How would British politics and economy look like without ww1?

Thomas1195

Banned
Assume that ww1 somehow was prevented in 1914 and by 1917-1920 the situation become similar to a Cold War.

What would British politics look like? Also how would their economy perform?

My views:

First, for sure Irish question and Land Reform would be the two main topics. The Liberal Party would be a major force for longer, especially if Home Rule was passed and Ireland was resolved peacefully, while Georgist policy of LVT would undermine both the right and the far left.

For economy, of course the macroeconomy would be much better: low debt, low deficit, net creditor. A national LVT can have positive impacts on economic development in the long run.

However, the laissez faire oriented economic policy would prevail for much longer, as ww1 created the conditions of the emergence of Keynesian economics and state interventionism. Potential negative effects: slower technological advance, slower to adopt assembly lines and mechanization in manufacturing, worse infrastructures, disorganized electricity supply system (as far as I know, there was absolutely no government plan for a standardized national electricity system like Central Electricity Board BEFORE WW1), disorganized railways.
 
It is quite likely that many of the economic trends that were noticed in the years leading up to 1914 would continue. Wages for skilled tradesmen would continue to rise. Many people would find jobs in new industries, such as those related to automobiles, petroleum, popular entertainment, and labor-saving devices for the home. At the same time, the mechanization of agriculture would reduce the need for farm laborers. Thus, despite a rising standard of living for most Britons, pockets of poverty would persist.

In the realm of politics, the trend towards expansion of the franchise would continue. However, the pace of the growth in the percentage of the population that was eligible to vote would not be as rapid as it was in our time line. Thus, it would take longer for the Labour Party to displace the Liberal Party, giving the politics of the 'teens and 'twenties somewhat more "Victorian" flavour than would otherwise have been the case.

Lloyd George would be less likely to thrive in such a political environment. At the same time, Haldane would not have been marginalized for his alleged German sympathies.
 

CaliGuy

Banned
First, for sure Irish question and Land Reform would be the two main topics. The Liberal Party would be a major force for longer, especially if Home Rule was passed and Ireland was resolved peacefully, while Georgist policy of LVT would undermine both the right and the far left.
Didn't the Protestants in Northern Ireland oppose Home Rule, though? If so, what exactly was going to be done to deal with their concerns?
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Didn't the Protestants in Northern Ireland oppose Home Rule, though? If so, what exactly was going to be done to deal with their concerns?
Passing two Acts for North and South like in 1920. IOTL, this came far too late to prevent the civil war.
 

CaliGuy

Banned
Passing two Acts for North and South like in 1920. IOTL, this came far too late to prevent the civil war.
So, would an earlier passage of these two acts result in both Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland receiving Home Rule which they are satisfied with in this TL?
 

Thomas1195

Banned
In the realm of politics, the trend towards expansion of the franchise would continue. However, the pace of the growth in the percentage of the population that was eligible to vote would not be as rapid as it was in our time line. Thus, it would take longer for the Labour Party to displace the Liberal Party, giving the politics of the 'teens and 'twenties somewhat more "Victorian" flavour than would otherwise have been the case.
Or they may not even displace the Liberals. The more radical figures like Haldane would not defect to Labour and would still push for reforms, especially in Education.

Meanwhile, Georgists like LG and Churchill in Liberal Party was on the rise at that time and without the war, they would drive further for LVT and land reform, both of which would undermine both the right and the left. Also, I think Keynesian school would eventually emerge within the party. These, together with Education reform, are their biggest weapons in the long run. If a good party leader like LG or maybe Haldane could embrace both Keynesian and LVT and make British economy grow like Canada IOTL, he could become like McKenzie King. Unlike IOTL, without ww1, they would have a chance to implement all of the policies above.

