Tuesday 30 March 2021

Comment - Time to end Tory Culture Wars on History

[From London Socialist Historians Group Newsletter, 72 (Spring 2021)]

"IT IS QUITE WRONG THAT THESE LOONY LEFT-WING WHEEZES SHOULD BE INFLICTED UPON OUR GREAT METROPOLIS.” - JACOB REES MOGG

The Tory culture war on history and those who challenge particular narratives of British history is not only continuing but expanding. Jacob Rees-Mogg has criticised the London mayor Sadiq Khan’s plans to review statues and street names in the capital in the light of the Black Lives Matter movement. He told hard right Tory backbencher Andrew Rosindell that British history should be celebrated. That would include of course the slave trade and numerous imperial conquests. 

Meanwhile education secretary Gavin Williamson, finding the task of providing safe education in a pandemic beyond him, has turned his attention instead to ‘free speech’. A 34-page policy paper has been issued which may lead to legislation.

It would be fair to say that the paper is not all Gavin’s own work but that of civil servants who are rather more professional in their approach than the education secretary. It has the temerity to refer to groups who have struggled to get free speech in the past, such as those fighting for gay rights. It doesn’t mention that the fight was in part necessary because of the Tories’ Clause 28 in the 1980s which sought to restrict discussion of such matters. 

In general though it appears to be a defence of the values of a liberal education, until one absorbs the detail. Its actual thrust is to make sure that assorted racists, Islamophobes and reactionaries can speak without protest in public settings. 

The problem Williamson has is that they already can - as the left knows all too well. The Times, which generally supports Tory culture wars, surveyed thousands of speaking events at universities and found issues with just six. Most were reportedly related to problems with organisation - missing paperwork and so on. One was a Jeremy Corbyn meeting that had to be cancelled and re-arranged because the venue was too small to hold numbers attending. 

Williamson’s ministerial colleague Oliver Dowden has also been active on the matter. The lines below relate to a communication the culture secretary Oliver Dowden has had with the ‘Commonsense’ group of hard right Tory MPs. They are the motor for the Tory culture wars. 

"History is ridden with moral complexity, and interpreting Britain's past should not be an excuse to tell an overly-simplistic version of our national story, in which we damn the faults of previous generations whilst forgetting their many great achievements. Purging uncomfortable elements of our past does nothing but damage our understanding of it." 

Dowden’s comments have drawn criticisms from many historians with the biographer of Eric Hobsbawm, Richard Evans, calling for an end to the Tory war on history. 

The point is that Dowden’s words reflect a lack of understanding of what history is, just as Williamson’s supposed defence of an abstract ‘free speech’ does. What is understood by history and what is seen as important and relevant in it varies over time. 

In particular it is informed by historical research that uncovers new historical details and suggests fresh ways of understanding our past. Recently for example I, along with others, have been wondering if the black presence in the Chartist movement was not rather greater than has been previously thought, given that Britain in the first half of the nineteenth century had quite large numbers of black working class residents, mainly sailors or ex-sailors. 

Until more research is done the answer is that we simply don’t know. If we followed Oliver Dowden’s perspective, that British history is an unchanging thing written on tablets of stone, we wouldn’t even bother to find out. 

That doesn’t seem much like freedom of thought and speech. 

Keith Flett

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