Frank Field - Böcker

In 2000 the Institute began a series of lectures, endowed by Michael Novak and the John Templeton Foundation, entitled the Templeton Forum on Markets and Morality. The four papers given in the first series, and revised by the authors, are included in this volume. Brian Griffiths considers the business corporation as a moral community, concluding that 'an independent moral standard is not only something which is good in itself but is also in the interests of shareholders and employees'. Robert A. Sirico argues that the accomplishments of business directly help to advance social prosperity, health and human welfare. Norman Barry contends that the market system is 'morally self-sufficient...and develops its own codes of conduct'. Ethical conduct requires companies simply to follow rules and conventions which make for long-run success. Frank Field discusses the provision of a minimum income in retirement which, in his view, cannot be achieved by markets alone.

How are Christians and others inspired to work together in government? What ideals do they have in common in this cynical age? One answer, known as English Idealism, was put forward by T. H. Green. It sprang from Christian belief and formed a public ideology. As a leading politician and churchman, Frank Field illustrates his understanding of English Idealism through the life and work of five people who have inspired him in his political career. He looks at: two Archbishops of Canterbury - the Temples, father and son - who helped to build up this public ideology; George Bell who, as Bishop of Chichester during World War II, had the courage to be a lone voice campaigning against the policy of obliteration bombing of German cities; William Beveridge - this country's key reformer of welfare; Eleanor Rathbone, one of the greatest M.P.s, who campaigned to build an inclusive citizenship.

Based on two conferences, this volume explores trends during the 1960s and 1970s in inner city areas in the United Kingdom. It describes how the inner city is losing jobs and skilled workers and, as the population falls, the number of disadvantaged people and those claiming benefits is increasing. To what extent, the book asks, does the educational system contribute to or alleviate Britain’s urban crisis? In answering this question, the contributors examine the complex interrelationships between educational, economic and social problems, and point out that one of the major weaknesses of the present educational system in Britain is that it is in no way linked to the labour market. They suggest how schools could be better linked to local employment opportunities while at the same time offering more culturally varied educational opportunities. They also analyze Britain’s urban programme and show that it in no way matches up to what is required if poverty – which is seen as the root of the urban crisis – is to be eradicated.

Based on two conferences, this volume explores trends during the 1960s and 1970s in inner city areas in the United Kingdom. It describes how the inner city is losing jobs and skilled workers and, as the population falls, the number of disadvantaged people and those claiming benefits is increasing. To what extent, the book asks, does the educational system contribute to or alleviate Britain’s urban crisis? In answering this question, the contributors examine the complex interrelationships between educational, economic and social problems, and point out that one of the major weaknesses of the present educational system in Britain is that it is in no way linked to the labour market. They suggest how schools could be better linked to local employment opportunities while at the same time offering more culturally varied educational opportunities. They also analyze Britain’s urban programme and show that it in no way matches up to what is required if poverty – which is seen as the root of the urban crisis – is to be eradicated.

The First World War dealt a profound shock to European society. In this original and stimulating book, the historian Frank Field looks at the experiences of France and Britain during the war years as revealed in the work of some of their most prominent writers responding to the unfolding catastrophe. Brooke, Wells, Shaw, Kipling, Lawrence, Owen and Rosenberg are set alongside Jaurès, Barrès, Maurras, Péguy, Psichari and Rolland, as case studies of the war's impact on intellectual life in their respective countries. The comparative perspective reveals deep differences between the French and the British experience, and yet a shared ordeal marked by the terrible ironies attendant on the shattering of common ideals. Literary images of war as a purification rite were effaced by the bloody realities of the conflict and the prophecies of writers who came to feel increasingly distanced from the essential innocence of the world before 1914 took on a new tone, grimly apocalyptic or bitterly disillusioned.

The impact of the First World War on European society and the rise of Communism and Fascism are important subjects that concern all students of recent history. The object of this book is to study these themes through the careers of three French writers: Henri Barbusse, Drieu la Rochelle and Georges Bernanos. Each of these writers served in the war and was subsequently attracted towards Communism or Fascism. Barbusse first achieved fame through his anti-war novel Le Feu, but in the years after 1918 he made a new career for himself as a rallying point for Communist sympathizers amongst the French intellectuals. After becoming one of the most intelligent and sophisticated advocates of Fascism in the 1930s, Drieu la Rochelle opted for a policy of collaboration with the Germans in 1940 and committed suicide in 1945. Bernanos moved to a position very close to Fascism in the 1930s, but his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, experiences that he so memorably described in Les grands cimeliires sous la lune, made him devote the remaining years of his life to an attack on all forms of totalitarianism.

