Appeasement, Rearmament, and the British Left-Wing Press: The Case of the Daily Herald

摘要

This paper provides an investigation into the responses of Britain's left-wing press between 1935-39 to key international developments, specifically fascist expansionism, and the (Conservative) government's foreign and defence policy. By examining the shifting relationship between editorial positioning and the development of such official policies as 'Appeasement' and Rearmament, this study argues for a new appreciation of the interdependency of media, mass politics, and policymaking. In doing so it aims to supplement the existing historiography on the sources of Britain's changing interwar foreign and defence policy, which has traditionally featured elite-centric studies of policymaking, with the public and opposition seen as bystanders to 'statecraft'. The value of the Left as a specific object of research lies in the expanding impact of democratic mass politics on interwar Britain's policy formulation. In this context, public opinion, as reflected in and shaped by newspapers, gained unprecedented impact on high politics. In a period when newspapers (typically with an avowed political alignment) represented dominant organs for the articulation of public opinion, press analysis offers the most effective insight into the masses' relationship to policy. A methodological framework for interpreting public opinion through newspapers is proposed, with an appraisal of the nuances of the press landscape in 1930s Britain. This paper's analysis is periodised around several international crises from 1935 to 1939 which both highlighted editorial positions and catalysed their shift. I conclude that revisions in leftist attitudes speak to a contingent yet meaningful relationship with the Baldwin and Chamberlain Governments' foreign and defence policy.