PaulHampton's blog

Working class environmentalism

I’m not a great one for polls, given the skewed questions and the dodgy sociological categories, but among the general gloom in recent polls on the environment, one finding stood out.

in the Guardian's ICM poll last week, the number of people who thought that environment should be the government's...

Chavistas try to split UNT

Chavistas try to split UNT

Pro-Chavez union leaders backed by the Labor Ministry have launched a new trade union centre in Venezuela – though it is not clear whether they will succeed.

Oswaldo Vera, the coordinator of the Bolivarian Socialist Workers Force (FSBT) and a National Assembly deputy...

24) The significance of Morris’ socialist ecology

The opinions of William Morris on what we now call ecology are important in any assessment of him as a political thinker in his own time. His views indicate a degree of originality and creativity that mark him out even among the best of his Marxist contemporaries, such as Paul Lafargue, Eleanor Marx...

23) Morris on lifestyle politics

Morris was a political activist, and although his personal life was informed by his socialist politics, he did not see lifestyle or consumer behaviour as a substitute for political action. And he was no “back to the land simple-lifer”, despite moving in circles where alternative living was practiced...

22) Morris on housing and living conditions

Morris was more coherent when commenting more concretely on housing under socialism. In The Housing of the Poor, an article published in Justice, (19 July 1884), he wrote:
“It might be advisable, granting the existence of huge towns for the present, that the houses for workers should be built is...

21) Morris on town and country

Morris apparently disliked urban living before he became a socialist, and he appears to have carried over this attitude into his socialist activity. In an early article in Justice, entitled Why Not? (12 April 1884) he lamented that under capitalism, “it is difficult to see anything which might stop...

20) Morris on transport

On transport, Morris was even more a prisoner of his time. Despite his conversion to socialism he remained hostile to rail transport, describing “the beastly sewers through which run stink-traps under the name of carriages – the whole of which arrangement is dignified by the name of the Metropolitan...

19) Morris on energy

Morris had less to say of contemporary relevance on energy, which is hardly surprising since renewables were barely even dreamt of when he was politically active.

He did however maintain an aversion to the coal industry, and expressed this sentiment in terms that are strikingly prescient to the...

18) Morris on machinery and workplace safety

One of the great myths about Morris is that he was hostile to technology. At best this myth is based on a very partial reading of his writings, and the extraction of his comments about the limits of machinery in socialist society. Typical of this genre was his comment on Edward Bellamy’s utopia...

17) Morris on work under socialism

Another of Morris’ contributions to Marxism was his positive conception of work under socialism. Not for Morris - as for his contemporary Paul Lafargue – the right to be lazy. He was fond of Daniel Defoe’s dictum about working to live, not living to work, but what he really wanted was the...

16) Morris on the working class as the agent of socialist ecology

Perhaps Morris’ most significant breakthrough was to identify working class action and the socialist movement more generally as the essential social agents in protecting the environment. Rather than appeal generally for upstanding people in general to protect nature, his message was explicitly aimed...

15) Morris on the causes of ecological degradation

Morris held to a materialist appreciation of the connection between human productive activity and the ruination of the environment. In a lecture The Dawn of a New Epoch, first delivered on 6 June 1886, he expressed the matter succinctly: “Like all other systems of society, it [capitalism] is founded...

14) Morris on the nature – society nexus

Morris had read Marx’s Capital in French by 1884 – an authorised English edition was still to be properly translated at this time. The first fruits of this reading were contained in the lecture, Useful Work versus Useless Toil, (21 January 1884). Morris expresses the primacy of nature in terms very...

13) Morris infused his socialism with ecology

Sometime in 1882, William Morris decided he was no longer a radical and began to associate himself explicitly with socialism. He stated in How I Became A Socialist (16 June 1894) that by the summer of 1882 he was ready “to join any body who distinctly called themselves Socialists.” (Edward Thompson...

12) Morris on poetry, art and nature

Morris made his name as an artist and as a poet, and his commitment to conservation was expressed through his work. His mode of expression was particularly influenced in this respect by John Ruskin, and many of his early pronouncements bear a striking resemblance to those found in Ruskin’s writings...

