From 1918 to 1945 the British Labour Party worked closely with some of the most prominent names in international relations (IR) scholarship. Through such structures as the 'Advisory Committee on International Questions', academic IR specialists were instrumental in the construction of Labour foreign policy, preparing a wealth of memoranda, reports and pamphlets for the Party. Here Lucian Ashworth examines the crucial role played by IR theorists. He puts the international theories of five key writers - Leonard Woolf, H. N. Brailsford, Philip Noel Baker, Norman Angell and David Mitrany - into the context of both the development of Labour's international policy and the evolution of the international environment between the wars. He demonstrates the inadequacy of the current interpretation within IR of the inter-war period and argues the obsession with the anachronistic division between realism and idealism - terms that had different connotations before World War II - masks both the very different debates that were going on at the time, and the changing international landscape of the inter-war period itself.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Inter-War International Relations and the Rise of the Labour Party
The problem with idealism
Labour's great transformation. The Party in 1918
The Labour Party Advisory Committee on International Questions
Chapter 2: Losing the Peace? 1918 to 1921
H. N. Brailsford
Opposition to the peace treaties
Criticisms of the League of Nations
French imperialism and the renewal of the international anarchy
The democratisation of foreign policy
Pacifism and radical socialism. The splits in Labour over foreign policy
The peace treaties as a continuation of the international anarchy
Chapter 3: The League and the New Diplomacy. 1922-1931
Philip Noel Baker
Labour as a party of government 1922-31
Making the League work. From 'reconstitution' to 'a League foreign policy'
Disarmament, arbitration and sanctions
The Second Labour Government and the 'Peace of Nations'
Making the League work. Labour and the last chance for peace
Chapter 4: Peaceful Change and the Rise of Fascism. 1931 to 1939
Norman Angell
Does capitalism cause war?
Labour in the wilderness: rearmament v. 'pacifism' and 'socialism'
The rise of the dictators and the weakness of League security
The National Government and appeasement
Defending capitalism? The road to war
Chapter 5: A Working Peace System? 1939 to 1945
David Mitrany
Labour and the war years. Chamberlain's fall and the Churchill Coalition
Peace without recriminations? Immediate war aims and the Party intellectuals
The shape of the new order. Federal or functional proposals
The Prospects for Allied unity
Chapter 6: Conclusion. Labour and the Idealist Muddle in IR
Leonard Woolf
The role of Labour's inter-war international experts
The Idealist muddle: Towards a better understanding of inter-war IR
Socialists and liberals. The problems of a social democratic foreign policy
