappropriate means to justify their actions. This article shows that, as with so much of the advice being given during the Suez Crisis, 'what was ignored proved to be correct and what was accepted proved to be wrong'.

The Mandarins' Mandarin: Sir Norman Brook, Secretary of the Cabinet by Keith Kyle

For most of the Suez Crisis those, admittedly limited, number of civil servants who had clearance to receive documents (codenamed TERRAPIN) were kept fully informed by Ministers and controlled the plans for the use of force. This was especially true, as this article shows, of Brook, with his two committees – Defence (Transition), which met throughout the Crisis and co-ordinated the reports of the specialist groups, and the Egypt (Official) – and his role as Secretary of the Cabinet and of the Egypt (Ministerial) Committee. It was only during the last phase that most civil servants were excluded, with the exception of Brook. It fell to Brook, as Secretary to the Cabinet, to undertake the unpleasant task of destroying any incriminating documentary evidence of collusion. Following Eden's departure for Jamaica to convalesce, Brook's calm was a great boon as he worked to restore order to Whitehall and to keep the machine running.

In the Know? Sir Gladwyn Jebb, Ambassador to France by Christopher Goldsmith

Most accounts of the Suez Crisis have tended to concentrate on the exclusion of Jebb from the Franco-British meeting on 16 October 1956, when Eden and Lloyd agreed to the Challe plan for collusion with Israel. But, as this article points out, it is also important to recognise that Jebb had earlier played a part in shaping the British response to the nationalisation of the Suez Canal, especially the development of a common Franco-British approach. As the Crisis developed, he became increasingly concerned about the implications of a continued commitment to a policy of force and the closeness of French relations with Israel – a worry which was reflected in his warning to Eden about the supply of French Mystere fighters to Israel. The Prime Minister chose to adopt another approach and took the first steps along the path to collusion and disaster.

The Limits of Opposition: Admiral Earl Mountbatten of Burma, First Sea Lord and Chief of Naval Staff by Eric Grove and Sally Rowan

Mountbatten's consistent opposition to British policy over Suez was motivated by moral and political considerations as much as by Service and strategic interests. He took very seriously his position within the Royal Family, the governing class and the Navy and, therefore, pushed his opposition to MUSKETEER as far as he could without prejudicing these interlocking positions. The fact that Mountbatten did not resign over Suez was of considerable importance for the Navy when he successfully defended its interests during the Sandys Defence Review in 1957–58.

The Missing Link? Patrick Dean, Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee by W Scott Lucas

Dean performed an important liaison role during the Crisis. He was not only Superintending Under-Secretary of State of the Permanent Under-Secretary of State's Department and Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, which linked the Foreign Office, the military and MI6, but he also bypassed official channels and passed on messages to the secret services from the Prime Minister. Dean's story, as this article makes clear, was part of a much larger and more important catalogue of chaos and fragmentation within Whitehall which led to the pursuit of several foreign policies during Suez. Moreover, MI6's persistent and, some might argue pernicious, influence led straight to the disaster of November 1956.

Cadogan's Last Fling: Sir Alexander Cadogan, Chairman of the Board of Governors of the BBC by Tony Shaw

Coincidence, combined with the closed nature of the British governing elite, placed Cadogan, one of the most distinguished civil servants of his generation, in a uniquely wide-ranging position during the Suez Crisis. He operated in three apparently autonomous, but ultimately antagonistic, spheres: as Chairman of the English-Speaking Union's Commonwealth Current Affairs Unit, as a government director of the Suez Canal Company and as Chairman of the BBC's Board of Governors. Further complications arose from his close friendship with Eden dating from the inter-war appeasement years. This article demonstrates that Cadogan's overall impact on Suez lay more in the sphere of presentation of government policy than in its actual formulation.

In the Company of Policy Makers: Sir Donald Logan, Assistant Private Secretary to the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs by Chris Brady

The policy-making role of Logan was negligible, but his place in the history of Suez is considerable. Logan was a man of genuine integrity who was present at an important moment in British history: the collusion meetings at Sèvres in late October 1956. He has told his story without embellishment and if only for this reason it is worth analysing. But he is also of interest because of his refusal to blow the whistle on Eden after the latter made his deceptive statement to Parliament on 20 December 1956. Logan epitomises the practical and realistic image of the British civil servant at this period.