The First World War dealt a profound shock to European society. In this original and stimulating book, the historian Frank Field looks at the experiences of France and Britain during the war years as revealed in the work of some of their most prominent writers responding to the unfolding catastrophe. Brooke, Wells, Shaw, Kipling, Lawrence, Owen and Rosenberg are set alongside Jaurès, Barrès, Maurras, Péguy, Psichari and Rolland, as case studies of the war's impact on intellectual life in their respective countries. The comparative perspective reveals deep differences between the French and the British experience, and yet a shared ordeal marked by the terrible ironies attendant on the shattering of common ideals. Literary images of war as a purification rite were effaced by the bloody realities of the conflict and the prophecies of writers who came to feel increasingly distanced from the essential innocence of the world before 1914 took on a new tone, grimly apocalyptic or bitterly disillusioned.

The welfare system in the United Kingdom is broken. The number of claims has escalated and so, in consequence, have welfare expenditures. The social system does not encourage welfare recipients to become independent. Half the population of the United Kingdom lives in households drawing one of the major means-tested benefits. Research documents that means-tests paralyze self-help, discourage self--im-provement, and tax honesty while at the same time rewarding claimants for being either inactive or -deceitful.In Making Welfare Work, Frank Field challenges the current political orthodoxy, particularly its emphasis on the role of legislation alone in bringing about social improvement in a welfare state. Field argues that the impact legislation has on personal character is pivotal to human advance in a welfare state. Welfare reconstruction needs to address and channel the differing roles of self-interest, self-improvement, and altruism, which are among the great driving forces in human character. A successful welfare state must reinforce these important forces which influence our nature because to create an imbalance between these three motive forces will always undermine welfare's objectives.Field discusses in detail aspects of modern British society in dire need of change. These include the drug trade, benefit traps, permanent adolescence, the rise of part-time work, inequality in incomes, excluding the disabled, single parents, and the very elderly, for example. This clearly delineated, well-researched blueprint for success will be important reading for politicians and policymakers in all industrialized nations. Its author is well-positioned to revise and review the welfare policies of democratic -societies.

This is a collection of Clement Attlee's writings - brought together by Frank Field MP - that comment on political leadership today. In 1946, Clement Attlee came to power as Labour Prime Minister with a huge landslide majority. Under his leadership some of the greatest reforms were initiated, not least the founding of the National Health Service. Attlee had a firm vision of a more just and equitable society, which the nation wanted. This firm vision is something that Frank Field believes is now absent from politics - the recent fiasco of the 10p tax reform is just one example.In retirement Clement Attlee wrote a masterly series of profiles of his great contemporaries, many published at the time in The Observer. They are of extraordinary historical interest and command an audience in their own right. But to Field they epitomize the intellect and humanity of a hero of 20th Century politics, a man with qualities so profoundly lacking among current political leaders. The book thus has a real purpose. New Labour has lost the plot and lacks a coherent vision for the well being of modern men and women.In a brilliant and controversial introduction, Frank Field argues his case convincingly. There is an afterword by Professor Peter Hennessy that goes on to show the importance of Attlee in full historical perspective.

Originally published in 1973, the contributors to this book examine the whole spectrum of low pay and propose solutions to this social, economic and political problem which is as relevant now as when the book was first published. They examine who are the low paid, and whether low pay is reinforced by other inequalities. They discuss why some industries have a tradition of low pay and how it can be tackled.

Originally published in 1977, this book was written at a time when unemployment figures in Britain were at their highest since the Depression of the 1930s, with 1.5 million people out of work. Beginning with a careful examination of what the unemployment figures do and do not tell, the book argues that official figures underestimated the numbers of unemployed. Discussion then turns to the people who were most likely to be unemployed, the myths about those out of work and the massive checks to prevent people wrongly claiming benefit. Case studies from groups of families in Liverpool illustrate what unemployment means in practice and shows to what extent unemployment leads to poverty while having little effect on rising prices. The author and contributors outline proposals for a policy of returning to full employment, which, they maintained, required the introduction of protectionist economic policies such as import controls: an idea which has found traction again in global 21st century politics.

Until this book was first published in 1979, poverty studies had been exclusively concerned with studying the poor. This controversial book changed the whole debate about poverty in Britain by shifting the emphasis to a detailed examination of the rich. It looks at the distribution of income and wealth in the second half of the twentieth century and critically examines the claim that Britain was becoming a more equal society. It also discusses the massive shift of resources to the corporate sector since 1974. There are chapters on the mechanics for reviewing top salaries and the increasing problem of tax avoidance.