11) Morris – from conservationism to socialist ecology

William Morris was one of the outstanding Marxists in the period after Marx’s death. Morris propagated basic revolutionary socialist ideas on the nature of capitalism, class struggle, the state, trade unions and on party organisation, helping to educate the new layer of working class militants who...

10) Morris was a revolutionary socialist

Perhaps a better approach is to accept what Morris said about himself and look at what he wrote and did for the last thirteen years of his life. To do so is to conclude that Morris was a revolutionary socialist, and one who built on and developed Marxist politics.

In an article in Cassell’s...

9) What sort of socialist was Morris?

Morris has been claimed by a wide spectrum of socialists – often without careful reference to his views. However a comprehensive study of writings indicates that he was not a utopian socialist, nor an anarchist, not a Fabian state socialist nor a sentimental socialist, as some have characterised him...

8) Morris on parliament and bourgeois parties

Soon after the split with SDF, the Socialist League debated its attitude towards standing candidates for parliament and for other bodies, such as local councils. On one side were Eleanor Marx, Aveling and Bax who like Engels favoured using elections as a means of making socialist propaganda; on the...

7) Morris on the state and revolution

One of the reasons for Morris’ scepticism about the possibilities of trade unionism was his understanding of the state. On the ABCs of the state, he was sharp and clear. In ‘An empty pocket is the worst of crimes’ (Commonweal, 17 July 1886) he wrote of the ruling class: “‘This is mine, and whether I...

6) Morris on the trade unions

Morris also took a close and critical interest in the trade unions. When he first came into political activity, unions in Britain mainly represented a small layer of workers scattered across a myriad of small societies. However this was already changing with the organisation of workers outside of...

5) Morris on working class political representation

Morris was no dilettante on matters of organisation. Once he had decided to become a socialist he joined the Democratic Federation and became a leading activist and public spokesperson. This entailed speaking at open-air meetings, selling papers and other literature and giving educational lectures...

4) Morris on working class self emancipation

The theme of working class self-emancipation runs through his writings. As the constitution of the Socialist League put it: “the liberation of the workers will be brought about by the workers themselves”. (Meier 1978 p.242)

Introducing the first issue of Commonweal, February 1885, Morris wrote:...

3) Morris on capitalism and class struggle

Morris understood capitalism in Marxist terms, as a class society, but also as a system that prepared the ground for socialism. In another lecture early in his socialist life, Art and Labour (1 April 1884) he paraphrased the Communist Manifesto:

“[Capitalism] has strengthened and solidified the...

2) The political commitment of William Morris

William Morris is perhaps unique in being claimed by almost everyone on the left as an inspiration. From Tony Blair to the old Communist Party of Great Britain, from Fabians to anarchists, Morris is held to have been an historic precursor.

However Morris was quite simply, as Edward Thompson put it...

1) William Morris: a political life

Morris was born on 24 March 1834 in Walthamstow, then a village on the edge of Epping Forest to the north west of London. He was born into a wealthy middle class family who wanted him to join the church. Ever the dissident, he gave up Oxford University to take up art and poetry.

In 1861 he founded...

"William Morris – a Marxist for our time", an online pamphlet

For many more articles on William Morris, see here.
For a longer introductory piece, see here.


William Morris is probably best known to most people these days as the creator of kitsch Victorian wallpaper designs. Morris was certainly a prominent nineteenth century artist, poet and all round...

James P. Cannon - “a revolutionary that one could model oneself after”

Review of Bryan D. Palmer, 2007, James P. Cannon and the Origins of the American Revolutionary Left, 1890-1928, University of Illinois Press

James P. Cannon (1890-1974) was a titanic figure in the history of Marxism, yet in spite of a long life devoted to socialism, he has until now eluded a...

A comment in the Evening Standard on Castro

The Evening Standard phoned me for a comment on Castro’s retirement yesterday. This is what they printed today.

Fidel Castro should be remembered as part of the Stalinist tradition: the antithesis of authentic socialism. Within a year of his coming to power in Cuba, workers had been denied the...

Steel Strike in Venezuela

More than 14,000 workers at Venezuela's largest steel plant, Ternium Sidor, were on strike last week in a dispute over their pay and conditions.

The United Steel Industry Workers Union (SUTISS) wants a decent pay increase plus retroactive payments, and more money for the pension fund. It took a...

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