Socialism and the English middle class: the public and private worlds of G.D.H. and Margaret Cole

社会主义和英国中产阶级：G.D.H. 的公共和私人世界

• 批准号: AH/E003680/1
• 负责人: Clare Griffiths
• 金额: $ 3.08万
• 依托单位: University of Sheffield
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2008
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2008 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FE003680%2F1
• 关键词: Socialism; English; middle; class; public

This project presents new insights into the political culture of Britain in the twentieth century, exploring what socialism meant to contemporaries in this period, and examining the challenges and opportunities for middle-class figures who positioned themselves within the Labour movement. G.D.H. (1889-1959) and Margaret Cole (1893-1980) - husband and wife, collaborators as writers and researchers, prominent commentators on politics, economics and society, Fabian socialists and middle-class intellectuals - were major figures in the development of the British left. They helped to shape party institutions and articulate the case for democratic socialism through their involvement in the Fabian Society, their direction of the Labour party's research department, and their educational work. Their writings on history and economics were influential across a wide readership, whilst some readers encountered them in a rather different literary guise, as writers of a series of detective novels. Their range of activities, enthusiasms and social and institutional relationships offers fruitful scope for examining the complexities of political engagement, the nature of middle-class identity, and the connections between personal and public life.Recent approaches to the study of political history have focused less on institutional histories of political parties and narrow histories of political thought, and more on notions of political culture - the settings within which political activity took place, the forms of expression used to debate and promote political ideas, and the relationship between aspects of broader cultural experience and the parameters within which people imagined the realm of public life and service and ideological debate. The boundaries between political and non-political aspects of an individual's life often appear problematic, and this study takes that question about political identities as its starting point. The Coles met through socialism and devoted much of their lives to various forms of political activity. 'Socialism and the English middle class' re-examines the place of politics within their married life and partnership, looking at how their political beliefs affected the ways in which the Coles functioned within a variety of social contexts and relationships. It also considers the degree to which their middle-class backgrounds, tastes and lifestyle influenced their vision of socialism and working-class politics - a vision which had tremendous influence on audiences during much of the twentieth century, both within Britain and more widely.The Coles' most recognisable legacy in the early twenty-first century lies in their writings on social and labour history, which helped to shape the historiography of radicalism and interpretations of the impact of economic development. G.D.H. Cole's political ideas have attracted renewed curiosity in recent decades, as an alternative vision of a socialist economy, based on pluralist, democratic and participatory socialism rather than the state-sponsored management which triumphed in Labour thinking after the Second World War. This study provides an opportunity to reassess the Coles' notions about socialism and their analyses of class, society and national identity. Re-examination of their significance and influence, and their role as academics, intellectuals and popularizers on a public stage, also deepens understandings about the historical role of the middle-class intelligentsia within left-wing politics, and indeed within political debate more generally. 'Socialism and the English middle class' will provide the first modern, critical biography of the Coles, using the rich resources of material from their private papers and voluminous publications to explore the context within which they set out to live a socialist life: the world which shaped them, and which they, in return, sought to reshape in a new political image.

该项目展示了对二十世纪英国政治文化的新见解，探索了社会主义在这一时期对同时代人的意义，并研究了在劳工运动中定位自己的中产阶级人物的挑战和机遇。G.D.H.（1889-1959）和玛格丽特·科尔（Margaret Cole, 1893-1980）是英国左派发展的主要人物，他们是夫妻，作为作家和研究人员的合作者，杰出的政治、经济和社会评论员，费边社会主义者和中产阶级知识分子。他们通过参与费边社、指导工党的研究部门和教育工作，帮助塑造了政党机构，并阐明了民主社会主义的理由。他们在历史和经济方面的著作对广大读者产生了影响，而有些读者则以一种截然不同的文学伪装，作为一系列侦探小说的作者。他们的活动范围、热情以及社会和机构关系为研究政治参与的复杂性、中产阶级身份的本质以及个人与公共生活之间的联系提供了富有成效的范围。最近研究政治史的方法较少关注政党的制度史和狭隘的政治思想史，而更多地关注政治文化的概念-政治活动发生的环境，用于辩论和促进政治思想的表达形式，以及更广泛的文化经验与人们想象公共生活，服务和意识形态辩论领域的参数之间的关系。个人生活的政治和非政治方面之间的界限经常出现问题，本研究以政治身份的问题为出发点。科尔夫妇是通过社会主义认识的，并把他们的大部分时间都投入到各种形式的政治活动中。《社会主义和英国中产阶级》重新审视了政治在他们婚姻生活和伙伴关系中的地位，看看他们的政治信仰是如何影响科尔夫妇在各种社会背景和关系中的运作方式的。它还考虑了他们的中产阶级背景、品味和生活方式在多大程度上影响了他们对社会主义和工人阶级政治的看法——这种看法在20世纪的大部分时间里对英国乃至更广泛的观众产生了巨大影响。科尔夫妇在21世纪早期最著名的遗产在于他们关于社会和劳工史的著作，这些著作有助于塑造激进主义的史学和对经济发展影响的解释。近几十年来，G.D.H.科尔（G.D.H. Cole）的政治思想作为社会主义经济的另一种愿景，重新吸引了人们的好奇心，这种经济基于多元、民主和参与性的社会主义，而不是二战后在工党思想中获胜的国家支持的管理。本研究为重新评估科尔斯夫妇关于社会主义的观念以及他们对阶级、社会和国家认同的分析提供了一个机会。重新审视他们的意义和影响，以及他们在公共舞台上作为学者、知识分子和普及者的角色，也加深了对中产阶级知识分子在左翼政治中，甚至在更广泛的政治辩论中所扮演的历史角色的理解。《社会主义与英国中产阶级》将提供第一本现代的、批判性的科尔夫妇传记，利用他们私人论文和大量出版物中的丰富材料资源，探索他们开始过社会主义生活的背景：塑造他们的世界，而他们，作为回报，试图以新的政治形象重塑这个世界。

项目成果

The Mysterious Case of the Coles

科尔斯的神秘案件

• 作者: Clare Griffiths

Fabians on the home front: G. D. H. and Margaret Cole and the politics of reconstruction in Britain during the Second World War

后方的费边主义者：G. D. H. 和玛格丽特·科尔以及第二次世界大战期间英国重建的政治

• 期刊: Still in submission process
• 作者: C V J Griffiths