

@mastersthesis {6827,
	title = {Municipal anti-socialism and the growth of the anti-socialist critique in {Britain}, 1873{\textendash}1914},
	year = {2006},
	note = {3225737},
	school = {University of Minnesota},
	type = {phdPh.{D}.},
	address = {Ann Arbor},
	abstract = {Municipal anti-socialism played a critical role in shaping wider debates over the growth of the state in Britain between 1873 and 1914. Municipal socialism, as formulated in Birmingham under the leadership of Joseph Chamberlain, provided a model for endeavors that sought efficiency and collective benefit through public management of services including gas and water. Municipal anti-socialists contended that, particularly when expanded beyond gas and water, municipal socialism fueled increasing debt and tax rates, pandered to the demands of public workers, and became economically inefficient and resistant to innovation. Municipal anti-socialists refined their arguments in the 1890s and gave support to the minority {\textquoteright}Moderate{\textquoteright} party on the London County Council (LCC), which sought to disrupt the municipal program of the majority {\textquoteright}Progressive{\textquoteright} party. The Liberal parliamentary victory of 1906 temporarily put municipal anti-socialists on the defensive. However, they worked to secure the victory of the Moderates, now renamed the {\textquoteright}Municipal Reformers,{\textquoteright} in the LCC election of 1907. The Municipal Reform Party restricted or discontinued some programs associated with municipal socialism while preserving others, demonstrating that some elements of municipal socialism were widely accepted by 1907. Through the anti-socialist organization the London Municipal Society (LMS), municipal anti-socialists also shifted their attention to attacking the socialism they believed implicit in {\textquoteright}new Liberalism{\textquoteright} after 1908. In the years before 1914, the debate over municipal socialism was affected by the emergence of regional as opposed to municipal economies of scale and the new fiscal demands placed upon local government by national authorities. By 1914, municipal anti-socialism had largely been absorbed into a wider anti-socialist discourse that challenged the growth of the state at both the local and national levels.},
	keywords = {0335:European history, 0582:History, 0615:Political science, Antisocialism, Conservative Party, European history, Great Britain, History, Municipal socialism, Political science, Social sciences},
	url = {http://search.proquest.com/docview/305305093?accountid=14270},
	author = {Gehrke, Jules Philip}
}
