SOCIAL THEORY AND SOCIAL SCIENCE

Banaji, Jairus. Theory as History. Essays on Modes of Production and Exploitation. [Historical Materialism Book Series, Vol. 25.] Brill, Leiden [etc.] 2010. xix, 406 pp. € 99.00; $141.00.

Key themes in the eleven essays in this collection, seven of which are reprints of previously published papers, are the Marxist notion of a “mode of production”; the emergence of medieval relations of production; the origins of capitalism; the dichotomy between free and unfree labour; and themes in agrarian history ranging from Byzantine Egypt to nineteenth-century colonialism. In the introductory chapter the author suggests how historical materialists might develop an alternative to Marx's “Asiatic mode of production”.

Christoyannopoulos, Alexandre J.M.E. Christian Anarchism. A Political Commentary on the Gospel. Imprint Academic, Exeter 2010. viii, 336 pp. £40.00; $80.00.

The aim of this book, a revised version of a doctoral thesis (University of Kent, 2008), is to outline an overall theory of Christian anarchism by weaving together the different threads presented by individual Christian anarchist thinkers. After introducing the main proponents of Christian anarchist thought (e.g. Leo Tolstoy, Nicolas Berdyaev, Jacques Ellul, Vernard Eller, Michael C. Elliott, Dave Andrews, writers involved in the Catholic Worker movement and Christian anarcho-capitalists), Dr Christoyannopoulos discusses the Christian anarchist critique of and response to the state.

New Perspectives on Anarchism. Ed. by Nathan J. Jun and Shane Wahl. Lexington Books, Lanham [etc.] 2010. ix, 505 pp. $105.00. (Paper: $46.95.)

This volume brings together twenty-six essays by scholars and activists, seven of which were previously published elsewhere, who consider anarchism from various disciplinary perspectives. Some contributions feature historical figures in the anarchist tradition (Proudhon, Landauer, Kropotkin, Elisée Reclus), others offer anarchist-oriented reflections on power, and still others explore anarchism in relation to religion, art and literature, the environment, political and social science, and contemporary events such as the Seattle movement.

Poteete, Amy R., Marco A. Janssen, and Elinor Ostrom. Working Together. Collective Action, the Commons, and Multiple Methods in Practice. Princeton University Press, Princeton, [etc.] 2010. xxiii, 346 pp. $85.00; £59.00. (Paper: $30.95; £21.95.)

The authors of this book examine various methods of conducting research on collective action and the commons. Providing numerous examples of collaborative, multi-method research, they explore the advantages and shortcomings of case studies, meta-analyses, large-N field research, experiments and modelling, as well as empirically grounded, agent-based models, and consider how these methods enhance research on collective action for managing natural resources. The authors outline a revised theory of collective action and offer practical solutions for researchers and students in a broad spectrum of disciplines. See also Tine De Moor's review essay in this volume, pp. 269–290.

Social Change, Resistance and Social Practices. Ed. by Richard A. Dello Buono and David Fasenfest. [Studies in Critical Social Sciences]. Brill, Leiden [etc.] 2010. x, 265 pp. € 89.00; $132.00.

In this volume about conflict-driven social change, fourteen sociologists of various nationalities study such contemporary social movements as environmentalism, migrant organizations, and world social forum activism, focusing, for example, on the homeless people displaced by Hurricane Katrina; young Muslim women refusing to shun their veils in French schools; the impact of NAFTA on Mexican society; the criminalization of Mexican labour migrants in the USA; and Filipino migrant domestic workers. One contribution sketches a research framework for analysing political armed violence.

AFRICA

Grappling with the Beast. Indigenous Southern African Responses to Colonialism, 1840–1930. Ed. by Peter Limb, Norman Etherington, and Peter Midgley. [European Expansion and Indigenous Response, Vol. 6]. Brill, Leiden [etc.] 2010. xi, 377 pp. € 119.00; $176.00.

The aim of this volume is to contribute new material to provide insight into the complex and diverse indigenous responses to European colonial intrusions into South Africa, Swaziland, Botswana, Zimbabwe (Rhodesia), and Namibia (German South-West Africa) from 1840 to 1930. The six chapters in the first part, on African political, social, and spatial responses, reflect on the historiography of African reactions, and examine Kgatla territorial expansion, intermediaries’ roles, Herero resistance, chieftaincy and ethnicity in Zimbabwe, and a Tswana-language newspaper. The four essays in the second part explore African literary, cultural, intellectual, and religious responses.

South Africa

Magaziner, Daniel R. The Law and the Prophets. Black Consciousness in South Africa, 1968–1977. [New African Histories Series.] Ohio University Press, Athens [etc.] 2010. xii, 283 pp. $59.95; £26.95.

Professor Magaziner in this book explores the theological turn in the Black Consciousness movement in South Africa between 1968 and 1977. Focusing more on ideas than on people and organizations, he traces the formation, early trials, and ultimate dissolution of the black consciousness movement, which began with the founding of the all-black South African Students’ Organisation (SASO).