So, would an earlier passage of these two acts result in both Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland receiving Home Rule which they are satisfied with in this TL?
No war, fewer other distractions.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
The plan in the 1914 act was to "temporarily" exclude some of the counties of Ulster (six or nine most frequently mentioned) from the Dublin parliament.
This was ONE plan, AFAIK favored by Asquith though the means of partions (counties, communities, ...) and who would get what part and how long "temporary" (6 years, 12 years) should last and what should happen then (popular votes of the single counties/communities, of all of Ulster) wasn't sorted when war began.

However, there was during the mediations with the king at least one thing the prostants as well as the catholics agreed upon : NO DIVISION OF ULSTER !
Both sides were on "all or nothing".

Unfortunatly I don't know what ideas, "schemes" Asquith might have had in mind to push things furtehr regarding Home Rule, when awr crossed his ways.
(Though I would love too ...)
 

NoMommsen

Donor
...The Liberal Party would be a major force for longer, ...
Something I'm inclined to contest given the last two election. The Liberals barely mamaged to get the majority only by means of the (though at that time lesser "radical") Irish members of parliament (and Sinn Fein WAS already blinking over the horizon).

... And next election was already due in 1915.

Therefore they would need some really "capturing" domestic theme to win or some (butterflied) international success improving domestic living standards.
 
I think its very dependent on what happens in Europe. British politics are never a vacuum and both domestic reforms and the condition of the economy will depend on wider factors affecting Europe. I'm not sure I see a ''Cold War'' as particularly likely in the 1910s and 1920s, as the mixture of tensions and reluctance for open conflict of our OTL Cold War were driven by the particular circumstances only possible in post 1945. Also the lack of Bolshevik revolution, for example, will have profound effects on party politics that ITTL will be very different. But for sake of argument:

* Women's Franchise may actually happen sooner. Remember OTL both suffragettes and the less militant suffragists suspended their campaigns by-and-large out of patriotic devotion. Whilst its true that women's work in the war did persuade some of the merits of female suffrage, it should also be remembered that the female suffrage campaign was causing significant problems for the Liberal Government in 1912-1914 and that pressure would have kept up ITTL.

*There will be a post-war crisis in housing. OTL the 'Homes for Heroes' movement but also the Govt experiments at running factories and works towns for the war effort persuaded many of the merits of what became known post-war as Council Housing. ITTL the rent crisis of 1915 will occur but there will be no particular drive for either Liberals or Tories to build mass housing to resolve the issue.

* Labour will come to displace the Liberals in many urban constituencies and across much of the industrial north. Whilst the Liberals will remain a significant party, they will have to abandon the Lib-Lab pact eventually. ITTL Labour will come to represent the party of social and economic intervention which will play particularly strongly in poor urban constituencies. [See situations like OTL's Poplarism on a wider scale].

* Railways will not stay the same. There were moves in some regions, such as what became post 1923 Southern Railways, to already form those larger groupings. Some areas will still be a patchwork of companies like in the 1890s, but increasingly railway companies were realising that merging and consolidating would help them cope with the growing challenge of war.

* Car and road transport will develop a little slower - there will be no 1919 glut of army surplus lorries released into the market place. Railway companies will fight longer to keep control of buses, airlines, etc.

* There will still be calls for economic and political Federation across the Empire with OTL's levels of little success. The economic maturation of colonial markets and growing notions of nationalisms there were certainly affected by the war but the groundwork for that growing separation was already inherent from the 1900s onwards.

* Pre-1914 political tensions will continue to bug major parties, particularly the spectre of tariff reform which will bedevil the Tories as OTL, but there will be new pressures that roughly correlate to OTL. The need to reform services like the Poor Law, to clear slum housing, how far to tackle Unemployment with Govt intervention.

These are just a few off the top of my head...
 
