Labour and working-class lives

Essays to celebrate the life and work of Chris Wrigley

Keith Laybourn, John Shepherd, Keith Laybourn, John Shepherd

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN:
  9781526143655
  9781784995270
• eBook ISBN:
  9781526100115
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: Social Sciences

British labour history has been one of the dominating areas of historical research in the last sixty years and this book, written in honour of Professor Chris Wrigley, offers a collection of essays written by leading British labour historians of that subject including Ken Brown, Malcolm Chase and Matthew Worley. It focuses upon trade unionism, the co-operative movement, the rise and fall of the Labour Party, and working-class lives, comparing British labour movements with those in Germany and examining the social and political labour activities of the Lansburys. There is, indeed, some important work connected with the cultural developments of the British labour movement, most obviously in the essay written by Matthew Worley on communism and Punk Rock.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Editors and contributors
• Chris Wrigley: a tribute: Professor the Lord Hennessy of Nympsfield, FBA
• Chris Wrigley: a personal reflection: Professor Margaret Walsh
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction: Keith Laybourn and John Shepherd
• 1 George Howell, the Webbs and the political culture of early labour history: Malcolm Chase
• 2 The appointment of Herbert Gladstone as Liberal Chief Whip in 1899: Kenneth D. Brown
• 3 A question of neutrality? The politics of co-operation in north-east England, 1881–1926: Joan Allen
• 4 Transforming the unemployed: trade union benefits and the advent of state policy: Noel Whiteside
• 5 The trade union contribution to the British Labour Party: Andrew Thorpe
• 6 The disaffiliation crisis of 1932: the Labour Party, the Independent Labour Party (ILP) and the opinion of ILP members: Keith Laybourn
• 7 Voices in the wilderness? The Progressive League and the quest for sexual reform in British politics, 1932–59: Janet Shepherd
• 8 Working-class culture in Britain and Germany, 1870–1914: a comparison: Dick Geary
• 9 Women at work: activism, feminism and the rise of the female office worker during the First World War and its immediate aftermath: Nicole Robertson
• 10 ‘We never trained our children to be socialists’: the next Lansbury generation and Labour politics, 1881–1951: John Shepherd
• 11 Comrades in bondage trousers: how the Communist Party of Great Britain discovered punk rock: Matthew Worley
• 12 Must Labour lose? Lessons from post-war history: Kevin Jefferys
• A select list of the publications of Chris Wrigley
• Index