BRITISH AND CONTINEN'rAL LABOUR POLICY. By B. G. de Montgomery.
(Kegan Paul and Co. 21s. net.) Mr. de Montgomery has written an exhaustive study of the political Labour movement and its legislation in Great Britain, France and Scandinavia during this century. In the first half of his book he deals separately with the movements in the countries under survey ; in the second, he discusses the special issues of Labour policy, such as unem- ployment, conciliation and arbitration, nationalization and the legal position of trade unions. His tone throughout is balanced and moderate, and he brings an impressive array of significant facts to the support of his conclusions. Chapter XIX. is perhaps the-most important in the volume ; it lies midway between the two main sections as a synthesis of the historical part and a foreshadowing of the author's attitude in the later, the controversial, portion of the volume. It is there that Mr. de Montgomery gives us his psychological interpretation of European Labour, showing how and why the national parties differ in outlook, construction, programme and method. The French, for instance, arc systematic and idealistic, but, though they would seem to possess more than any other race the qualities which make for successful unity, their Labour Party has followed the general decentralization of industry by splitting up into various societies with clashing nuns and divergent plans of procedure. In England, on the other hand, the mentality of the workmen is predominantly opportunist and practical, and circumstances as well as political traditions have made them suspicious of the far-away and the fantastic. They have broken from dogmatic Marxism for this reason ; and they will break from every idea, no matter how attractive and class-flattering, which does not promise concrete and fairly immediate results. Dislike of bureaucracy, dislike of ideologues, and a positive dread of postponed issues—such negative characteristics as these have caused a sharp differentiation between our insular Labour policies and the orthodox Utopian Socialism of Europe. This is perhaps Mr. de Montgomery's main thesis ; it is not a notably new one, but he works it out with the undogmatic thoroughness that comes only from a painstaking study of documents and high selective intelligence in making use of them.
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