I think its very dependent on what happens in Europe. British politics are never a vacuum and both domestic reforms and the condition of the economy will depend on wider factors affecting Europe. I'm not sure I see a ''Cold War'' as particularly likely in the 1910s and 1920s, as the mixture of tensions and reluctance for open conflict of our OTL Cold War were driven by the particular circumstances only possible in post 1945. Also the lack of Bolshevik revolution, for example, will have profound effects on party politics that ITTL will be very different. But for sake of argument:

* Women's Franchise may actually happen sooner. Remember OTL both suffragettes and the less militant suffragists suspended their campaigns by-and-large out of patriotic devotion. Whilst its true that women's work in the war did persuade some of the merits of female suffrage, it should also be remembered that the female suffrage campaign was causing significant problems for the Liberal Government in 1912-1914 and that pressure would have kept up ITTL.

*There will be a post-war crisis in housing. OTL the 'Homes for Heroes' movement but also the Govt experiments at running factories and works towns for the war effort persuaded many of the merits of what became known post-war as Council Housing. ITTL the rent crisis of 1915 will occur but there will be no particular drive for either Liberals or Tories to build mass housing to resolve the issue.

* Labour will come to displace the Liberals in many urban constituencies and across much of the industrial north. Whilst the Liberals will remain a significant party, they will have to abandon the Lib-Lab pact eventually. ITTL Labour will come to represent the party of social and economic intervention which will play particularly strongly in poor urban constituencies. [See situations like OTL's Poplarism on a wider scale].

* Railways will not stay the same. There were moves in some regions, such as what became post 1923 Southern Railways, to already form those larger groupings. Some areas will still be a patchwork of companies like in the 1890s, but increasingly railway companies were realising that merging and consolidating would help them cope with the growing challenge of war.

* Car and road transport will develop a little slower - there will be no 1919 glut of army surplus lorries released into the market place. Railway companies will fight longer to keep control of buses, airlines, etc.

* There will still be calls for economic and political Federation across the Empire with OTL's levels of little success. The economic maturation of colonial markets and growing notions of nationalisms there were certainly affected by the war but the groundwork for that growing separation was already inherent from the 1900s onwards.

* Pre-1914 political tensions will continue to bug major parties, particularly the spectre of tariff reform which will bedevil the Tories as OTL, but there will be new pressures that roughly correlate to OTL. The need to reform services like the Poor Law, to clear slum housing, how far to tackle Unemployment with Govt intervention.

These are just a few off the top of my head...

The rise of labour was not inevitable and it is highly debateable whether labour would have become the party of intervention. Both Keynes and Beveridge were Liberals Macdonald and Snowden (the most orthodox of economic thinkers) were labour.
 
The rise of labour was not inevitable and it is highly debateable whether labour would have become the party of intervention. Both Keynes and Beveridge were Liberals Macdonald and Snowden (the most orthodox of economic thinkers) were labour.

Whilst the rise of Labour is certainly debateable, my point was actually about specific areas not the national scale. If you look at areas that Labour was competing strongly in, such as in the two 1910 elections for example, you can see the seeds of growing Liberal electoral irrelevance in parts of the industrial north of England, urban Wales, and the Scottish lowlands. This is a trend that would have continued ITTL, even if the Lib-Lab pact breaks down.

Yes Keynes and Beveridge were pro-intervention and Macdonald and Snowden were not in economic terms but that wasn't necessarily true for social matters. Macdonald and Snowden, along with most of Labour, took a strong early line on the sort of social intervention [ending the Poor Law, more welfare provision, tackling unemployment through state management such as Labour Exchanges, further support for mothers and children] that OTL divided the Liberals. It is likely that, I feel at least, ITTL Labour will be more united on this social intervention.

Besides, whilst you are right about Keynes and Beveridge vs Macdonald and Snowden, its worth pointing out that much of the latter's economic conservatism was during a period of global and national recession and depression. ITTL Labour's first serious Government may come about in different circumstances and may not be peopled by the same characters if, say, it occurs in the late 1930s. Likewise Keynes and Beveridge may well have been sidelined if the Liberals shift to a more orthodox free-trade laissez faire position ITTL.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Besides, whilst you are right about Keynes and Beveridge vs Macdonald and Snowden, its worth pointing out that much of the latter's economic conservatism was during a period of global and national recession and depression. ITTL Labour's first serious Government may come about in different circumstances and may not be peopled by the same characters if, say, it occurs in the late 1930s. Likewise Keynes and Beveridge may well have been sidelined if the Liberals shift to a more orthodox free-trade laissez faire position ITTL
Well, their economic policies were same in 1924, because Snowden was basically a classical Liberal in economic view, and even less interventionist than the Tories.

