The National Government and Political Extremism

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Discuss The Efficacy of The National Government’s Rejoinder to Political Fanaticism in the 1930s in Britain

The National Government had the responsibility of guiding Britain through the world depression and it damaging effects on Britain. There was the nightmare of mass unemployment; there was serious dangers from political extremism, both from the communist left and from the fascist right. Outside Britain there was the rise of aggressive dictators like Hitler, Mussolini and Franco in Spain. How well the National Government carried through its responsibilities is a matter of debate. Many contemporaries and many later historians attacked the National Government for being ineffectual and doing too little too late. Deciding between these interpretations is far from easy – but it is the task of historians to look at the evidence to try to separate reality from myth.

From 1931 until 1940, Britain was governed by a national government that was not genuinely ‘national’. Although the ex-Labour leader, Ramsay MacDonald, was PM, the National Government was not a true coalition of all the parties. The bulk of what was left of the Labour Party was in bitter opposition. The Liberals made not much more than a token contribution. The power base of the National Government was the massive majority of Conservatives held in parliament. When MacDonald finally resigned in 1935 and Stanley Baldwin became PM for the third time, this Conservative domination became even more obvious.

Severe economic crisis can lead to political extremism and the 1930s did see the triumph of political extremism and of dictatorship in several European countries, notable Germany. Other countries witnessed violent conflict between the political extremes of communist and fascist parties yet in Britain, though extreme political parties developed, they never got close to power nor did they seriously disrupt national life.

Founded in 1920, the CPGB lasted until the 1990s. Although always small numerically, it had influence beyond its numbers. Members were attracted to it in the 1930s for various reasons. It was based on a distinct philosophy that claimed to provide the working classes and their middle-class supporters with the model for a more equal and progressive society. After a communist regime was established in Russia from 1917, it appeared they were building what British sympathisers called ‘a new civilisation’.

As capitalism seemed to be collapsing in the early 1930s and parliamentary democracy seemed unable to cope, these revolutionary ideas and the challenge of creating a better type of society from their ruins appealed to many idealistic young people. Faced with mass unemployment, the break up of the Labour government in 1931 and creation of a British fascist party in 1932, membership of the CPGB rose. The rise of fascism in Europe also made communism attractive because it was the communists who seemed to be carrying the fight against fascism. This was particularly so in the late-1930s with the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War.

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The Conservative Party often exaggerated the threat from communism as a way of weakening support for Labour. A classic example of this is the allegations of communist influence behind the General Strike of 1926. Certainly communists were prominent in many aspects of British life in the 1930s. Several trade unions had leaders who were CPGB members or sympathetic to it. Communists played a lead role in major strikes such as the Birmingham rent strike in 1939. Communists also played a leading role in organisations like the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement (NUWM) which had 50,000 members in the early 1930s. ...

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