AMERICA

Caulfield, Norman. NAFTA and Labor in North America. [The Working Class in American History.] University of Illinois Press, Urbana [etc.] 2010. x, 246 pp. $70.00. (Paper: $25.00.)

After an overview of labour and global capitalism in North America from 1850 to 1970, Professor Caulfield in this book focuses on the effects of the North American Free Trade Agreement and the North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation, aiming to demonstrate the waning political influence of trade unions, their disunity, and divergence on labour migration and workers’ rights.

The Chinese in Latin America and the Caribbean. Ed. by Walton Look Lai and Tan Chee-Beng. Brill, Leiden 2010. x, 242 pp. Ill. € 32.00; $45.00.

In this collection of eight essays on the Chinese diaspora in the Latin American/Caribbean region, the editors distinguish three periods in the history of this migration: the early colonial period (pre-nineteenth century), when the profitable three-century trade connection between Manila and Acapulco led to the first Asian migrations to Mexico and Peru; the classic migration period (nineteenth to early twentieth centuries), marked by the coolie trade; and the renewed immigration from the late twentieth century to the present. See also Rosemarijn Hoefte's review essay in this volume, pp. 257–268.

Argentina

Atzeni, Maurizio. Workplace Conflict. Mobilization and Solidarity in Argentina. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke [etc.] 2010. xv, 171 pp. £60.00.

Based on case studies of workers’ collective action involving factory occupations of two car plants in Cordoba, Argentina, in 1996, this study aims to identify and analyse the on-going driving forces behind workers’ mobilization in capitalist society. Engaging with John Kelly's mobilization theory and Marxist traditions of industrial-relations analysis, Dr Atzeni argues that workers’ collective resistance is not based on the notion of injustice but is to be seen as a function of the emergence of class solidarity. See also Maria Ullivarri's review in this volume, pp. 313–316.

Chamosa, Oscar. The Argentine Folklore Movement. Sugar Elites, Criollo Workers, and the Politics of Cultural Nationalism, 1900–1955. University of Arizona Press, Tucson 2010. 271 pp. Ill. $47.50.

The folklore movement in Argentina in the first part of the twentieth century involved academics studying the local culture of peasants and rural workers of mixed indigenous and Spanish descent who lived in Argentina's interior provinces. Professor Chamosa in this book reconstructs how the conservative plantation owners who exploited the criollo peasants sponsored the folklore movement that romanticized them as archetypes of nationhood. Ironically, he argues, many of the composers and folk singers who participated in that movement embraced revolutionary and reformist ideologies and denounced the exploitation to which the criollo peasants were subject.

Barbados

Chamberlain, Mary. Empire and nation-building in the Caribbean. Barbados, 1937–66. [Studies in Imperialism.] Manchester University Press, Manchester [etc.] 2010. xii, 216 pp. £60.00.

Barbados in the 1930s was an impoverished, racially divided and socially disadvantaged British colony. Taking this Caribbean island as a case study, Professor Chamberlain in this book examines nation-building processes in the British West Indies, arguing that the riots that broke out in Barbados in 1937 after the eviction of labour organizer Clement Payne politicized and radicalized many in the Caribbean and proved to be the watershed moment in the struggle for independence.

Canada

Sangster, Joan. Transforming Labour. Women and Work in Post-war Canada. University of Toronto Press, Toronto [etc.] 2010. x, 414 pp. Ill. £55.00; $85.00.

Through a number of case studies from across Canada, Professor Sangster explores in this study the increase in women's paid labour in the decades following World War II, and what this increased participation in the labour force meant for women. Dealing with themes such as women's experiences with unions, Aboriginal women's changing patterns of work, and the problems immigrant women had to face, the author charts women's efforts to influence their own living and working conditions to challenge the usual depiction of this period as one of conformity, domesticity for women, and feminist inactivity. See also Ester Reiter's review in this volume, pp. 305–307.

Cuba

Curry-Machado, Jonathan. Cuban Sugar Industry. Transnational Networks and Engineering Migrants in Mid-nineteenth Century Cuba. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke 2011. xiv, 264 pp. Ill. £58.00.

This book is about the migrant engineers, most of them from France, the United States, and the British Isles, who travelled to Cuba to operate the newly imported steam-driven machinery used on the sugar plantations and railways and in the mines and foundries. Focusing on the period from 1837, the year the first Cuban railroad opened, until 1868, when the first Cuban war of independence began, the author explores the application of engineering advances, describes the recruitment of the foreign engineers who came with the steam engines, and analyses the maquinistas’ experiences in Cuba. See also G. Roger Knight's review in this volume, pp. 303–305.

Yun, Lisa. The Coolie Speaks. Chinese Indentured Laborers and African Slaves of Cuba. [Asian American History and Culture.] Temple University Press, Philadelphia, 2008. xxiii, 311 pp. $37.50.

