The origins of the British welfare state: state and social welfare in England and Wales, 1800-1945

Bernard Harris, The origins of the British welfare state: state and social welfare in England and Wales, 1800-1945, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2004, pp. xii, 402. £52.50 (hardback 0-333-64997-4), £17.99 (paperback 0-333-64998-2).

Every decade since the 1960s, a major text seeking to popularize the latest trends in academic research has been produced on the long-term development of British welfare policy. Hence Maurice Bruce's pioneering The coming of the welfare state (1961) was followed in 1973 by Derek Eraser's The evolution of the British welfare state (3rd éd., 2003) with its nuanced account of the nineteenth-century accommodation between laissez-faire and collectivism. Then in 1982 Pat Thane's Foundations of the welfare state (2nd ed., 1996) injected a gendered and comparative perspective. Harris ably maintains this tradition by incorporating into the well-known story not only rich new historical detail but also quantitative evidence and theoretical insights gained from the social sciences. It may have taken longer than the standard decade to produce but that is because there is so much more to incorporate. A...