Transatlantic Diplomat: Sir Roger Makins, Ambassador to Washington and Joint Permanent Secretary to the Treasury by Saul Kelly

Makins' role in the Suez Crisis is of particular interest to historians. His main duties as Ambassador in Washington during the early stages of the crisis were to keep on good terms with the Eisenhower Administration, conveying British policy to them and explaining US policy to London without losing the confidence of the Eden government. The main thrust of Makins' advice, after returning to London in mid-October 1956 to take up the post of Joint Permanent Secretary of the Treasury, was to stress the need to secure US support for an International Monetary Fund (IMF) loan for Britain and other financial and economic measures to avert the looming disaster for sterling and the economy. It was as a result of his transatlantic contacts that the British government eventually secured this vital financial and economic support, in return for withdrawing from Egypt.

The Diplomat's Diplomat: Sir Pierson Dixon, Ambassador to the United Nations by Edward Johnson

Dixon had the onerous task of defending Britain's use of force against Egypt in the UN, a forum in which Britain had few supporters, even though he was often 'kept in the dark' about the real aims of Eden's policy. Although Dixon later claimed that the Anglo-French action at Suez was 'a miscalculation and a mistake', at the time he did what he could to defend it publicly, while warning privately of the serious consequences for Britain of ignoring the UN. The personal effect of all this was 'the severest moral and physical strain he had ever experienced'.

The Past as Matrix: Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick, Permanent Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs by Ann Lane

Kirkpatrick was a key player in the development of policy and one of the few who had an overview. He was a solid supporter of Eden's policy towards Egypt. His belief that Nasser was another Hitler, combined with his concern at the Soviet challenge to Britain's position in the Middle East, framed his approach to the Suez Crisis. In the end, however, Kirkpatrick was out-manoeuvred as the Suez operation became increasingly determined by military considerations. His defence of British actions to his senior officials, however, went beyond the call of loyalty to Ministers.

Conclusion by John W Young

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 13.1

Operation Robot and the British Political Economy in the Early 1950s: The Politics of Market Strategies by Jim Bulpitt and Peter Burnham

Operation Robot was a scheme which emerged from the Bank of England and the Overseas Finance Division of the Treasury in January 1952. It sought to convince ministers of the need to radically restructure Britain's domestic political economy and centred on the proposal to introduce sterling convertibility on a floating exchange rate in the budget of 1952. Although Butler failed to gain sufficient cabinet backing for the scheme, the issues raised by the Robot episode are fundamental to understanding the preoccupations of British governors in the 1950s.

Hunters in the Backyard? The UK, the US and the Question of Arms Sales to Castro's Cuba, 1959 by Mark Phytian and Jonathan Jardine

The UK supplied arms to the Batista government in Cuba right up to the time of Batista's dramatic flight in December 1958. The new Castro government's request that the balance of an order for Sea Fury aircraft - paid for by Batista - be delivered, created a marked dilemma for the British government. Supply was economically desirable and would also bring political benefits. However, supply would also run counter to US interests. Later in 1959 the dilemma was heightened when the Cubans suggested exchanging the Sea Furies for more advanced Hunter aircraft. This case represents an intriguing example of the politics of British arms sales in the immediate post-Suez era, and also a modest contribution to the ongoing debate which seeks to explain US reactions to the Cuban Revolution, and the question of whether or to what extent the US 'pushed' Castro into the arms of the USSR.

