The Formation of the Co-Operative Party Re-Considered

Bibliographic Data

ID9968592
AuthorsTony Adams (0000-0002-0880-6936, corresponding author)
Year1987
Volume32
Issue1
Pages48-68
Publication date1987-04-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Review of Social History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0020-8590 • E-ISSN: 1469-512X
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0020859000008324
OpenAlexW2159520634
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited2

Throughout its long history the British co-operative movement had maintained a position of political neutrality, steadfastly rejecting time after time proposals designed either to involve the movement directly in electoral politics or to become allied to an existing party. In what appeared to be a dramatic volte-face the 1917 Co-operative Congress meeting in Swansea voted by a huge majority to "secure direct representation in Parliament and on all local administrative bodies". 1 In 1971 Sidney Pollard offered a new analysis of this critical episode in the history of British co-operation. His contribution to Essays in Labour History 1886-1923 rejected traditional explanations of the remarkable and sudden changes in co-operative political activity during the first quarter of the twentieth century. Earlier studies had attributed the 1917 decision to the impact of war and, in Pollard's words, "to specific and immediate business grievances". 2 Pollard, on the other hand, sought to play down the significance of short-term pragmatic motivations and emphasised instead the role of ideology, establishing co-operative political involvement as an episode in the steady forward march of the British labour movement

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