A changing world: a note on the importance of context in writing history

Collecting stories of struggles which can inspire a new generation is important but makes sense only if the context is provided which can help make a bridge to the present.  This is not easy many of the old certainties of the left, the welfare state, Russia as socialist, the Labour Party as a vehicle for progress have been weakened if not destroyed. Many on the left  are now so pessimistic  they reject any grand narrative.  Among historians, one consequence  is that they choose to research fragments  without any context.  The fragments may be fascinating in themselves, inspiring stories but the failure to relate to a bigger picture gives them an ephemeral quality. 

So context is important and no matter how big the big picture is, it changes.   Writing this on the eve of the referendum, at a moment when Cameron's plan to deal with the right in his own party looks at serious risk of coming unstuck, the question arises in my mind: What does the Tory right bang on about the EU?  Clearly not for the same reasons as Lexit. Rather it's about a crisis in their big picture.  When our ruling class decided in the 1960s to join what was then called the Common Market, it was a clear response to the loss of empire.  There was a loss of what had been the more or less captive markets of the former colonies, many now trying to develop their own industry and lessen their dependence on imports from Britain.  Linked to this there was the decline of sterling as a reserve currency.  From the rulers' point of the rationale for membership has not changed.  What has changed is the strength of weakening of the Tories traditional base of support. There was a time in the 1950s when a third of the working class voted Tory. In part there was down to an instrumental view that an an individual aspiring to 'get on', the Tories would help  but there was also the view that the Tories were better placed to run the country. In her autobiography, Betty Tebbs quotes herself as a very young woman in the 1930s saying that those with the money were better placed to make decisions about it. This was strengthened by the idea that Britain was somehow 'great'.  It had had the largest empire in history.  Surely there was something special about being British that overcame class divisions? Racism was an essential part of this. There were other empires, French, Portuguese, Spanish and, de facto, the US.  All were ruled by white people.  The superiority of whites was obvious. Though Labour wasn't anti-Empire, the Tories drew much more of their support from the idea.

In truth, the twentieth century saw more or less uninterrupted decline of British power.  Though new colonies were acquired after 1918 (see Sykes-Picot), WW1 weakened Britain.  The war was brought to an end by revolution in Russia followed by revolution in Germany. All the European imperial powers were weakened. Only the US came out stronger, not least for being the main creditor.  The US-British alliance that emerged in WW1 and was strengthened in WW2 was 'common sense'. One simple example is the conclusion to the popular children's book '1066 and all that' published in 1930, a light hearted look at British history which ends with the sentence ' America was thus clearly Top Nation, and history came to a.'  The alliance, taking the form of NATO in 1949, soon reinforced with a huge nuclear arsenal, dominated post war British politics. To oppose this in any organised way put you in a very small minority.  The Communist Party of Great Britain had 30,000 members.  The numbers of organised pacifists and Trotskyists was much smaller. The first big post war movement to challenge the establishment, CND, had a national leadership that never led a fight against NATO, only against nuclear weapons.

2016 and the context, the big picture, has changed. The US's share of world GDP is now around half of what it was in 1950. China and India are challenging the domination of the world by Western Europe and the US over the last two to three centuries. At the same time, the world looks a more dangerous place with intractable conflicts in the Middle East, conflicts that a materialist analysis shows are rooted in the legacy of imperialism. For the Brexit Tories, the retreat into British nationalism has a pathetic ring to it.  It is also very dangerous.  

Racism may have changed its form from biological to cultural but the need to confront it is as strong as ever.  The struggles of the 1960s and 70s were part of a world wide revolt that failed to break through.  It was 'the fire last time' and so long as we keep in mind the changing context and do not oversimplify how the world has changed in the last half century, we can continue to write its history confident that this can make a contribution to our current battles.