BRITISH SOCIALISTS Stanley Pierson Harvard University Press

Brockway's book) in the seventeenth questions such as (amongst others) the future century, were not only not won by the political shape of Britain and whether 'the socialists in the nineteenth century (the poorest he' would enjoy equal rights with 'the subject of Pierson's book) but still remain to greatest he' in Parliamentary elections, as be won today. happened in the famous Putney Debates in BRITISH SOCIALISTS The English bourgeois Revolution, itself a October 1647. Stanley Pierson most important episode in the fight for The Levellers were the first political Harvard University Press democracy in Britain, and the movements to movement of modern times. They produced extend it further — those of the Agitators, a kind of 'British Road' to Political BRITAIN'S FIRST SOCIALISTS Levellers and later, Diggers — have been Democracy, really a (much re-drafted) Fenner Brockway brilliantly described and analysed from left- outline of a democratic Constitution called Quartet Books £5.95 wing and Marxist standpoints in the 'An Agreement of the People for a firm, and These two books deal with events separated monumental books of H N Brailsford and present peace on the grounds of Common in time by almost 250 years and emphasise Christopher Hill. Fenner Brockway's major Right'. This included — two centuries before that the price for social and political advance aim in producing yet 'another book' on the Chartism — demands for democratic is a continuous struggle. For many of the subject is not only to provide 'a concise and electoral reform, Manhood Suffrage, Annual demands for which Cromwell's New Model straightforward account' for the general Parliaments, abolition of property qualifica- Army, and especially the Agitators and reader but, above all, to establish the tions, as well as far-reaching demands for Levellers within it, fought (the subject of credentials of the Agitators, Levellers and equality before the law, religious toleration, Diggers as 'the initiators of democratic abolition of a state church and of tithes, trial socialist principles'. by jury, abolition of the Privy Council and What emerges from his most living and other central courts, the election of sheriffs readable account is the great contribution and justices of the peace and many more. that was made during the course of this fine The Diggers sought to make a reality of struggle to the theory and practice of political 'common ownership' by occupying democracy in general and in Britain in uncultivated waste and common lands, particular. working them in common and sharing the The first 'shop stewards' of ordinary fruits of their common labour. With soldiers — the Agitators — were delegates Cromwell's turn to reaction and dictatorship, elected on a regimental basis in Cromwell's death and the restoration of the Monarchy, army. These became a formidable force all these inspiring movements were finally compelling the top army generals to discuss crushed. But they left living relics. with them not only their immediate Brockway argues strongly in favour of the grievances (delay in payment of wage arrears, correctness of proclaiming the Agitators, opposition to service in Ireland), but deeper Levellers and Diggers as the 'first Socialists'. Reviews For all their great merits, this estimate would Labour Party which they created and which seem to me to be incorrect. They were Pierson asserts they dominated. His whole involved in the first stages of a bourgeois argument is that these two elements are revolution, and an incomplete one at that. incompatible and that this incompatibility is They lived before the development of the root cause of the weakness of the modern industrial capitalism and of the individual socialist organisations and of the industrial working class. They were mainly socialist movement in general in Britain. small farmers, traders and skilled craftsmen. '. separated from . immediate They fought for advanced democratic aims practical concerns, the socialist visionaries but not for a society organised on the basis of lost their strength. But insofar as the the principles of Clause 4 of the Labour Party socialists concentrated on the advance of Constitution. trade union interests, they cut themselves off To be sure, we have inherited from them from the deeper inspiration of the the understanding of the importance of movement'. democracy and incorporated it into our His argument has contemporary relevance conception of the advace to socialism. But but not in the form he describes. The they did not, and could not, given the time 'contradiction' arose from the conditions in they lived in. which British socialism developed. In the Pierson's book deals with the politcial 1880s and 1890s, socialist ideas were the organisations of the Labour movement which property of only a tiny minority and amongst either called themselves socialist or had these, and the early socialist organisations socialist aims. He divides them into three — themselves, conceptions about the nature of a the Social-Democrats, by which he means socialist society, a strategy to achieve it and the Marxist organisations (the Social- the features and tasks of a genuine socialist Democratic Federation, the Socialist Labour party were extremely vague. Party, the British Socialist Party and the The idea that capitalism would 'collapse' Communist Party); then the Ethical and the workers 'take over' became fairly Socialists, by which he means the widely accepted as the movement developed. Independent Labour Party; and finally, the Thus propaganda to 'convert' people to a Fabians — and examines their development visonary socialism became widespread, above all in terms of their relations with the particularly on the part of the ILP. The Labour Party. Social Democratic Federation, Socialist He does this largely by discussing some of League and Socialist Labour Party, on the their outstanding, individual figures - other hand, sought to win people for Marxist 'those who served as organisers and ideas in their different ways, although a propagandists', those who formulated and Marxism of a somewhat mechanical kind. expounded their respective ideologies. These three latter organisations, however, This method, while providing interesting were fiercely opposed to struggle for slants on the early socialist movement, when immediate demands which they castigated as added to his view of the general background 'palliatives' and 'diversions'. With the on which British socialists developed as well establishment of the Communist Party, both as to his estimate of the Labour Party and the propaganda for socialist ideas and maximum dilemmas he asserts it created for the socialist participation in the day to day struggles of the organisations, adds up to a strange and working class and working people, are seen as confused picture. two essential sides of the work of a He ascribes a specially important role in the revolutionary Marxist party. True, the development of early socialism here to people degree to which both aspects are undertaken with a 'divided consciousness'. These were presents problems, and a struggle — not young, mainly of lower middle class origin, always successful — has to be waged against who, revolted by the gross, materialist society over-concentration on either one or the other. of the 80s and 90s and by their own soul- Today, the major contradiction is not destroying and dismal lives, looked for some between 'utopianism' and 'practicalism' in movement or body of ideas which would the labour movement but between the Fabian point the way to a new, more humane and and right wing ideas of the 'gang of three' and perfect society. other right wing forces in the labour These represented the Utopian, 'visionary' movement on the one hand, and the element in the socialist movement which alternative ideas and practice of the Labour found further expression in the outlook of the Left and other sections of the socialist Left on Ethical Socialists of the ILP who sought to the other. combine socialism with Christian belief. The Finally, a protest against the way William other element was the 'practical' one, Morris is treated in Pierson's book. His great reflected in the trade unions whose leaders contribution to the early development of the were — and remain — non-socialist and the socialist movement is almost totally ignored Marxism Today October 1980 35 and where he is mentioned he is bracketed with John Ruskin as embodying the aesthetic, artistic and visionary approach to socialism. Nowhere does Pierson number Morris amongst the early Marxists, refer in depth to the Socialist League and his role in it or to his tireless political activity as propagandist, lecturer, writer and seller of the League's paper. This is — as Robin Page Arnot says — part of the myth built up about Morris by those who wanted to discredit Marxism. Jack Cohen.

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