History 151C - Spring 2013
Professor James Vernon - jvernon@berkeley.edu
For many years Britain was seen as the crucible of the modern world. Over the past three centuries this small, cold and wet island was the first to develop representative politics, the idea of the individual, an industrial economy, sustained and rapid population growth, rapid transport, a predominantly urban population, mass culture, the nuclear family, and, of course, an empire upon which the sun famously never set. And yet, despite this precocious modernity, imperial Britain remains a deeply traditional society that has failed to rid itself of ancient institutions like the monarchy, the aristocracy and the established church.
The class explains this paradox through an account of the rise, fall and rebirth of ‘liberalism’. We will see how during the eighteenth century Britain’s ancien regime spawned a ‘liberal’ critique of it by those who believed free trade, representative government, the rule of law, individual self-improvement and meritocracy would bring prosperity and civilization to all who deserved it. While ‘liberalism’ reformed much of the ancien regime during the nineteenth century it failed to deliver wealth and civilization at home (let alone across the empire) or to keep Britain abreast with its new global competitors. Although this lay the foundation for the growth of Britain's welfare and security state in the twentieth century, we will see how social democracy emerged embedded in the remnants of the ancien regime, liberalism and the empire. These multiple inadequacies of social democracy produced an evangelically reborn form of ‘neo-liberalism’ that has subsequently become the common sense of our age.
The class combines economic, social, political and cultural history. Each lecture is supported by a number of short readings consisting of primary web resources and a set textbook. These readings should be completed before each lecture and will be the basis of discussion in section. Assessment will be based upon section assignments and participation (30%), a mid-term (30%) and a final examination (40%). Students may write a short research paper (10 pages) in place of the final exam if they declare so by the mid-term.
Lectures: Tuesday and Thursday 11-12.30, 20 Barrows
Office hours: Tuesday 3.30-5.30pm, Dwinelle 2214.
Mid-term: 7 March
Final: 16 May, 8-11am
GSIs: Gillian Chisom gchisom@berkeley.edu
Office hours: Wednesday, 1-3pm
Sections: 103. Monday, 3-4pm, 203 Wheeler
102. Friday, 9-10am, 279 Dwinelle
Melissa Turoff melissa.turoff@berkeley.edu
Office hours: Tuesday 1-2pm
Sections: 101. Monday, 4-5pm, 206 Dwinelle
Required text:
Ellis Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, 1714 to the present (Wiley-Blackwell, 2010) 1405139366
Lecture Schedule
22 January. Introduction: Downton Abbey and Why Britain Still Matters
24 January. A new imperial state
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, chs.1&2
Burke on Warren Hastings [1788]
Richard Price, A Discourse on the Love of Our Country [1789]
Porter, Britain’s empire in 1815
The Peterloo Massacre (Preface) [1819]
29 January. An enlightened civil society?
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, chs.2&3
George Eliot, Felix Holt the Radical, ch.31
The Proclamation for the Encouragement of Piety and Virtue [1787]
The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano [1789], ch.5
John Brand Observations on Popular Antiquities [1777], both prefaces
31 January. The great transformation and the population question
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.4
Morgan, Trade and the British Empire
Overton, The Agricultural Revolution
Malthus Essay on the Principle of Population [1798], chs.1&2
Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, v.2, ch.5
5 February. A liberal revolution in imperial government
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.5.
Evans, Laissez-Faire and the Victorians
Poor Law Commissioners Report [1834], Remedial Measures II.I.I-25
The Northcote-Trevelyan Report, pp.1-11 & 22-23
Queen Victoria’s Proclamation on Government of India 1858
7 February. An empire of free trade?
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.6.
Oldfield, British Anti-Slavery
Richard Cobden on free trade [1846]
Trevelyan on the Irish Crisis [1848], pp.183-201
Rev George Clayton, [Three] Sermons on the Great Exhibition [1851]
Engels, The Condition of the Working Classes [1844], pp.75-90
12 February. Learning to do democracy
BBC BItesize, Political Reform in Britain
The Poll Book for Whitehaven [1832], scan
Corrupt Practices Act [1883], pp.1-7
Chartist National Petititon [1838]
14 February. The uneven work of gender
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.8.
Henry Mayhew, The Life of a Coster Girl [1864]
Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management – The Mistress [1861]
The English Woman’s Journal, v.1 [1858]
19 February. Religion, reason and the pleasures of the freeborn Englishman
Hone, The Everyday Book [1825], Explanatory Address
The Religious Census of 1851, pp.102-3.
Samuel Smiles, Self-Help [1882]
Thomas Wright, ‘Among the Gods” (1867)
Newcastle United v Liverpool [1901]
21 February. An industrial, urban and imperial nation?
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.7.
Walter Bagehot, Lombard Street [1873], ch.1
William Booth In Darkest England [1890], Preface & ch.1
Ebenezer Howard, Garden Cities of Tomorrow [1902], intro
26 February. The discovery of poverty and the social question
Mearns, The Bitter Cry of Outcast London [1883], pp.15-25
Blease, New Liberalism and the Social Question [1913]n
28 February. Empire, immigration and national efficiency
Josephine Butler on abolition in India [1887]
Kipling and the White Man’s Burden [1899]
E.Pankhurst, Why We Are Militant [1913]
5 March. The Great War
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.9.
Diary of Private Donald Fraser, September 1915
Questions in Commons on Conscientious Objectors in Prison [1917]
7 March. Mid-term
12 March. Rebuilding 'middle England'
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.9.
Marie Stopes, Married Love [1918], preface and ch.1
Baldwin, ‘On England and the West’[1926]
The Commons Debate on General Dyer [1920] (especially Churchill from 1720)
14 March.Depression, planning and a new society
Huxley, Brave New World [1932], ch.1.
J.M.Keynes, The General Theory [1936], ch.24
J.B.Priestley’s English Journey [1934]
Orwell’s Road To Wigan Pier [1937], ch.7
19 March. Mass democracy and the problem of leisure
HYPERLINK "http://www.grassrootsfeminism.net/cms/node/234"
Mass Observation (1937), pp.1-12
21 March. The People's War?
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.10.
Prest, Evacuation
26 & 28 March. Spring break
2 April. Engineering the new Jerusalem
The Festival in London on film (1951)
4 April. Affluence and consensus?
Labour Party Political Broadcast [1959]
Goldthorpe et al, The Affluent Worker [1969], conclusion
9 April. End of empire and the invention of multiculturalism
Journey by a London Bus (1950)
Macmillan, Winds of Change [1960]
11 April. A new meritocracy – or whatever happened to the working class?
Film: 59 UP
16 April. The long 1960s and the ends of Christian Britain.
The Wolfenden Report [1957]
Civil Rights and the Troubles in N.Ireland
Spare Rib [1972]
18 April. Punk Britain.
Wasson, A History of Modern Britain, ch.11.
Powell, Rivers of Blood [1968]
Conservative Party Manifesto 1979:Our Five Tasks
23 April. Thatcher, Blair and neo-liberalism?
