A Useful History of Britain : The Politics of Getting Things Done

"The United Kingdom has not yet lasted as long as the Kingdom of Wessex, and may not do so. Conventional histories of Britain, though, tell the story of the origins of the UK as if that was the natural endpoint of political development on the island. Here, Michael Braddick sets out to do something else--to ask how people in the past used political power to get things done. Offering a concise thematic overview, it shows how history can speak directly to current political debates. Many people feel that national governments are irrelevant to their lives and that the problems we now face are beyond our control--climate change, disease and global economic regulation for example. But much of this is not new. The ideas and challenges driving political life have always affected larger parts of the globe: British experience has always been part of a shared and parallel global history, often directly linked by institutions reaching well beyond the island. On the other hand, throughout the last 6000 years people have acted at smaller scales too. What we really have in common with previous inhabitants of this island is the ambition to use political power to get things done, not a shared destiny culminating in government based in Westminster. This book sets out to learn more broadly from their experience, giving us a much fuller perspective on where we are now. Just as importantly, it gives us more resources for thinking about what we might do next."--Publisher's description Cover 1 A Useful History of Britain: The Politics of Getting Things Done 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Acknowledgements 8 Contents 10 List of Illustrations 12 Introduction: From Stonehenge to Global Britain: The History of Political Life on Britain 16 1: Political Life: Power Over Our World, Power Over Each Other 29 The Roman Empire: Collective Institutions and Differential Power 32 Private Property and the Public Good 37 Public Works 43 Collective and Differential Power: The EU 49 2: Mobilizing Ideas and the Uses of Collective Institutions 53 Ideas and Power Relations 54 Inheritance, Tenure, and the ‘Feudal Compact’ 54 Shaping the Uses of Collective Power 59 Roman Ideas and Their Legacy 59 Christianity and Anglo-SaxonGovernment 63 The Rise of Political Arithmetic and Political Economy 69 Conflict and Resistance 72 Church and State: Religious and Political Obligations 73 Diverse and Contested Ideas 78 3: Material Conditions and the Uses of Collective Institutions 85 Economic Change and Political Complexity 86 Hunter-Gatherers,Farmers, and Traders 86 The Slave Trade: How Collective Power Shapes Economic Exchange 90 Industrialization and Global Interdependence 94 Inter-StateCooperation: From Westphalia to the EU 98 Environmental Change and Collective Institutions 102 Government and Technological Change 108 4: Organizational Capacity and the Changing Limits of the Possible 114 Collective Institutions, Famine, and Disease 115 Collective Institutions and Economic Change: The Romans 125 The regulation of credit 129 Path Dependency 133 5: Geographies of Collective Institutions and Identities: Which Groups Take Action for What Purposes? 139 Local and Regional Structures 140 Dynastic and National Structures 147 Supra-nationaland Inter-State Organizations 155 Institutions, People, and Political Identities 160 6: Political Inclusion: Who Makes Things Happen? 166 Inequality: Differential Power 167 Accessing the Power of Ideas 171 Appropriation 171 Triangulation 174 Rejection, Subversion, and Imagining Alternative Worlds 177 Accessing the Power of Collective Institutions 179 Lobbying and Petitioning 179 Triangulation: Using the Law and the Church 183 Alternatives to Existing Institutions: Direct Action 187 Informal Spaces, Alternate Worlds, Making a Life 191 Historicizing Agency: Representation, Deliberation, Administration 196 7: Change Over Time: Phases in the History of Political Life 201 The Neolithic to the Iron Age: Material History, Identity, and Collective Power 203 55 BCE to 950: The Impact of Rome, Christianity, and the Vikings 206 Dynastic Kingdoms I: 950–1300 211 Dynastic Kingdoms II: 1300–1650 214 A Hybrid State with a Maritime Empire: 1650–1800 218 Industrial Britain, 1800–1945 221 Post-War, 1945–2018 224 Conclusion: Globalizing the British Past: Parallel and Shared Histories 229 National History in a Global Age 229 A History for Use 234 Notes 240 Introduction 240 Chapter 1 240 Chapter 2 241 Chapter 3 242 Chapter 4 244 Chapter 5 246 Chapter 6 247 Chapter 7 248 Conclusion 249 Picture Credits 250 Further Reading 252 Introduction 251 Chapter 1 253 Chapter 2 254 Chapter 3 254 Chapter 4 255 Chapter 5 255 Chapter 6 255 Chapter 7 256 Conclusion 256 Index 260 The United Kingdom has not yet lasted as long as the Kingdom of Wessex, and may not do so. Conventional histories of Britain, though, tell the story of the origins of the UK as if that was the natural endpoint of political development on the island. Here, Michael Braddick sets out to do something else - to ask how people in the past used political power to get things done. Offering a concise thematic overview, it shows how history can speak directly to current political debates. Many people feel that national governments are irrelevant to their lives and that the problems we now face are beyond our control-climate change, disease and global economic regulation for example. But much of this is not new. The ideas and challenges driving political life have always affected larger parts of the globe: British experience has always been part of a shared and parallel global history, often directly linked by institutions reaching well beyond the island. On the other hand, throughout the last 6000 years people have acted at smaller scales too. What we really have in common with previous inhabitants of this island is the ambition to use political power to get things done, not a shared destiny culminating in government based in Westminster. This book sets out to learn more broadly from their experience, giving us a much fuller perspective on where we are now. Just as importantly, it gives us more resources for thinking about what we might do next. -- Provided by publisher This is a short history of the political life of this island over a very long period, showing how history can speak clearly to current political debates.