The Failure of a Dream

The Independent Labour Party began the 1930s as a significant force in dispute with the Labour Party proper. In 1932, as these conflicts led to a split, the party had more MPs in Scotland than the larger organisation and a membership five times that of the British Communist Party. In the first major study of the Independent Labour Party after disaffiliation from the mainstream in 1932, Gidon Cohen draws on archival material from Moscow and newly released police and secret service...
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The Independent Labour Party began the 1930s as a significant force in dispute with the Labour Party proper. In 1932, as these conflicts led to a split, the party had more MPs in Scotland than the larger organisation and a membership five times that of the British Communist Party. In the first major study of the Independent Labour Party after disaffiliation from the mainstream in 1932, Gidon Cohen draws on archival material from Moscow and newly released police and secret service papers as well as other major British archives. In doing so he explores the culture and politics of an organisation which he argues, contrary to received scholarship, remained an important component of the British left throughout the 1930s. _x000D_ _x000D_ CONTENTS: _x000D_ 1. Introduction _x000D_ 2. The Split _x000D_ 3. Membership and Organisation _x000D_ 4. Electoral Arenas _x000D_ 5. Divided We Fall: Internal Politics _x000D_ 6. Intellectuals, Ideas and Policy _x000D_ 7. Infiltration: Communism and the National Unemployed Workers Movement _x000D_ 8. The Mainstream: Labour and the Unions _x000D_ 9. Pacifism, Wars and the Internationals _x000D_ 10. Conclusion"