Political Change and the Rise of Labour in Comparative Perspective (review)

Mary Hilson has written an in-depth study of the development of labor movements in two naval dockyard towns in Britain and Sweden during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Naval dockyard towns have long been seen as particularly difficult territory for labor movements and have therefore been somewhat understudied by labor historians. Hilson hopes to remedy this lacunae somewhat by investigating how labor movements in Plymouth and Karlskrona understood, reacted to, and indeed ultimately overcame the challenges they faced in appealing to and organizing workers in these towns. Those interested in the peculiarities of dockyard towns, the intricacies of labor movement organizing, and the details of union and left-wing party development in Sweden and Britain will find much useful information in this volume.

But Hilson views her book as more than a study of two somewhat neglected towns in England and Sweden. Political Change and the Rise of Labour in Comparative Perspectivealso aims to answer broader questions in labor history as well as prove the value of comparative historical research. These two goals are linked as Hilson correctly notes that answering a cross-national question requires a cross-national approach.

Hilson's "broad question" is: "Why did social democratic parties emerge in all European countries in the late nineteenth century?" Regardless of levels of economic development, industrial profile, class structure, or political institutions, socialist parties appeared in all continental European nations at approximately the same time. Yet the tendency on the part of many labor historians is to treat countries as "exceptional." This is certainly true of the cases Hilson examines—Britain and Sweden. And of course, on some level they are (but what country isn't?). Britain was the earliest industrializer and possessed a political system of unusual stability and adaptability. That such factors shaped the development of its moderate, laborite labor movement seems beyond refute. Sweden, on the other hand, developed late, underwent greater and more tumultuous political changes, while remaining on the periphery of European political conflicts. That such factors shaped the development of its incredibly successful social democratic labor movement also seems beyond refute.

Yet if we focus merely on the dynamics of these (or any) particular cases, we will miss the forest for the trees. While the ideological coloring and success of European labor movements varied significantly, the fact remains that all arose at approximately the same time and under the influence of international socialism. If understanding labor movements' differences requires an examination of country and local level factors, understanding their broad similarities requires cross-national and structural analysis.

Hilson attempts to provide such a mixed study in her study of Plymouth and Karlskrona by focusing on many similar micro and macro level challenges labor movements in both places faced. (On the micro level the similarities came largely from both towns' dependence on shipbuilding—e.g. local industry's heavy dependence on state financing; somewhat isolated populations; particularly high resonance of imperialist rhetoric; and distinctive employment pat- terns—while on the macro level they came from international trends and events—e.g. political liberalization, economic development, and the First World War.) However, Hilson also pays attention to the important ways in which Britain and Sweden (and Plymouth and Karlskrona) diverged, and how these differences shaped the challenges and responses of labor movements in the two places. (Here, for example, there is much information about the distinctive role played by cooperative movements in Plymouth. On the other hand, I don't think Hilson emphasizes enough the ways in which each country's political institutions shaped their labor movements. For example, in Britain the Labor party had to deal with fairly well-established liberal and conservative parties, while the Swedish SAP was the first modern, mass party in Sweden.)

That an explicit plea to combine cross-national and local research has to be made strikes a comparative political scientist as odd and troubling. While there is certainly...