Paths Not Taken

Henry R. Winkler

Description

Distinguished historian Henry Winkler examines the changing and often contradictory views that characterized the British Labour party's approach to foreign policy from the end of World War I through the 1920s. He documents the progression from Labour's general indifference toward international issues before World War I, to its almost total rejection of the prevailing international order after the war, to its eventual grudging acceptance of the need to work for international cooperation through existing institutions. In the early 1920s, the Labour party began to abandon its earlier positions of pacifism and class struggle in favor of a more pragmatic approach to foreign affairs as party leaders recognized the possibility that they might one day come to power. Central to the shift in policy were such leaders as J. R. Clynes, Norman Angell, Arthur Henderson, Hugh Dalton, Philip Noel-Baker, and Will Arnold-Forster, who rejected traditional policies and who supported the League of Nations and, more tentatively, collective security. According to Winkler, these positions might have offered a viable alternative to the ruling Conservative party agenda had they not been undermined by the disintegration of the entire European order in the 1930s.

Originally published 1994.

A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.

Sujets

• Parti travailliste (Royaume-Uni)
• Norman Angell
• Philip J. Noel-Baker
• Foreign Policy
• Arthur Henderson
• Philip Noel-Baker, Baron Noel-Baker
• J. R. Clynes
• Hugh Dalton
• Labour Party (UK)
• British Studies

Informations

• Publié par: The University of North Carolina Press
• Date de parution: 09 novembre 2000
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780807866344
• Langue: English

