Bøker av Patrick Diamond

A highly readable history of the Labour party and its civil wars.

This book examines the history of Labour's civil wars and the underlying causes of the party's schisms, from the first split of 1931, engineered by Ramsay MacDonald, to the ongoing battle for the future between the incumbent, Keir Starmer, and those who fundamentally altered the party's course under his predecessor, Jeremy Corbyn.

This Palgrave Policy Essential maps and assesses key changes in the Whitehall model over the last two decades.

After a period of electoral dominance, centre-left parties in western Europe have suffered a dramatic erosion of support; the vote share enjoyed by social democrats is at its lowest ever level. Social democracy stands at a point of great promise, but also peril. This book explores these themes and argues that to write off centre-left politics now would be a great mistake. It counters the idea that social democratic values have been rejected by voters. The ideal of solidarity and the need to forge bonds of connection in a volatile, interdependent world is as compelling as it always was. At the same time, the centre left clearly faces difficulties: ';the forward march of labour' has been abruptly halted while declining trust in politics adds to the problem of constructing viable electoral coalitions. The UK's decision to vote to leave the European Union is symptomatic of societies throughout Europe that are irreparably divided between voters who embrace economic change and openness, and those who are opposed to it.Social democracy has to find new ways to build bridges between ';open' and ';closed' communities by updating public institutions and policies, just as socialist parties did in the immediate aftermath of the second world war.

After its disastrous defeat in 2015, Labour is at grave risk of throwing away the 2020 general election. The party has to understand why it suffered such a devastating defeat and learn crucial lessons if it is to recover. The reasons appear obvious enough: the British public did not believe that Ed Miliband was a credible prime minister; people feared that a Labour government would plunge the British economy back into chaos; and they perceived that the party was out of touch on issues like immigration and welfare. Labour was not just narrowly defeated in 2015, it was overwhelmingly rejected by an electorate who no longer trust the party. Underlying all of this is a sense that Labour is a party that does not understand the modern world, wedded to an outdated ';cloth cap' image of heavy industry and the monolithic public sector. The risk for the Labour party, like social democratic parties across Europe, is further electoral defeat and then inevitably, permanent irrelevance. As of today, there are few signs that the party grasps why it lost and, in particular, why swing voters in marginal seats were not prepared to vote Labour. A party that does not understand why it was defeated scarcely deserves to be taken seriously by the electorate. This book examines why Labour so overwhelmingly lost the trust of voters, and crucially how the party under a new leader can win them back by 2020 charting Labour's path to power.

Anthony Crosland bequeathed a significant intellectual legacy to the Labour Party including his celebrated treatise The Future of Socialism published sixty years ago. In this timely book, Patrick Diamond argues that Crosland continues to serve as a vital reference point for today's Labour Party. He considers a wide range of Crosland's writings on the economy and politics, relating his ideas to ideological debates taking place within the Labour Party about egalitarian social democracy, electoral strategy, the European question, and the importance of progressive liberalism on the British centre-left. This is the first substantial work to fully consider Crosland's legacy for British social democracy. Written in a clear and persuasive way, it will appeal to a broad audience ofthinkers and activists with an interest in the history oftheLabour Party and the British Left.

The economic crisis of recent years continues to have a profound effect on the lives of European citizens. Economically, politically and socially, the crisis has led to fundamental change for many peoples lives. As well as creating new concerns, the crisis has simultaneously exacerbated existing ones, raising profound challenges to the sustainability and success of the European model. This book seeks to examine this new social reality of post-crisis Europe, exploring what both the EU and national governments can do to restore its strength, sustainability, cohesion and competitiveness.

This fascinating volume brings together important contributions from key authors to examine the relationship between social justice and global justice. The introduction by the Editors provides a clear overview of the the articles featured as well as explaining the need to provide a modern conception of social justice in an era of globalization.