Marx, Engels and Modern British Socialism: The Social and Political Thought of H. M. Hyndman, E. B. Bax and William Morris

Flaherty, Seamus

This book is a reception study of Karl Marx’s and Friedrich Engels’ ideas in Britain during the late nineteenth century and a revisionist account of the emergence of modern British socialism. It reconstructs how H. M. Hyndman, E. B. Bax, and William Morris interacted with Marx and ‘Marxism’. It shows how Hyndman was a socialist of liberal and republican provenance, rather than the Tory radical he is typically held to be; how Bax was a sophisticated thinker and highly influential figure in European socialist circles, rather than a negligible pedant; and it shows how Morris’s debt to Bax and liberalism has not been given its due. It demonstrates how John Stuart Mill, in particular, was combined with Marx in Britain; it illuminates other liberal influences which help to explain the sectarian attitude adopted by the Social Democratic Federation towards organised labour; and it establishes an alternative genealogy for Fabian socialism. 

Details

Published by: Palgrave Macmillan

Publication Date: 2020-05-21

Format: Hardcover

ISBN-13: 9783030423384

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-42339-1

Dimensions: 210cm x148cm

Pages: 271