r/LibDem • u/Rossmaans • 7d ago

Recommended Reading?

Hi all, I just wondered if anyone had some recommended reading about the history of the Liberals/Lib Dems or significant people etc.

I'm exploring my political leanings so I'm eager to get to know more about liberal thinking and the key figures in the movement. Time period doesn't particularly matter, I'm open to anything.

Thanks in advance!

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u/LeChevalierMal-Fait The Last Cameroon 7d ago

The Strange Death of Liberal Britain is a wonderful read, its analysis of the suffragettes is ahem dated but as a starting point as to why the Liberals were not a major party for the last 100 years its been I think an influential prespective.

Then maybe get a more modern book to see all the places Dangerfield was wrong.

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u/Rossmaans 7d ago

Thank you! Sounds interesting, I'll take a look

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u/Ticklishchap 7d ago edited 7d ago

It’s years since I read Dangerfield - the mid ‘80s, I think, as a History undergraduate. In what way is his analysis of the suffragettes ‘dated’?

Edit: Also, it’s ‘The Strange Death of Liberal England’, not Britain as a whole.

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u/LeChevalierMal-Fait The Last Cameroon 6d ago

Its been a few years for me but I recall him suggesting that homosexuals originated in the suffragette movement and you have langauge like hysteria

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u/aeryntano 7d ago

The Liberal History group do 4 books and many issues of their journal on this very subject area.☺️

https://liberalhistory.org.uk/shop-front/#Liberal-History-Books

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u/Rossmaans 7d ago

Awesome, thank you!

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u/markpackuk 7d ago

Jonathan Parry's book, Liberalism, is good on the interplay between politics and political beliefs. If you'd like a taster, I did a podcast with him - https://www.markpack.org.uk/174939/liberalism-by-jonathan-parry-podcast/ - but the book isn't very long anyway.

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u/Ok-Glove-847 7d ago

Less of a history and more of a primer, How To Be A Liberal by Ian Dunt is very good in my opinion.

David Torrance has A History of the Scottish Liberals and Liberal Democrats, which is obviously restricted to Scotland but is short and thorough and worthwhile.

David Laws’s Coalition is about, well, the coalition, but the Lib Dems’ only experience of national government since the war is certainly a relevant part of its history, whatever you think of it; likewise, Clegg’s Politics: Between the Extremes.

Vernon Bogdanor who wrote the Strange Survival of Liberal Britain (not to be confused with the Strange Death of, which someone else recommended) also has a one-hour lecture on the history of the liberals which you can find on YouTube and which is very good.

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u/Rossmaans 7d ago

Thanks very much for the recommendations

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u/Top_Country_6336 6d ago

I think "The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights"

https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights

It was liberalism's direct response to fascism.

Fascism attacked individual dignity, equality, and pluralism - saying some people were superior and states had unlimited power. The Declaration countered with universal human dignity and strict limits on government power.

Liberals realised desperate people were vulnerable to fascist appeals, so freedom now meant both protection from the state AND basic security.

Modern movements like Reform clearly echo fascist patterns - attacking asylum seekers' rights, trans rights, European cooperation, and the ECHR while emphasising nationalist symbolism with flags on roundabouts. A symbol of going around and around and going no-where fittingly.

And the Orange Book by David Laws, much cheaper than Amazon on World of Books.

I guess John Locke and the Enlightenment in general if you want to look at the roots of Liberalism?