Keynes was a rising economist in Cambridge. He would eventually rise to prominent, like figures such as Arthur Pigou. Actually, basically all prominent economists in Britain were Liberals.

Two other powerful weapons were Land Value Tax and Education reforms (the latter was pushed by Haldane, who would not be marginalized and ejected ITTL).
 
Last edited:
Well, their economic policies were same in 1924, because Snowden was basically a classical Liberal in economic view, and even less interventionist than the Tories.

Keynes was a rising economist in Cambridge. He would eventually rise to prominent, like figures such as Arthur Pigou. Actually, basically all prominent economists in Britain were Liberals.

Two other powerful weapons were Land Value Tax and Education reforms (the latter was pushed by Haldane, who would not be marginalized and ejected ITTL).

Firstly, I think its a bit of an over-simplification to say that ''all prominent economists in Britain were Liberals''. Even if that was true, which it isn't really, being an economist who supports the Liberal Party does not mean the same as being the person who writes government economic policy. There's no guarantee that Keynes would have risen to prominence - nothing is certain in history. It's an extreme example, but your POD doesn't preclude Keynes simply dropping dead from an aneurysm in 1916, in which case he would have no impact on this timeline.

Secondly the Liberals were not OTL wedded whole-heartedly to one economic policy. In 1914 they are less than a decade in from their major reforming experience in the landslide of 1906 which was rooted in a shared ideology of free-trade and non-intervention. There's no guarantee that Haldane wouldn't be sidelined ITTL - he might stay a major player as you say but equally he might be pushed aside if the party swings towards a more hands-off approach. It was Lloyd George, and his faction, who really pushed Keynesian. Without the war there is no guarantee that Lloyd George ever achieves the hegemony over the Liberal Party that allowed him to steer its interventionist ideas in the 1920s and 1930s OTL.

Its also a bit unfair to claim Education Reform as solely the preserve of the Liberals. All three parties had major ideas of what they would do with education at the time, each different from the other, and each would have had significant impact if implemented in this timeline.

Finally, recent studies have argued you need to see Snowden in his context. He does more in 1924 but Labour are a minority government and desperate not to mess their first chance at Government up by doing anything too radical. In 1929 his hands are tied, to some extent, by prevailing economic wisdom surrounding what to do about the depression. Remember that OTL Keynes's ideas are by no means economic orthodoxy in the interwar years and you can't necessarily assume that any Government in power at the time would have taken such seemingly drastic steps without a second thought.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Secondly the Liberals were not OTL wedded whole-heartedly to one economic policy. In 1914 they are less than a decade in from their major reforming experience in the landslide of 1906 which was rooted in a shared ideology of free-trade and non-intervention. There's no guarantee that Haldane wouldn't be sidelined ITTL - he might stay a major player as you say but equally he might be pushed aside if the party swings towards a more hands-off approach. It was Lloyd George, and his faction, who really pushed Keynesian. Without the war there is no guarantee that Lloyd George ever achieves the hegemony over the Liberal Party that allowed him to steer its interventionist ideas in the 1920s and 1930s OTL.
Actually IOTL by 1924s even Asquith accepted and supported Keynes' ideas, if you read his manifestos in 1923 and 1924.

The shift in Liberal approach from Classical to Progressive Liberal after Gladstone was a long transition, first with social intervention and then economic intervention.

Lloyd George was already very popular due to his various acts during 1909-1911. And he had an advantage of coming from popular class.

