Partys 1945 Election - Essay Example

The 1945 election put democratic-collectivist étatisme into the saddle’ (D. Marquand). Is this a fair assessment of what the 1945-51 Attlee governments stood for? The 1945 general election gave Clement Attlee and the Labour Party a crushing majority, a landslide majority of 146 seats (Woodward, ____) The Clement administration was of mass radicalism ideology that stemmed from the World War II. Gt gave the Labour Party its first majority in the parliament. This proved a great opportunity for Clement Attlee to bring a mass social change. At 62, Attlee was a younger prime minister than Churchill and Chamberlain (Child, 2006). When the Labour Party ran for the seat in 1945 elections their manifesto was ‘let us face the future’ (Matthijs, 2012, p. 12), a slogan made to advertise the party’s intentions. The social change that made them prepare for the future included establishing the Socialist Commonwealth of Great Britain. The Labour Party liked to see itself as the party of Commonwealth (Fielding, 2004). This manifesto proved very attractive to a nation that was upset due to war and was looking forward to meaningful social and administrative changes. The measures taken by Attlee’s administration regarding food rationing deserve praise (Chick, 2002). The prime minster had pressure to radically reconsider Britain’s military commitments because of financial and economic difficulties (Heinlein, 2002). He was even forced to slow the demobilization (Ovendale, 1994). The party’s manifesto gave the nation hope. Attlee’s administration was offering the nation something new that made them believe that the pre-war poverty and atrocities wont return. They offered the nation a whole new way of living (Francis, 1997). David Marquand, a well-known critique of Britains social and political atmosphere and history, quotes in his book about Attlee’s first Chancellor of Exchequer, Hugh Dalton promising the nation about building a new society and having power to do it. Marquand’s claim bear a lot of truth to it. Since 1918 the British society has gone through many social and political changes. The Labour Partys victory in the 1945 elections surround the debate about democratic collectivist statism. One needs to understand what collectivism means. In Latin it means to gather together. It is an ideology that encourages societies to think on collective bases and not on individual needs. It states that collective human behaviour is morally much stronger than individual actions. It is because it takes care of all human beings with the premise that individual actions should not benefit the individuals. They should be intended to serve the community. The collectivist also believe that when an individual submits to collective goal it guarantees that this person will not be exploited or subordinated for other purposes that serve others. Etatisme in English means statism, it is the ideology that suggests that the state dictates the political vision. It is the belief that gives the state autonomous power over the individual meaning, that the state has the right to exert force on the citizens in order to achieve desired progress, as planned by the state in fields such as economics and politics. It also gives this take the right to exert force for social changes. Statism is an ideology that gives the power of the masses to a person who defines goals and the process for achieving those goals in the interests of this majority. This executive authority holds almost an autonomous power. This authority has administration in all major aspects of the state. The definitional reasons stated above disagree with this claim that Democratic collectivist statism was put into the saddle as quoted by David Marquand. Three major reasons for this claim are; the evaluation of nationalization program, the economy and economic planning and developing the program and social reforms. All these programs indicate that instead of forming egalitarian, socialist, and a collectivist society, Clement Attlees administration strengthened the British capitalism. The government failed to craft and implement policies that could revolutionize peoples lives, contrary to what the government claimed. The distinctive side of the plans of government included The Public Ownership program which was a symbolic charge that the party believed in. As Marquand quotes the party ideology “social transformation rather than mere social reform” (Marquand, 2009, p. 131), it was as if Clement somehow made the party believed in 1945 that that they need to carry their socialist policy as aggressively as possible. The party aggressively followed Clement’s agenda. Party’s 1945 election manifesto states “let us face the future” (Mathjis, 2012, p. 12), it also stated that every industry must go through the National Service test (Weston, 2013). Meaning that if it is serving the nation then it is on the right track. However, if it is not efficient the nation needs to set things straight (Weston, 2013). The government policies made an obligation for industries to be supervised constructively. It meant that industries should be promoting the nation’s needs, restrictive antisocial monopoly and prejudice needed to be eliminated. The unity and momentum of the Labour Party translated into an extraordinary phase that spurred legislative activism between 1945 and 1959. In a matter of only four years the Attlee’s administration started government takeovers of many areas of the economy. These actions included nationalizing the Bank of England, civil aviation, electricity and gas supply, cable and wireless, the railways, coal mines, the iron