Author | Aneurin Bevan |
---|---|
Language | English |
Subject | Politics, Socialism |
Publisher | William Heinemann Ltd |
Publication date | 1952 |
Publication place | United Kingdom |
In Place of Fear is a book written by Aneurin Bevan, founder of the National Health Service. The book was influential among the Labour Left and the Labour movement as a whole but was overshadowed by Anthony Crosland's The Future of Socialism , although Crosland referred to In Place of Fear as "the most widely read socialist book" of the period. [1]
Serving as a semi-autobiographical text [2] Bevan brings to great attention his life growing up in the mining towns of south Wales.
A young miner in a South Wales colliery, my concern was with one practical question, where does power lie in this particular state of Great Britain, and how can it be attained by the workers. [3]
— Aneurin Bevan, In Place of Fear, p. 1
Considered highly quotable [4] and is a central source for the beliefs of the pre-Benn Labour left.
Bevan, throughout the book, is a strong advocate for Democratic socialism, the final chapter sharing the ideology's name. He states his belief that Democratic socialism has the only principles 'broadly applicable to the situation in which mankind now finds itself'. [5] By extension of this he advocates for great levels of freedom of speech and expression, opposing concentration of newspaper ownership. [6]
Although mostly remembered as an extension of his fight for the Health Service [7] it is also considered to be a statement of what British socialism should be. [8]
Michael Mackintosh Foot was a British politician who was Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition from 1980 to 1983. Foot began his career as a journalist on Tribune and the Evening Standard. He co-wrote the 1940 polemic against appeasement of Hitler, Guilty Men, under a pseudonym.
Aneurin "Nye" Bevan PC was a Welsh Labour Party politician, noted for tenure as Minister of Health in Clement Attlee's government in which he spearheaded the creation of the British National Health Service. He is also known for his wider contribution to the founding of the British welfare state. He was first elected as MP for Ebbw Vale in 1929, and used his Parliamentary platform to make a number of influential criticisms of Winston Churchill and his government during the Second World War. Before entering Parliament, Bevan was involved in miners' union politics and was a leading figure in the 1926 general strike. Bevan is widely regarded as one of the most influential left-wing politicians in British history.
Hugh Todd Naylor Gaitskell was a British politician who was Leader of the Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition from 1955 until his death in 1963. An economics lecturer and wartime civil servant, he was elected to Parliament in 1945 and held office in Clement Attlee's governments, notably as Minister of Fuel and Power following the bitter winter of 1946–47, and eventually joining the Cabinet as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Facing the need to increase military spending in 1951, he imposed National Health Service charges on dentures and spectacles, prompting the leading left-winger Aneurin Bevan to resign from the Cabinet.
James (Jeremiah) Griffiths was a Welsh Labour Party politician who served for 34 years as a Member of Parliament (MP). He was a trade union leader and became the first Secretary of State for Wales, serving from 1964 to 1966 under Harold Wilson.
Bevanism was a movement on the left wing of the Labour Party in the late 1950s led by Aneurin Bevan which also included Richard Crossman, Michael Foot and Barbara Castle. Bevanism was opposed by the Gaitskellites, moderate social democrats within the party. The Gaitskellites typically won most of the battles inside Parliament, but Bevanism was stronger among local Labour activists. The Bevanites split over the issue of nuclear weapons, and the movement faded away after Bevan died in 1960.
Charles Anthony Raven Crosland was a British Labour Party politician and author. A social democrat on the right wing of the Labour Party, he was a prominent socialist intellectual. His influential book The Future of Socialism (1956) argued against many Marxist notions and the traditional Labour Party doctrine that expanding public ownership was essential to make socialism work, arguing instead for prioritising the end of poverty and improving public services. He offered positive alternatives to both the right wing and left wing of the Labour Party.
Asheridge is a small hamlet in the parish of Chartridge, in Buckinghamshire, England. Prior to 1898 it was part of Chesham parish. It is situated in the Chiltern Hills, about two and a half miles north west of Chesham, 5 miles from Great Missenden and 6 miles from Wendover.
Janet Lee, Baroness Lee of Asheridge, PC LLD HonFRA, known as Jennie Lee, was a Scottish politician. She was a Labour Member of Parliament from a by-election in 1929 until 1931 and then from 1945 to 1970.
Richard Howard Stafford Crossman was a British Labour Party politician. A university classics lecturer by profession, he was elected a Member of Parliament in 1945 and became a significant figure among the party's advocates of Zionism. He was a Bevanite on the left of the party, and a long-serving member of Labour's National Executive Committee (NEC) from 1952.
The post-war consensus, sometimes called the post-war compromise, was the economic order and social model of which the major political parties in post-war Britain shared a consensus supporting view, from the end of World War II in 1945 to the late-1970s. It ended during the governance of Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher. The consensus tolerated or encouraged nationalisation, strong trade unions, heavy regulation, high taxes, and an extensive welfare state.
The Future of Socialism is a 1956 book by Anthony Crosland. It was one of the most influential books in post-war British Labour Party thinking. It was the seminal work of the 'revisionist' school of Labour politics.
Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and supports a gradualist, reformist and democratic approach towards achieving socialism. In practice, social democracy takes a form of socially managed welfare capitalism, achieved with partial public ownership, economic interventionism, and policies promoting social equality.
The National Health Service in England was created by the National Health Service Act 1946. Responsibility for the NHS in Wales was passed to the Secretary of State for Wales in 1969, leaving the Secretary of State for Social Services responsible for the NHS in England by itself.
Gaitskellism was the ideology of a faction in the British Labour Party in the 1950s and early 1960s which opposed many of the economic policies of the trade unions, especially nationalisation and control of the economy.
Susan Barnes Crosland was a British-American journalist who lived and worked primarily in London. She was the widow of the Labour Party politician Anthony Crosland.
One Nation Labour refers to the theme and branding of the British Labour Party adopted by the party in 2012 under the leadership of Ed Miliband. Miliband described the "One Nation" term as being related to British Conservative Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli's idea of One Nation conservatism. Disraeli claimed a need for government to reduce economic inequality, which he believed was splitting Britain into two nations of rich and poor people. Miliband stated that the theme of One Nation was shared by Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee. Miliband has declared inspiration from Disraeli's and Attlee's One Nation theme, in that it challenges social barriers of class and promotes the unity of Britain.
Democratic socialism is a left-wing set of political philosophies that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy, with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within a market socialist, decentralised planned, or democratic centrally planned socialist economy. Democratic socialists argue that capitalism is inherently incompatible with the values of freedom, equality, and solidarity and that these ideals can only be achieved through the realisation of a socialist society. Although most democratic socialists seek a gradual transition to socialism, democratic socialism can support revolutionary or reformist politics to establish socialism. Democratic socialism was popularised by socialists who opposed the backsliding towards a one-party state in the Soviet Union and other nations during the 20th century.
The history of socialism has its origins in the Age of Enlightenment and the 1789 French Revolution along with the changes that it brought, although it has precedents in earlier movements and ideas. The Communist Manifesto was written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in 1847-48 just before the Revolutions of 1848 swept Europe, expressing what they termed scientific socialism. In the last third of the 19th century parties dedicated to Democratic socialism arose in Europe, drawing mainly from Marxism. The Australian Labor Party was the world's first elected socialist party when it formed government in the Colony of Queensland for a week in 1899.
A statue of Aneurin Bevan stands at the western end of Queen Street, Cardiff, Wales in recognition of Aneurin Bevan who is credited with founding the National Health Service (NHS). It has been described as "perhaps one of Wales' most iconic statues".