For Haldane, before the war he was actually one of the top rank in the cabinet, together with Asquith, Grey, and Lloyd George.

Liberals were not the only ones who push for education reform, but they were strong supporters and had strong records with it.

*There will be a post-war crisis in housing. OTL the 'Homes for Heroes' movement but also the Govt experiments at running factories and works towns for the war effort persuaded many of the merits of what became known post-war as Council Housing. ITTL the rent crisis of 1915 will occur but there will be no particular drive for either Liberals or Tories to build mass housing to resolve the issue.
A big opportunity for Georgists
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Yes Keynes and Beveridge were pro-intervention and Macdonald and Snowden were not in economic terms but that wasn't necessarily true for social matters. Macdonald and Snowden, along with most of Labour, took a strong early line on the sort of social intervention [ending the Poor Law, more welfare provision, tackling unemployment through state management such as Labour Exchanges, further support for mothers and children] that OTL divided the Liberals. It is likely that, I feel at least, ITTL Labour will be more united on this social intervention.

Likewise Keynes and Beveridge may well have been sidelined if the Liberals shift to a more orthodox free-trade laissez faire position ITTL.

Secondly the Liberals were not OTL wedded whole-heartedly to one economic policy. In 1914 they are less than a decade in from their major reforming experience in the landslide of 1906 which was rooted in a shared ideology of free-trade and non-intervention. There's no guarantee that Haldane wouldn't be sidelined ITTL - he might stay a major player as you say but equally he might be pushed aside if the party swings towards a more hands-off approach. It was Lloyd George, and his faction, who really pushed Keynesian. Without the war there is no guarantee that Lloyd George ever achieves the hegemony over the Liberal Party that allowed him to steer its interventionist ideas in the 1920s and 1930s OTL.
After rethinking, I believe the Liberals would become increasingly progressive and interventionist, as opposed a rightward shift, if they survive past the Asquith and Co generation as a major party. Look at the Liberal MPs who were born from 1870 onward, the majority of them were radicals/progressives, like Samuel, Acland, Foot, Sinclair, Trevalyan, Addison, Montagu or Wegdewood Benn. IOTL they lost of a good deal of them to Labour, mainly due to the war (many of them were anti-war) as well as the Liberal split during the war. Not to mention the future young radicals during the interwar like Foot (sons), Acland (sons), or Harold Wilson. No more Gladstonians among the younger guys.
 
After rethinking, I believe the Liberals would become increasingly progressive and interventionist, as opposed a rightward shift, if they survive past the Asquith and Co generation as a major party. Look at the Liberal MPs who were born from 1870 onward, the majority of them were radicals/progressives, like Samuel, Acland, Foot, Sinclair, Trevalyan, Addison, Montagu or Wegdewood Benn. IOTL they lost of a good deal of them to Labour, mainly due to the war (many of them were anti-war) as well as the Liberal split during the war. Not to mention the future young radicals during the interwar like Foot (sons), Acland (sons), or Harold Wilson. No more Gladstonians among the younger guys.

Well maybe.

To be honest, the war had such a seismic effect on society in Britain that its almost impossible to predict what would have happened to politics in Britain. Even trying to guess at long term trends based on political positions c1914 is very complex. Party politics in early twentieth century Britain was very reactive, and how the Liberals would have developed would have shaped, and been shaped by, other political trends. For example a Conservative Party that more fully embraces Tariff Reform in the 1920s will put Free Trade much higher on the agenda than one that, say, decided to adopt a more populist model and appeal to working-class conservatives. Either option would affect how the Liberals understood their place in politics.

So you may be right and the Liberals become more progressive and interventionist. Or you may see them out flanked by a Trade-Union supported Labour Party. Or you might see them split in the late 1920s over an issue like Free Trade, nationalised Health Care, or railway regulation. Or they might remain in the centre, a mixture of laissez-faire and interventionist, as Labour and the Tories veer towards the radical edges.

To be honest, one guess is as good or as bad as another.
 
Top