Extrait

PATHS NOT TAKEN
PATHS NOT TAKEN
BRITISH LABOUR AND INTERNATIONAL POLICY IN THE 1920S
HENRY R. WINKIER
THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA
CHAPEL HILL AND LONDON
1994 The University of North Carolina Press
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Winkler, Henry R. (Henry Ralph), 1916-
Paths not taken: British labour and international policy in the 1920s / Henry R. Winkler
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8078-5757-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Great Britain-Foreign relations-1910-1936. 2. Labour Party (Great Britain)-History. I. Title.
DA578.W475 1994
327.41-dc20
94-459
CIP
98 97 96 95 94 5 4 3 2 1
Published with the help of the Charles Phelps Taft Memorial Fund,
University of Cincinnati.
FOR BEA
CONTENTS
Preface
Introduction
1. The Background
2. Labour and the Paris Settlement
3. The Aftermath of War
4. The Beginnings of Change
5. Labour s Uneasy Success
6. Alternatives to Locarno
Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
PREFACE
Many years ago, I tried to suggest in a couple of articles the process by which the British labor movement transformed a set of foreign policy attitudes that were the propaganda of a tiny minority group into positions that, however controversial, were the program of a party prepared to face the responsibilities of government and of international diplomatic intercourse. My intention then was to flesh out what were essentially shorthand sketches in a fuller investigation of the step-by-step interplay among Labour s policy makers and the handful of organs of Labour opinion that served them with their rank and file.
For a variety of reasons not particularly relevant here, I was diverted from those intentions and spent the better part of three fulfilling decades in administrative responsibilities at Rutgers University and the University of Cincinnati. As an aside, I tend to think that those responsibilities in public institutions helped give me a better sense of the political process and of how the politicians world of compromise and give-and-take must of necessity operate. Now, in retirement, I have turned to an unfinished task. My intention is not to reproduce once again the story of Labour s foreign policy after the First World War. That has more than adequately been done. Instead, I have wanted to follow the emerging and conflicting patterns that characterized Labour s discussion of policy in the twenties and that resulted, by the end of the decade, in what might have been a viable and reasonably responsible posture had not all the assumptions of the twenties been quickly shattered in the tragic dissolution of European order during the thirties.
As is always the case, my obligations are many. I am grateful to the University of Cincinnati for giving me a sabbatical year at the end of my tenure as president, to its Research Council for a generous grant to facilitate my work, and to its Charles Phelps Taft Memorial Fund for aid in publication. Librarians at the Public Record Office, the divisions of the British Library, and the various college and university depositories listed in my bibliography have been invariably helpful. I am especially beholden to Dr. Angela Raspin of the Manuscript Room of the British Library of Political and Economic Science at the London School of Economics, to Stephen Bird, Archivist at the Labour party headquarters, to Norman Higson, Archivist of the Brynmor Jones Library of the University of Hull, to Sally Moffitt, Associate Librarian of the Walter Langsam Library of the University of Cincinnati, and to my Assistant, Mrs. Marie Ludeke. All of them provided help substantially beyond the call of academic duty.
I have had the great good fortune to number my most perceptive critics among the members of my family. My daughter, Karen J. Winkler of the Chronicle of Higher Education , and my son, Professor Allan M. Winkler of Miami University of Ohio, have read and corrected the manuscript and, perhaps even more important, have encouraged me to complete it at every step of the way.
Above all, my wife, Bea, worked with me in libraries and archives, reminding me from time to time how fundamentally absurd politicians-like the rest of us-often are. Her judgments from the perspective of a lay person frequently compelled me to reconsider my assumptions and always added pleasure to the satisfaction of rediscovering my academic roots. This book is dedicated to her with thanks and with love.
INTRODUCTION
After the First World War, the British Labour party engaged in a decade-long debate on international policy. As the party struggled to establish its credibility in domestic affairs, it also developed positions that demonstrated its readiness to take over the conduct of foreign policy whenever that became possible. Over the years, a small group of moderate internationalists gradually advanced a number of alternatives to the more traditional insistence on protecting national interests by national rather than international means. They argued increasingly that the fledgling League of Nations must become the essential mechanism in the search for international peace and security. Their position encountered fierce resistance from a wide spectrum of Labour s policy makers and opinion shapers whose disillusionment in the postwar period was bitter and intense. By the end of the decade, the gradual acceptance of the League of Nations outlook marked a significant shift in Labour s approach in the international area and reflected its growing maturity as an international force.
During the 1920s, most Conservatives deprecated the attempt to develop a system of collective security in place of an almost exclusive dependence upon national armaments. They feared any closer integration with other states, especially in Europe, and rejected reforms of the new League of Nations Covenant that might curtail in any way the principle of national sovereignty. For their part, while the Labour party was attempting to establish its plausibility as a responsible force in national politics, many in the labor movement refused to accept that responsibility required accommodation and compromise. They repudiated the notion that even the flawed international body born of the peace settlement could be employed to ensure a more peaceful and a more secure world order. As the outline of that settlement became clear, an almost root-and-branch repudiation of the aims of capitalist and imperialist governments swept across all but a small segment of the Labour party and its affiliates. Suspicion of France in particular was endemic. It led to an unwillingness, or an inability, seriously to consider France s fears of a resurgence of German power and her concern for the security that had twice been imperiled in less than half a century. A substantial group within the ranks of Labour viewed postwar Germany as the aggrieved nation and often ignored the growing strength of revisionist nationalism in the Weimar Republic. Many-perhaps most-within the labor and trade union movements looked with considerable skepticism at the infant League of Nations. To them, the League was merely an instrument of capitalist governments determined to preserve their position in the world of power politics no less than their primacy over working people at home. It required long discussion, as well as the experience of office in 1924, to persuade many within the mainstream of Labour that the simple expression of international goodwill by British socialists was an unrealistic foundation upon which to base a responsible foreign policy.
The move away from the bitter disillusionment of 1919 and 1920 was never smooth and often acrimonious. In a sense, as some of Labour s standard-bearers attempted to wean the movement away from the protest of the immediate postwar years, two foreign policies, personified by two dominant figures, came into being. The differences between Arthur Henderson, the solid, steady secretary of the Labour party, and Ramsay MacDonald, its most colorful and glamorous figure, were as much a matter of style and personality as of substance, but on one issue they were poles apart. MacDonald, despite his pragmatic approach to policy when he became prime minister and foreign secretary, was never persuaded that any international organization would have to rely upon arms to enforce agreements and ensure the peace. Instead, he placed his trust in the gradual development of an international spirit of goodwill. Henderson, even when he made compromises to accommodate Labour s widespread misgivings about the use of arms, nevertheless came increasingly to be the leading spokesman among all major British politicians for the support of international institutions backed by international force. He made effective use of the policy papers produced by members of Labour s newly formed Advisory Committee on International Questions, where the small group of advisors who shared his enthusiasm for a moderate League of Nations policy came to dominate. As the years passed, these advisors came to forge a moderate policy urging the fullest possible use of League agencies in the day-to-day conduct of international affairs. They provided data for supporting the work of such bodies as the International Labour Organization and the Mandates Commission of the League. Above all, they helped Henderson argue the case for the use of the League, backed by a measure of force, to uphold international agreements and even, if t