Реферат: General Strike Of 1926 Essay Research Paper

strike along the traditional ‘labourist’ view, which emphasised the separation

of the political and the industrial sphere, as a purely industrial act. This

notion was supported the developments in the 1920s when the depression and the

employers offensive weakened the militant and revolutionary forces , whereas the

success of the Labour Party and the reorganisation of the TUC General Council

further strengthened these ‘labourist’ forces.

The government’s and the employer’s view, of course, was a different one.

Since the French syndicalists in 1906 had drawn up the Charter of Amiens,

reaffirming their belief in direct political action and the general strike as a

means of overthrowing the Parliamentary system, governments and industrialists

all over Europe saw a general strike as a revolutionary challenge for the

constitution and the economic system. Although the British Labour movement had

never been really committed to this idea, during the post-war boom when it was

on the offensive, there were two examples of semi-syndicalist conceptions

concerning the use of industrial action against the war and British intervention

against the Soviet Republic. Government and employers were warned and did not

hesitate to condemn every notion of nation wide industrial action as

unconstitutional and revolutionary.

The mining dispute which caused the General Strike emerged after the First

World War when the triple alliance broke and the miners were left to fight alone

against the government’s plans to privatise the mines. As a result the mines

suddenly returned to their private owners and the miners faced demands for very

substantial wage cuts of up to 50 per cent . The dispute escalated because the

crisis was seen by all the key players -the government, the em-ployers and the

Trade Union Council (TUC)- as an example for future industrial relations in

Britain. The trade un-ion movement saw its opportunity to challenge the notion

that wage reduction could solve Britain’s economic diffi-culties and decided

therefore that a future united action in support of the miners would take the

form of a general strike. But as Margaret Morris emphasised. "It was the