Conceptualizing The State: Innovation And Dispute In British Political Thought 1880-1914 (oxford Historical Monographs)

This book is concerned with the way in which the concept of the state was invoked in British political argument between 1880 and 1914. It central claim is that the decades bracketing the turn of the century witnessed a significant change in the prevailing terms of British political discourse - that the concept of the state, hitherto a relative stranger to British debate, emerged as a key component of the idiom in which critical reflection on politics was cast. James Meadowcroft surveys the ways in which the state was understood in this period, and also presents a detailed analysis of the conceptions of the state in the work of six prominent theorists: Herbert Spencer, Hugh Cecil, Bernard Bosanquet, L T Hobhouse, J A Hobson and Ramsay MacDonald. This book is concerned with the way in which the concept of the state was invoked in British political argument between 1880 and 1914. Its central claim is that the decades bracketing the turn of the century witnessed a significant change in the prevailing terms of British political discourse, that the concept of the state, hitherto a relative stranger to British debate, emerged as a key component of the idiom in which critical reflection on politics was cast. James Meadowcroft surveys the ways in which the state was understood in this period, and also presents a detailed analysis of the conceptions of the state in the work of six prominent theorists: Herbert Spencer, Hugh Cecil, Bernard Bosanquet, L. T. Hobhouse, J. A. Hobson, and Ramsay MacDonald. This scholarly study of six prominent theorists of the late nineteenth century - Herbert Spencer, Hugh Cecil, Bernard Bosanquet, L.T. Hobhouse, J.A. Hobson, and Ramsay MacDonald - explores the ways in which the notion of the state was invoked in political discourse, and analyses the varying conceptualizations found in their work. Title Pages 1 Acknowledgements 3 Introduction 4 The State and Political Argument 33 Herbert Spencer, Hugh Cecil, and the State 75 Bernard Bosanquet, Leonard Hobhouse, and the State 121 John Hobson, Ramsay MacDonald, and the State 179 The Movement of Theory 226 Select Bibliography 253 Select Bibliography 253 Index 268