and steel industry, and long-distance road haulage (Coates, 1975, p. 44). Over 2 million workers were transferred to the public sector from private by 1951 (Weston, 2013). The Labour Partys nationalization was unprecedented and highly aggressive. Despite these measurements the goals of the program were too ambitious, indefinite and perplexing. The program was oriented more two words proving the enemies and the forces that were raising voices against the governments policies then two words a genuine change in the society. The nationalization agenda the strength to the private sector. It reinforced the social positions and the economics of the groups in authority. The private sector benefited from this program in many ways. They were relieved of their responsibility, it required the industries a new investment program. It gave them a ready-made infrastructure for publicly owned basic industries. The problem with this structure was the pricing policies were to be designed in a way that further subsidized the private sector. Public ownership of this agenda also strengthened the groups that it originally promised to make reforms of. The balance between labour and capital remained in status quo. Attlee’s government promised the transformation of balance of power between classes but the program failed to achieve that. It was true both on individual industries and for the whole society. Attlee’s government benefited from the support it was getting from the private industries (Weston, 2013). In other words the private industry was benefiting more from the governments policies. Despite the massive nationalization agenda 80% of the economy still remained under private groups (Weston, 2013). The piecemeal legislation of nationalizing 1/5 of the British economy was different from their previous beliefs. They justified their actions by saying that nationalization was only appropriate in places where private companies were failing. Failure in this regard meant failure in benefiting the nation. The Labour Party eventually went towards accepting the mixed economy which was a departure from the clause IV of party’s manifesto. It stated very clearly that the party will work for securing workers with the full fruits of their industry so that they can equally hold a common ownership with the means of production. The argument against the Attlees reign does not target spirit or the essence of its policies. The problem was in its execution. Attlee’s government did not live up to people’s expectations or even up to their own claims. Even the cabinet formed under Attlee’s government differed significantly from its own idealistic model (Daalder, 1963). In this regard David Marquand is wrong in assuming that the Attlee’s administration was centralist. The state did not own the levers of economic power. Moreover the Labour government overly generous paid the compensation schemes. As a result of this they decreased the redistribution of class power. It strengthened the prestige of those groups that significantly benefited from the interwar depression (Coates, 1975, p. 52). Marquand suggests that the nationalization agenda opened the door for the state to channelized economic forces towards public interest. But the fact is collectivism was nowhere to be found. The elite class which was profiting considerably, the oligarchs of the recently acquired industries, used the compensation money in the private sector (Weston, 2013). This vicious economic cycle put the money back into the pockets of the elite class. The collectivism or benefiting the society on the whole did not knew up to its standards as individual self-striving predominantly ruled. The working classes were disappointed by these measures. Sir Cuthbert Morley Headlam writes in his book Parliaments and Politics in the age of Churchill and Attlee: The Headlam Diaries 1935-51 (1999) that the socialists did not make use of a wonderful opportunity, both Attlee and Dalton made a sorry pair. The Labour Partys nationalization agenda made way for undemocratic forces to play their part in the system. The schemes that they had devised failed to live up to expectations, they did not challenge the precious hierarchy. The trade union functions in the managerial responsibilities stayed as they were. The common perception was that democracy will trickle down to factories and the common worker would benefit from the much advertised common ownership. From 1948 to 1949 there were 34 resolutions in the Labour Party conferences that handled the matters of Democratic control within the nationalized industries (Weston, 2013). They supported worker’s participation and encouraged including more socialists in the Board of Directors. However the results of these efforts did not translate it into expectations as they did not become reality, instead, the Morrisonian Public Corporations emerged. These corporations were bureaucratically structured and operated on undemocratic and ad hoc basis. The conventional status division between workforce and the management swelled. The so-called public corporations were governed by the members of ownership classes of the former private industries and groups. For instance National Coal Board’s head had also previously headed a large private colliery companies of the country (Weston, 2013). The Labour Party indirectly supported capitalistic managerial practices. Involvement of workers in the decision-making process was very limited. This forbade them from exercising their full control of their own careers in industry. According to a survey huge number of workers were agitated by nationalization policies (Weston, 2013). A railway review