Description
The transformation of the Labour Party by 1997 is among the most consequential political developments in modern British history. Futures of Socialism overhauls the story of Labour's modernisation and provides an innovative new history. Diving into the tumultuous world of the British left after 1973, rocked by crushing defeats, bitter schisms, and ideological disorientation, Colm Murphy uncovers competing intellectual agendas for modern socialism. Responding to deindustrialisation, neoliberalism, and constitutional agitation, these visions of 'modernisation' ranged across domestic and European policy and the politics of class, gender, race, and democracy. By reconstructing the sites and networks of political debate, the book explains their changing influence inside Labour. It also throws new light on New Labour, highlighting its roots in this social-democratic intellectual maelstrom. Futures of Socialism provides an essential analysis of social democracy in an era of market liberalism, and of the ideas behind a historic political reconstruction that remains deeply controversial today.
Table of Contents
Introduction: The plural modernisations of the British left; Part I. Social Democracy and the Challenge to the Nation-State: 1. 'Keynes is dead, Beveridge is dead': modernisation, globalisation, and European integration; 2. Industrial democracy, market socialism, and stakeholder capitalism: modernisation and socioeconomic democracy; Part II. Identities and Mmodern Socialism': 3. 'An old working class may be waning, but a new one is being born'? Gender, Labour, and modernisation; 4. A telling absence: race, multiculturalism, and modernisation; Part III. The Search for a Modernising Social Democracy; 5. 'A modern democracy': modernisation and constitutional reform; 6. White heat to interactive whiteboard: modernisation and Labour's economic strategy; Conclusion: contested futures of socialism in Britain's late twentieth century.