The Electorial Sociology of Modern Britain Reconsidered by Christopher Stevens

This article challenges the dominant class alignment model of twentieth-century UK electoral behaviour. It suggests that there has been greater diversity in political opinion at the grass-roots level of politics than the two-class model allows; and that this diversity resembled a class alignment only because of the limitations of the political system and the electoral strategies of the main parties. It argues that political values derive from local communities, where they are formed both by local workplace and neighbourhood experiences and by the political, social, economic, religious and recreational networks that underpin them. It therefore follows that the key to political behaviour is to be found in the particular pattern of each local political economy. Stock Market Deregulation and Crash:

'Big Bang': Chronology of Events by Virginia Preston

Witness Seminar: 'Big Bang': The October 1986 Stock Market Deregulation edited by Michael David Kandiah

The October 1987 Stock Market Crash – Ten Years On by Michael David Kandiah

Witness Seminar: The October 1987 Stock Market Crash edited by Michael David Kandiah

The Macroeconomic Policies of Mr Lawson by Michael J Oliver

The recent ICBH Witness Seminar on the 1987 stock market crash was notable for the reluctance of Lord Lawson and Sir Peter Middleton to engage in any discussion on macroeconomic policy at the time of the crash. This article will show that as Chancellor, Lawson had made many ill-judged decisions over monetary policy by October 1987 and continued to do so after the crash. The article will trace the origins of these decisions and examine how the working relationship between the Prime Minister and Chancellor gradually deteriorated after 1985. By placing the stock market crash into a wider context than was offered by Lawson at the Seminar, it is possible to see how the Conservative party lost its reputation for 'sound finance' through the deleterious effects of the 'Lawson boom'.

Comment:

ICL - The Ministry of Technology (Mintech) and the Merger by Murray Laver

Bibliographical Essay:

The Liberal Party and International Affairs, c.1919–1988 by Richard S Grayson

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 12.4

Special Issue

The Making of Channel 4

Edited by: Peter Catterall, Queen Mary & Westfield College, University of London, and Institute of Contemporary British History

Channel 4 had been a matter of controversy for years even before it came on the air in November 1982. There were lengthy debates about what its role would be and the part to be played by the ITV companies and the growing number of independent television producers. There was also political controversy over the profile of the new channel, some wishing to see it as ‘their’ channel in response to the apparent political hegemony of Margaret Thatcher.

The result was sharp conflicts, not only over programming but, as the channel became established, over its relationships with the ITV companies and its regulatory body, the IBA. These controversies in the making of Channel 4 are revisited in this volume.

The opening article by Edmund Dell, the channel’s first chairman, describes and explains his sometimes stormy relationship with Jeremy Isaacs, the chief executive, while the witness seminar and the other articles offer the views of Channel 4 commissioning editors and representatives from the IBA, the ITV companies, the independent producers, the Home Office and the BBC.

Abstracts of Issue 12.3

How Winston Churchill Became 'The Greatest Living Englishman' by John A Ramsden

Winston Churchill enjoyed after 1945 a remarkable reputation as a great man with a unique, historic status, but this did not follow on from the Second World War in a smooth and uncomplicated way. His increasing age and his iconic status as the war leader of 1940 were used by Churchill himself and by his many admirers in order to keep him in the public eye, but other aspects of the man such as his wit, his writings, his painting and his birthday celebrations were also used to promote the idea of a man whose sheer range of talents set him entirely apart from the ordinary. Churchill's funeral in 1965 completed the process, with writers and world leaders seeking both to celebrate Churchill's standing and to hijack his name for their own political causes, a process that has continued ever since.

Churchill and Romania: The Myth of the October 1944 'Betrayal' by Mark Percival

Churchill has been criticised in contemporary Romania for allegedly 'selling' the country to Stalin by the October 1944 percentages agreement. The importance of the agreement has, however, been exaggerated because of the lack of a clear explanation of its meaning in official documents and because the idea of Churchill and Stalin carving up Europe has appealed as a simple explanation for the division of the continent, while fitting the political agenda of some circles in Greece and Romania. The agreement was quoted as a justification for Britain's lack of intervention in some aspects of Romanian affairs in 1944 and 1945, but the presence of the Red Army in the country meant that Moscow could impose its will regardless, making British restraint irrelevant to Romania's fate. Moreover, Britain had important commercial interests in Romania which it sought to protect and did not accept the inevitability of communist rule until December 1945.