report in 1948 suggested that 45% of 485 railway workers showed frustration due to the way things were going a year after the nationalization (Weston, 2013). Public ownership remained as it was, meaning that the private capitalists kept enjoying their ownerships in fact they were not sure of their interest being protected by the government’s policies. The main beneficiaries of ‘social imperialism’ remained the dominions, rather British citizens (Tomilson, 2002). The workers were almost left out. They became frustrated, agitated and pessimistic of nationalization agenda. It was as if only the titles had changed the distribution of power remained the same. The crises of 1947 diminished the reputation of both Attlee and Morrison considerably (Brooke, 1995), when Morrison is considered the finest administrator the Labour Party has produced (Layborn, 2001). This paper only focuses on the thesis statement. It does not take away the measures taken by the Clement Attlees government to benefit the people. The futuristic looking government of 1945 England intended the private investment to adhere to governments policies. On paper the government was against the business tycoons that were benefiting emphatically from the previous policies. Attlee’s administration was looking towards promoting economic assets in the collective interest of people. The government was anti-capitalistic and was highly in favour of collectivist agenda. They made efforts in centralizing the power giving more autonomy to the state so they can better craft economic policy and implement them towards achieving those goals. Without a doubt Attlee was a reformist with a genuine concern of improving the lives of poor (Pearce, 2006). After leaving government service in 1955, he received earldom (Cook, 2001). Attlee’s contribution was critical in managing diverse people and complex institutions (Bookshire, 1995). Even his own team comprised of strong willed people of diverse views (Wilsford, 1995). However things did not end up as they had been intended, the goals were not achieved. Their socialist commitment somehow got mixed up with other policies and agendas. It was as if Keynesian expedients infiltrated into the government’s policy of collectivism (Weston, 2013). The Labour Party that ruled from 1945 to 1949 had given hope to the nation. People considered them to actually deliver in regards with social reconstruction. The aim of the paper is not to take away the credit of government’s effort in uplifting the war-torn nation. It did make efforts for creating a welfare society and improved the lives of millions. The massive majority win in elections was evidence of peoples trust, faith and hope in the party’s manifesto. The party’s membership had increased considerably. Their popular vote did not show any signs of slowing down. The election of 1951 also saw the Labour Party succeeding by a significant margin (Weston, 2013). Despite the fact that the Labour Party under Clement Attlee’s administration did considerably well towards rebuilding the society, David Marquand is exaggerating when he states that Attlee’s administration put “Democratic-collectivist etatisme into the saddle”. The capitalist and financially privileged groups and individuals enjoyed the same powers. The old hierarchy was evident. The much advertised collectivism was nowhere to be found. The centralized state was also absent. References 1. Bookshire, J. H. 1995. Clement Attlee. Manchester University Press. 2. Brooke, S. 1995. Reform and Reconstruction: Britain after the war. Manchester University Press. 3. Chick, M. 2002. Industrial Policy in Britain 1945-51: Economic planning, nationalisation and Labour Governments. Cambridge University Press. 4. Coates, D. 1975. The Labour Party and the struggles for socialism. London: Cambridge University Press. 5. Childs, D. 2006. Britain since 1945: A political history. Oxon: Tylor & Francis. 6. Cook, B. A. 2001. Europe since 1945. NY: Taylor & Francis. 7. Daalder, H. 1963. Cabinet reforms in Britain: 1914-63. Stanford University Press. 8. Fielding, S. 2004. Economic policy. Manchester University Press. 9. Francis, M. 1997. Ideas and policies under Labour, 1945-51: Building a new Britain. Manchester University Press. 10. Headlam, C. M. 1999. Parliaments and Politics in the age of Churchill and Attlee: The Headlam Diaries 1935-51. Cambridge University Press. 11. Heinlein, F. 2002. British government policy and decolonization 1945-1963: Scrutinizing the official mind. London: Psychology Press. 12. Laybourn, K. 2001. British political leaders: A biographical dictionary. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO. 13. Ovendale, R. 1994. British defence policy since 1945. Manchester University Press. 14. Mathjis, M. M. 2012. Ideas and economic crisis in Britain from Attlee to Blair. London: Routledge. 15. Marquand, D. 2009. Britain since 1918- The strange career of British society. London: Phoenix Publishers. 16. Pearce, R. 2006. Attlee’s Labour Governments. London: Routledge. 17. Tomilson, J. 2002. Democratic socialism and economic policy: The Attlee years 1945-51. Cambridge University Press. 18. Weston, J. 2013. Clement Attlee and the British Labour Party. From Blitz to the Big Society; British Politics since 1940 [Thesis] Retrieved 23 March. 14 [Online] http://www.scribd.com/doc/127093833/Clement-Atlee-and-the-British-Labour-Party 19. Wilsford, D. 1995. Political leaders of contemporary Western Europe: A biographical dictionary. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group. 20. Woodward, N. 2004. The management of the British economy, 1945-2001. Manchester University Press. Read More