Originally published in 1983, the contributors to this book focus on a small group of private individuals who own a large part of Britain’s assets. In particular the book examines how new privileges were being created and old ones entrenched and magnified. It summarises what was then known about the distribution of income and wealth in British society and examines the sweeping changes made by the Thatcher Government. It pays special attention to the findings of the Royal Commission on the Distribution of Income and Wealth, which the Thatcher Government wound up, and provides a critique of the official view on the relative lack of importance of agricultural wealth. The book concludes with an examination of how different pension rights affect the distribution of income in old age.

The welfare system in the United Kingdom is broken. The number of claims has escalated and so, in consequence, have welfare expenditures. The social system does not encourage welfare recipients to become independent. Half the population of the United Kingdom lives in households drawing one of the major means-tested benefits. Research documents that means-tests paralyze self-help, discourage self--im-provement, and tax honesty while at the same time rewarding claimants for being either inactive or -deceitful.In Making Welfare Work, Frank Field challenges the current political orthodoxy, particularly its emphasis on the role of legislation alone in bringing about social improvement in a welfare state. Field argues that the impact legislation has on personal character is pivotal to human advance in a welfare state. Welfare reconstruction needs to address and channel the differing roles of self-interest, self-improvement, and altruism, which are among the great driving forces in human character. A successful welfare state must reinforce these important forces which influence our nature because to create an imbalance between these three motive forces will always undermine welfare's objectives.Field discusses in detail aspects of modern British society in dire need of change. These include the drug trade, benefit traps, permanent adolescence, the rise of part-time work, inequality in incomes, excluding the disabled, single parents, and the very elderly, for example. This clearly delineated, well-researched blueprint for success will be important reading for politicians and policymakers in all industrialized nations. Its author is well-positioned to revise and review the welfare policies of democratic -societies.

'For the past half-century Frank Field has been an outstanding parliamentarian, social reformer and champion of the disadvantaged. He joined the Labour Party at the age of 16 and was expelled from it at the age of 78.' -Brian & Rachel Griffiths'Frank Field is one of the most important, iconoclastic and remarkable politicians of his generation. This book is told with his Christian belief, regrets and all, and his trademark searing honesty.' -Nick TimminsIn the increasingly dirty world of British politics, one man has stood out for unimpeachable integrity – the former Labour Member of Parliament for Birkenhead, Frank Field.In this touching but also profound memoir, the veteran former Labour MP and social campaigner Frank Field reveals the poverty of his own childhood and the deep and lasting effect of his Christian socialism.Field has spent his life fighting poverty in Britain, and has found allies on all sides of the political spectrum. In this book, Field talk about his activism, his foundational work with the Child Poverty Action Group and his work passing legislation for the Minimum Living Wage. He explains why he has dedicated his life to speaking out against the corruption of greed and power and writes with great alacrity about the titans of his political age, including Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher. In the end, Field’s zeal for reform was too much for too many people, and, in 2015, he was deselected by his own local Labour party.Politics, Poverty and Belief is an implicit indictment of modern British politics – the world of cash for questions, Partygate and all the rest – in which the poor get poorer and the rich get richer.

One of the most outstanding diarists in modern Britain, the leading churchman and public figure Herbert Hensley Henson (1863-1947) commenced his Journal in Birkenhead in 1885, while tutoring the indolent son of William Rathbone, a Liverpool shipping magnate. This extensively annotated edition publishes the first four volumes in full. It covers his experiences in a ship-building town hit hard by the industrial depression of the mid-1880s, and mired in religious sectarianism; his return to All Souls College, Oxford, and establishment of the Oxford Laymen's League for the defence of the Church, while agonising over whether he should become ordained; and his work at the Oxford House, the Anglican settlement in Bethnal Green, in combatting the influence of secularism. The value of the Journal from its earliest volumes is evident in its incisive commentary on people, places, and events, its searching reflections on Christianity and the authority of the Church, and in its fine literary style.

In his famous report of 1942, the economist and social reformer William Beveridgewrote that the war was a 'revolutionary moment in the world's history' and so a time 'forrevolutions, not for patching.' The Beveridge Report outlined the welfare state that Attlee'sgovernment would go on to implement after 1946, instituting, for the first time, a nationalsystem of benefits to protect all from 'cradle to the grave.' Since then the welfare system hasbeen patched, beset by muddled thinking and short-termism. The government spends overGBP171bn a year on welfare and yet, since the Beveridge Report, there has been no strategicreview of the system. Compare that to Defence which, with its comparatively small budgetof GBP35bn, is subject to a strategic review at least every decade. Reform of the welfare systemneed not mean dismantlement, but serious questions must be asked about how a welfarestate as we understand it remains sustainable into the 21st century.