The Wilson Government and the Debate Over Arms to South Africa in 1964 by John W Young

The Labour government came into office in October 1964 with a public commitment to end arms sales to the apartheid regime in South Africa. Yet, less than two months later, Prime Minister Harold Wilson's Cabinet agreed to proceed with a substantial order of Buccaneer aircraft for the South African Navy. A number of factors affected this apparent reversal of intent, including fears for the security of Britain's remaining colonies in southern Africa and the need to retain the use of the Simonstown naval base, though the most important influence was the desire to safeguard export earnings.

Swimming with the Tide? Britain and the Maastricht Treaty Negotiations on Common Foreign and Security Policy by Alasdair Blair

Despite the importance of the Treaty on European Union, little attention has been paid to the manner in which the negotiations were conducted or to an analysis of particular topics. This article addresses one particular aspect by focusing on Britain's participation in the Common Foreign and Security Policy negotiations. It emphasises that, notwithstanding London being portrayed as an 'awkward' member of the European Union, it was neither awkward nor isolated in the course of the CFSP negotiations. Moreover, Britain eventually accepted a formula which went further than its pre-negotiating position. An important influence on this outcome was the Foreign and Commonwealth Office's stranglehold on the dossier. Conservative MPs were also generally more concerned about symbolic issues, including Economic and Monetary Union, the Social Chapter and the proposed federal goal. Greater freedom was therefore possible for negotiators within the area of CFSP, where Britain formed an effective alliance with other member states, most notably Italy.

Focus of a Changing Relationship: The Washington Embassy and Britain's World Role since 1945 by Michael F Hopkins

The British Embassy in Washington became, after 1945, the centre for the multifaceted Anglo-American 'special' relationship. This article sketches the legacy of the Second World War, the nature of the American political system and the way the embassy was organised to operate in that system. It then attempts to identify that institution's contribution in a series of episodes: the Korean and Gulf wars; the Suez and Cuban missile crises; the Falklands War; and the fall of the Shah of Iran. It concludes that the embassy was able to exert influence – partly because of generally good relations between president and prime minister but, more importantly, because of the quality of understanding established by a succession of outstanding ambassadors.

Witness Seminar: The Role of the British Embassy in Washington edited by Gillian Staerck

This witness seminar, organised by Dr Michael F. Hopkins, Liverpool Hope University College, and by Dr M.D. Kandiah, Institute of Contemporary British History, London, was held on 18 June 1997 in the Map Room at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), Whitehall. It was supported by the North America Department of the FCO. The discussion was introduced by a paper by Dr Hopkins and was chaired by Lord Wright of Richmond (Private Secretary to Ambassador and later First Secretary, British Embassy, Washington 1960–65, and Permanent Under-Secretary and Head of Diplomatic Service, FCO 1986–91).

The principal participants were:

• Sir Antony Acland (British Ambassador, Washington 1986–91)
• Professor Kathleen Burk (University College London)
• Sir Bernard Burrows (Counsellor, British Embassy, Washington 1950–53)
• Lord Greenhill of Harrow (served in British Embassy, Washington, 1949–52, and as Minister, 1962-64; Permanent Under-Secretary, FCO 1969–73) and Sir Nicholas Henderson (served in British Embassy, Washington 1947–49 and as British Ambassador, Washington 1979–82).
• Further contributions came from the Rt. Hon. Edmund Dell (former Labour MP, Paymaster General 1974–76 and Trade Secretary 1976–78), Sir Jeremy Greenstock (private secretary to Peter Jay when HM Ambassador in Washington 1977–9), Professor Sean Greenwood (Canterbury Christ Church College), Dr Saul Kelly (University of Westminster), Professor Keith Kyle (Royal Institute for International Affairs), Mariot Leslie (FCO), Michael Makovsky (Harvard University), Mark Pellew (FCO), and Philip Priestley (FCO).

