This year marks the 130th anniversary of the ILP, a milestone in British political history that we aim to mark and celebrate over the next 12 months in a number of ways....
Five Misrepresentations of Homage to Catalonia
George Orwell’s celebrated book on the Spanish Civil War is often misinterpreted, says DANNY EVANS. It deserves to be read afresh without political blinkers....
A Telling Tale
Edith Jacques lived from 1909 until 2012. Her twin sons, Terrance and Ernie, were born in 1938 and, at the age of 84, have written a fine biography of their mother. HARRY BARNES reflects on what we can learn from this tough but enthralling story....
Tales From the Tracks
PAUL SALVESON’s latest book is a collection of short railway stories set in northern England featuring unions, strikes, ILPers … and signalbox ghosts....
Labour & the Constitution
WILL BROWN reflects on a recent Compass paper on electoral reform, the union and devolution, that calls for Labour to be far more radical on constitutional reform than the current debates over proportional representation. ...
Open Labour Launches its ‘Britain-Boosting’ Position Paper
Open Labour has launched a comprehensive new position paper setting out what it describes as “Britain-boosting” policy ideas to “enable people to live freer, happier and healthier lives”....
Social-Democracy with a Hyphen
The Social-Democratic Federation had various names and endured many splits during its existence, but at its best it embodied the crucial and often neglected link between socialism and democracy. PAUL MAYNE reviews a new book on one of Labour’s founding organisations....
New Labour & the Democratic Bridge
When Tony Blair’s New Labour government was elected on 1 May 1997, exactly 25 years ago last Sunday, it brought to an end 18 years of Conservative rule....
Acting Local: Community Wealth Building – Past, Present & Future
CHRISTOPHER OLEWICZ examines an inside account of Preston Council’s much-hailed ‘model’ for local development, and casts his mind back to the 1980s when his own local authority tried to resist the march of Thatcherism with bottom-up regeneration and municipal enterprise....
Fenner Brockway & the Return of ‘Hungry England’
CHRISTOPHER OLEWICZ looks back 90 years at Fenner Brockway’s ground-breaking report on destitution in 1930s Britain. With the current cost of living crisis, he asks, is ‘literal starvation’ once again stalking the nation’s poorest communities?...
Fear & Loathing in Liquid Times
BEN SALTONSTALL reviews a new book on the failings of the left that asks the right questions but falls for the all-too-easy answers of right-wing populism. ‘The book has the potential to tell the left things it needs to hear and understand. Unfortunately, it fails to do so.’...
Slaughterhouse-Five & the Drums of War
With conflict brewing on the Russia-Ukraine border, and talk of an ‘unthinkable’ war in Europe, MARIA GOULDING turned to ‘one of the most enduring anti-war novels of all time’, a book that speaks the unspeakable, and finds truth in the aftermath of horror....