Originally published in 1963, this book examines the English Local Government, and more specifically, the Manor and the Parish, considering the various exemptions, immunities and franchises which enabled the inhabitants of particular localities to exclude the authority of the county at large, or that of one or other of its officers, and thereby enjoy, within their own favoured areas, some peculiar forms of self-government. The book includes chapters on the city and borough of Westminster, ...

The book contains all known so far 151 aphoristic entries in the diaries of Beatrice Webb about her lifelong friend, Nobel laureate and Oscar winner Bernard Shaw written between 1893 and 1943 and edited by a leading contemporary Shavian Vitaly Baziyan. Beatrice Webb's keenest observations about the greatest Irish dramatist Bernard Shaw represent an important source for the study of British cultural, social and political history. They help to get a clearer picture of world-renowned playwrig...

This book examines the economic, social and political thought of two highly influential cross-disciplinary contributors to the debate in the United Kingdom about welfare economics, social welfare, nationalisation and public policy. Active between the 1880s and the 1930s, their many books, papers, lectures and speeches shaped the discourse on heterodox economics, social democracy and the managed economy. The Webbs sat on Royal Commissions, permeated local and central government, and were in...

The History of Trade Unionism: Revised Edition, Extended to 1920 by Sidney and Beatrice Webb is a comprehensive and authoritative account of the development and evolution of trade unions in Britain from their earliest origins to the aftermath of World War I. This seminal work, meticulously researched and richly detailed, traces the rise of collective labor organization, exploring the social, economic, and political forces that shaped the labor movement over more than a century. The Webbs c...

The author of this British book states that "The reader must not expect to find, in this historical volume, either an analysis of Trade Union organisation, policy, and methods, or any judgment upon the validity of its assumptions, its economic achievements, or its limitations." The book instead explains how, since the original publication of the book in 1890, the trade union movement has grown to encompass 60% of all workers, and how it may now form the foundation for a new political party...

Industrial Democracy is a book written by Sidney Webb. It dives into socialist reform and the organization of trade unions and joint bargaining. The book pioneered the term industrial democracy to the social sciences.

First published in 1922, in this volume Sydney and Beatrice Webb give a detailed account of the evolution of the English Prison System from the common gaol and the house of correction of the sixteenth century down to the statutory changes of the twentieth century, and survey the successive efforts at reform of John Howard and Elizabeth Fry, Jeremy Bentham and James Neild, Sir T. Fowell Buxton and J.J. Gurney. The origin and development of the cellular system, the treadwheel and the crank, ...

Originally published in 1963, this volume is devoted to an analysis of the organisation of the Commissioners of Sewers, the Incorporated Guardians of the Poor, the Turnpike Trusts and the Improvement Commissioners, and depicts the important development of these bodies during the eighteenth century. By examining the constitutional features of these statutory authorities Mr. & Mrs. Webb support their main contention that here are to be found the beginnings of most of the Local Government ser...

In 'The History of Trade Unionism (Revised Edition, Extended to 1920),' the Webbs present a seminal anthology exploring the evolution of labor movements and their pivotal role in shaping industrial societies. This comprehensive collection offers an illuminating range of essays that capture the triumphs and tribulations of trade unions, mapping their historical trajectory from nascent organizations to formidable forces in socio-economic reform. The anthology's strength lies in its diversity...

First published in 1910, this volume is a dispassionate analysis of the changes in and the various aspects of official policy towards pauperism from the ‘Revolution of 1834’ to the Majority and Minority Reports of 1909. In their preface to this volume the Webbs wrote:"What obscured the history was the manner in which masses of heterogeneous facts were heaped together. To read, one after another, these complicated Orders and lengthy Reports, each dealing with all kinds of paupers an...

Originally published in 1968, English Prisons Under Local Government gives a detailed account of the evolution of the English Prison System from the common gaol and the house of correction of the sixteenth century down to the statutory changes of the twentieth century, and survey the successive efforts at reform of John Howard and Elizabeth Fry, Jeremy Bentham and James Neild, Sir T. Fowell Buxton and J. J.Gurney. The origin and development of the cellular system, the treadwheel a...

This book investigates how, alongside Beatrice Webb’s ground-breaking pre-World War One anti-poverty campaigns, George Bernard Shaw helped launch the public debate about the relationship between equality, redistribution and democracy in a developed economy.The ten years following his great 1905 play on poverty Major Barbara present a puzzle to Shaw scholars, who have hitherto failed to appreciate both the centrality of the idea of equality in major plays like Getting