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 12.2

Détente Deferred: The Attlee Government, German Rearmament and Anglo-Soviet Rapproachement 1950-51 by Spencer W Mawby This article examines the British government's first attempt to promote East-West détente through the abandonment of the policy of West German rearmament in return for concessions from the Soviet Union on other, largely unspecified, issues. It describes the Attlee administration's initial plans for a German defence contribution and the backlash against this policy which occurred after the outbreak of the war in Korea. This is followed by an account of the failure of the 1951 Paris agenda talks which Attlee and his ministers hoped would lead to a four power council of Foreign Ministers and a relaxation in Cold War tensions. It concludes by suggesting that though the attempt to promote détente floundered because of Cabinet divisions and superpower intransigence the episode marked a significant new departure in British diplomacy.

The 1958 Treasury Dispute by Mark Jarvis

The Treasury team resigned in January 1958 beacsue they would not accept an increase in the Civil Estimates for 1958-59 over the level of 1957-58. This could have posed a serious threat to Harold Macmillan's new adminstration. It was overcome by the Prime Minister playing down the significance of the episode, presenting the case that the three ministers were making an issue out of a small sum of money – £50 million. Although most historical accounts include this episode, they tend to over-concentrate on the build-up to the resignation. The aftermath of the departures, especially the debate within the Cabinet and inside the Treasury, has been overlooked. This article will show that the £50 million proved to be a difficult figure to find. It caused the Cabinet to take actions denied to Thorneycroft when he was Chancellor, and manipulate the figures to sustain the argument that the Treasury team had resigned over an insignificant sum.

The Principle of the Thing: The Consertative Government and the Control of Commonwealth Immigration, 1957-59 by David Welsh

This article examines the considerations that led to the failure of the Macmillan government during its first years to legislate for either control of Commonwealth immigrants or the power to deport them. It is argued that the opposition in principle to legislation undermining the legal equality of British subjects was very important for some parts of the government, that legislation was not regarded as inevitable, and that the extension of administrative controls over immigrants was a tactical moanoeuvre to prevent legislation.

Labour, the Tabloids, and the 1992 Election by James Thomas

This article explores the controversy surrounding the behaviour of the British tabloid press in the 1992 general election, and the effect that their anti-Labour campaign had on the result. The stance of the popular press is placed within the context of its behaviour since 1948 to show that between 1979 and 1992 the popular press was more hostile to Labour than at any time in the post-war period. The reasons for this, along with the wider effects that a hostile press had on Neil Kinnock and the Labour party are assessed. The article concludes that there were more fundamental reasons for Labour's defeat in 1992, but the taboid press campaign almost certainly made the difference between a Conservative victory and a hung parliament.

Thomas Balogh and the Fight for North Sea Revenue by June Morris

Thomas Balogh was Hungarian by birth. He fled to Britain in 1930 and joined the Labour party in 1943. Thereafter, in opposition and in government, he gave crucial advice on the formuation of economic policy on many fronts. In the Labour government of 1964 he was Economic Advisor to the Cabinet from 1964 to 1968 and consultant to Harold Wilson in 1969. He was given a life peerage in 1968, became Minister of State for Energy in the House of Lords from 1974 to 1975, was Deputy Chairman of the British National Oil Corporation (BNOC) from 1976 to 1978 and consultant to BNOC in 1979. Balogh's unique perspective and wide field of interest led him to a quick appreciation of the vast economic and political implications raised by the discovery of hydrocarbons in the North Sea. As the size and significance of Europe's offshore energy potential unfolded, he was to devote much of his time through the 1960s up until the late 1970s in pinpointing the inconsistencies and inadequacies of government policy on the oil and gas finds and in advocating reforms to combat the serious flaws which he believed were robbing Britain of economic benefit in the form of revenue and of other lost opportunities.

