Abstract
This article examines the widespread and varied reception of Hilaire Belloc's The Servile State (1912) in Australia from the time of its publication to the mid-twentieth century. Belloc's claim that market capitalism was giving rise to a series of legislative reforms which entrenched the inferior, servile status of the working classes was of particular interest in Australia where innovations such as compulsory industrial arbitration were pioneered. In the 1930s Belloc's ideas inspired the Catholic Action movement, and they were subsequently developed in the debates around post-war reconstruction by a range of figures including the radical professor of philosophy John Anderson.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 305-327 |
Number of pages | 23 |
Journal | Journal of the History of Ideas |
Volume | 82 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Apr 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Copyright © by Journal of the History of Ideas, Volume 82, Number 2 (April 2021).All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of scholarly citation, none of this work may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher. For information address the University of Pennsylvania Press, 3905 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112.