James Smyth

RESISTING LABOUR: UNIONISTS, LIBERALS, AND MODERATES IN GLASGOW BETWEEN THE WARS

This article examines the co-operation between unionists and liberals in inter-war Glasgow. As with the parliamentary challenge of labour, unionists and liberals were confronted at the local level also. The usual response was some sort of municipal alliance or pact. In Scotland, where unionist support for continuing links with liberals was particularly pronounced, this took the form of specific ‘moderate’ parties created to contest local elections. This strategy was markedly successful in keeping labour out of office. The moderates secured their majority in Glasgow by completely dominating the middle-class wards and winning a number of working-class seats. Moderate success is examined through the essential unity of the middle-class vote, the more limited local franchise, and religious sectarianism. However, it became increasingly difficult for the moderates to satisfy both their middle-class and working-class supporters. The sudden emergence of a militant protestant party in the depths of the depression provided a temporary vehicle of protest, which split the moderate vote and allowed labour in to power in 1933.

Local elites and social control: building council houses in Stirling between the wars

This article examines the role played by local councillors in constructing new housing in Scotland during the inter-war period. Rather than view local authorities as simply the objective agency of central governments ambitions to construct council houses, we argue that the self-interest and motivations of councillors have to be recognized as significant factors in this process. It is argued also that the concerns of private landlords were neither ignored nor sacrificed in the rush to build new housing. Rather, given that councils remained dominated by local business men, many of whom were private landlords, councillors acted in ways to protect their own material and class interests. In so doing, they consciously, if implicitly, shaped the social geography of twentieth-century Scotland.

The Raploch: A history, people's perceptions and the likely future of a problem housing estate

This article explores the experience of belonging and identity, and the social distance and separateness which has long characterised aspects of Stirlings Raploch housing estate. Detailed historical archive work uncovered the limited social planning and architectural ambitions set for this housing estate, when compared to the earlier Riverside development. The consequences of such decision making and subsequent poor management of the estate is then articulated through a series of qualitative interviews which explore attitudes to the construction and sustaining of neighbourhood and community identities. Achieving a physical solution to Raplochs social problems has eluded a series of recent regeneration initiatives and this paper suggests that the core problem is not primarily architectural but rather one of class-related discrimination and stigma which has been core to Raplochs identity since the 16th Century.

Music, emotion and remembrance: unveiling memorials to the fallen of the First World War in Scotland

ABSTRACT The unveiling of memorials to those who fell in the First World War were highly solemn, dramatic and emotional events. Yet, while much attention has been given by historians to memorials and the purposes behind memorialisation, there has been less discussion of just how the feelings of the public were stimulated and provoked. Most accounts concentrate on the aesthetics and symbolism of the monuments themselves, and the speeches given by the officiating parties and individuals at unveilings. In doing so, however, they miss what was perhaps the most important emotional aspect of these ceremonies: music. This article argues that non-verbal sounds best expressed the raw emotions of the occasions and, in doing so, gave them their power and significance in establishing the mood of the moment and the public’s attachment to the memorials. Examining the major city memorials of Scotland as well as the National Memorial at Edinburgh Castle, it focuses on the significance of the bagpipes and Scotland’s most famous lament, ‘The Flowers of the Forest’, in providing the emotional high points of the ceremonies.

THOMAS CHALMERS, THE ‘GODLY COMMONWEALTH’, AND CONTEMPORARY WELFARE REFORM IN BRITAIN AND THE USA

Current prescriptions for welfare reform and increased reliance on the voluntary sector often base their appeal on the lessons of history, in particular the apparent successes of Victorian philanthropy in combating ‘pauperism’. This article looks at how this message has become influential in the USA and the UK among the ruling parties of right and left through the particular prism of the neo-conservative appreciation of the work of Thomas Chalmers, the early nineteenth-century Scottish churchman and authority on poverty. The attraction of Chalmers, both to the Charity Organization Society then and neo-conservatives today, lies in the practical application of his idea of the ‘godly commonwealth’ in Glasgow and Edinburgh where voluntary effort, organized through the church, replaced the statutory obligations of the poor law. While Chalmers, and his followers, declared his ‘experiments’ to be great successes, modern Scottish historians have revealed these claims to be false and his efforts failures. Only by completely ignoring the evidence presented by this historiography and continuing to rely on Chalmerss own writings and earlier hagiographies can the neo-conservative approbation of Chalmers be sustained. Such wilful neglect raises questions both about their approach to history and their proposed remedies for tackling poverty today.