Archive Report: Major Accessions to Repositions in 1997 Relating to Twentieth-Century Politcal History by Katherine Williams

Review Articles:

No Entry: Britain and the EEC in the 1960s by Anthony Forster

Foreign Policy and the Art of Intelligence by Rodric Braithwaite

Book Reviews

Abstracts of Issue 11.4

Taking Care of Business: The Politics of Executive Pay in the United Kingdom by Martin Conyon and Robert Singh

In the 1990s, the remuneration of executive directors of private corporations became a political issue in the United Kingdom. Although issues of pay equity featureed prominently in post-war British politics, the question of directors' pay had previously generated no political controversy. In this article, we argue that nine distinct factors account for the politicisation of directors' pay, together reflecting the transformation of the British political economy that occured after 1979. However, although the politicisation of executive compensation led to the establishment of the Cadbury and Greenbury Committees – whose recommendations on corporate governance reform were widely adopted by private companies – no substantive reforms to the corporate regime governing executive pay occurred. The tactical exigencies of party politics since the later 1980s contributed to the absence of statutory regulation of executive compensation, and the continuing political dissensus over the issue.

Business and the Environment: An Inter-War Perspective on the Federation of British Industries by John Sheail

Prompted by the prominence given to environmental issues by present-day business, this article assesses the part played by the UK 'peak' body, the Federation of British Industries in the inter-war years. The response of the Federation to demands for further curbs on air and water pollution reveals not only the anxieties of members as to the impact of closer regulation on industrial competitiveness, but the strength and character of the relationship that existed between business and government. Within the environmental arena, questions of the most fundamental kind arose as to how far industry might be expected to regulate its own excesses, take a more coherent and forceful stance on issues of public concern, and welcome a more interventionist approach from government.

The Politics of the Independence of Kenya by Keith Kyle

Although Iain Macleod is fully entitled to the credit for breaking the constitutional deadlock over Kenya by clearing the path to African rule, his subsequent actions were dictated by fear of British public opinion. He felt unable to risk the Governor's threat to resign if he were to be stopped from calling Jomo Kenyatta 'a leader to darkness and death'. Macleod's stonewalling over Kenyatta's release resulted in sending the African majority party into opposition and allowing the minority party to insist on its own embarasssingly complicated constitution. Ths situation looked so desperate by 1962 that, fearing another Congo, Harold Macmillan wanted to ask the UN to take over control of Kenya. At the last minute two
men, Jomo Kenyatta and Malcolm MacDonald, saved Britain and Kenya from a great imperial fiasco.

Doctors and the State: The Changing Role of Medical Expertise in Policy-Making by Virginia Berridge

This article examines the changing nature of the relationship between doctors and the central state in Britain through a comparative historical study. It takes an old area of policy, that of illicit drugs, and compares the ways in which medical expertise in policy-making has been exerted with a new area, that of AIDS. It draws attention to similarities such as the move from outside pressure to insider status, and the key influence for both areas of the expert advisory committee, closely allied to central government, the high point of the politics of expertise in the post-war period. Issues such as the role of emergent 'policy communities' in areas of health policy; the role of medical civil servants as gatekeepers for medical expertise; the rise of key expert specialisms; and the role of medical 'product champions' are important. The role of the media in establishing expertise and the management of dissent is also considered. The article ends with a discussion of the current pressures on the role of medical expertise within the Department of Heath, and within these two policy areas, pressures which make the future of the doctor/state relationship seem uncertain.

'Statistical Floodlighting'? The Unpublished Economic Surveys 1946-47 by Keir M Thorpe

This article seeks to place the first two Economic Surveys which were produced under the Labour governments 1945-51, in the context of that government's aim to plan the economy. It shows immediate thinking behind the surveys, rather than the philosophy of planning which had developed in the 1930s and early 1940s. It considers in particular the role of James Meade, Director of the Economic Section at the time, in shaping the views of officials and ministers as to what the surveys and economic planning entailed. It then goes on to highlight some of the fears of those in government surrounding the surveys, and the problems they encountered producing them and effecting some sort of economic plan upon them. Thus it explores the precedents which were established in the first 18 months of the labour government that hampered its subsequent Economic Surveys and attempts at economic planning.

Archive Reports:

Harold Macmillan's Private Papers in the Bodleian Library, Oxford by Nia Mai Williams

And Then There Were Two: The Polaris A3TK Penetration Aids Carrier (PAC) by Dave Wright

Thirty-One Years On: A Review of Cabinet Papers, October-December 1966 by Matthew Elliot

Book Reviews