Emergence of the Labour Party, 1890-1914

The Labour Party, 1890-1951

In this course, Professor Keith Laybourn (University of Huddersfield) considers the early history of the Labour Party from its foundations in the trade union movement of the late nineteenth century to the achievements of Clement Attlee’s post-war Labour government. We begin in the first module by critically examining historians’ explanations for the rapid growth of the Labour Party in the early twentieth century. In the second module, we think about the development of the Labour Party from the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 to the formation of the second Labour minority government under Ramsay MacDonald in 1929. In the third module, we focus on the collapse of the 1929 Labour government and the establishment in 1931 of a National Government, focusing in particular on the debate about MacDonald’s role in the 1929 government’s collapse. Finally, in the fourth module we focus on Labour’s post-war achievements during its first majority governments under Clement Attlee from 1945-51.

Emergence of the Labour Party, 1890-1914

In this module, we think about how and why the Labour Party grew so rapidly in the early twentieth century, focusing in particular on four historiographical theses: (i) the role of class politics, (ii) the impact of the First World War, (iii), the decline of the Liberal Party and, (iv) regional variation in Labour support.