Based on two hitherto unexplored sources – the testimonies of nearly 3,000 Chinese indentured workers (“coolies”) in Cuba before a Chinese commission investigating the conditions of the workers in 1874, and a communal biography of the Chinese in Cuba by the second generation Afro-Chinese author, Antonio Chuffat Latour – Professor Yun explores the living and working conditions of Chinese workers in the Cuban sugar industry at the end of the nineteenth century, and the concomitant emergence of a “coolie narrative”. She considers how these histories and narratives raise theoretical questions regarding race, diaspora, globalization, and free labour.

Mexico

Romero, Robert Chao. The Chinese in Mexico 1882–1940. University of Arizona Press, Tucson 2010. xii, 254 pp. Ill. $50.00.

This is a social history of Chinese immigration to Mexico, from 1882 (the year that the US Chinese Exclusion Act was passed) to 1940, in the context of the global Chinese diaspora of the time. Professor Romero traces the formation of a Chinese transnational commercial “orbit”, a network encompassing China, Latin America, Canada, and the Caribbean, shaped by Chinese entrepreneurs pursuing commercial opportunities in human smuggling, labour contracting, wholesale merchandising, and small-scale trade. The book also contains chapters describing interracial marriage, gender, and transnational families; disparities in socioeconomic level; and Mexican Sinophobia and anti-Chinese campaigns.

Peru

Heilman, Jaymie Patricia. Before the Shining Path. Politics in Rural Ayacucho, 1895–1980. Stanford University Press, Stanford (Calif.) 2010. xii, 254 pp. $60.00. (E-book: $60.00.)

From 1980 to 1992, Maoist Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) rebels, Peruvian state forces, and Andean peasants waged a civil war that left some 69,000 people dead, largely indigenous campesinos. Using archival research and interviews, Professor Heilman examines the political history of the rural indigenous district of Ayacucho from 1895 until the 1980 launch of Sendero Luminoso's insurrection, arguing that by using violence against indigenous populations, the Senderista rebels reproduced precisely the racial and class hatred that their People's War aimed to defeat, and revealing that racial and class divisions within rural indigenous communities had repeatedly led to violent conflict in the past.

Suriname

Bhagwanbali, Radjinder. De nieuwe awatar van slavernij. Hindoestaanse migranten onder het indentured labour systeem naar Suriname, 1873–1916. [NSHI-SIN-IISR reeks, vol. 1.] Amrit, Den Haag 2010. 258 pp. € 15.00

Bhagwanbali, Radjinder. Tetary de koppige. Het verzet van Hindoestanen tegen het Indentured Labour System in Suriname, 1873–1916. [NSHI-SIN-IISR reeks, vol. 3.] Amrit, Den Haag 2011. 143 pp. €12.50.

These are the first and third volumes in a planned trilogy about the history of Hindustani people in Suriname's indentured labour system from 1873 to 1916. In the first volume Dr Bhagwanbali describes the recruitment of the labourers in India (for which the Dutch had obtained official permission from England in 1872 in the so called Koelietractaat, or coolie convention), the transport of the indentured labourers from Calcutta to Suriname, and the harsh working and living conditions on the plantations. Resistance against the exploitative working conditions is the main theme of the third volume. Tetary was one of the leaders of the rebellion at the Zorg en Hoop plantation in 1884. See also Rosemarijn Hoefte's review essay in this volume, pp. 257–268.

United States of America

Baker, Kimball. “Go to the Worker”. America's Labor Apostles. [Marquette Studies in Theology, No. 70.] Marquette University Press, Milwaukee 2010. 276 pp. Ill. $30.00.

This compilation of ten biographies, based on interviews with key members of the Catholic social action movement, aims to give voice to priests and laymen who used papal encyclicals as their guides to promote the rights of working people in the United States from the 1920s onwards. The book is, in the author's own words, “a work of advocacy, not academics”.

Bales, Kevin and Ron Soodaleter. The Slave Next Door. Human Trafficking and Slavery in America Today. University of California Press, Berkeley [etc.] 2009. viii, 312 pp. £16.95.

According to government statistics some 14,500 to 17,500 people are trafficked into the United States each year and an unknown number of native-born Americans are held in slavery, working as commercial sex slaves, fruit pickers, construction workers, gardeners, and domestics. This study aims to explore how and why slavery constitutes an enduring phenomenon in present-day America, how it remains practically unchecked by the US government, and what could be done through raising awareness and concern to end modern slavery once and for all.

Bynum, Cornelius L. A. Philip Randolph and the Struggle for Civil Rights. [New Black Studies Series.] University of Illinois Press, Urbana [etc.] 2011. xix, 244 pp. Ill. $75.00.(Paper: $25.00.)

The journalist, labour leader and civil rights activist A. Philip Randolph (1889–1979) organized the first US all-black trade union, forced the American labour movement to reflect on its racial policies and practices, and secured executive orders banning workplace discrimination in war industry jobs and desegregating the US armed forces. Concentrating on Randolph's early career during the interwar years, in this book Professor Bynum examines Randolph's views on race, class, civil rights, and the labour movement, presenting an analytical intellectual history that uses biography to illuminate the origins and evolution of Randolph's ideas and activism.

Christianson, Scott. Freeing Charles. The Struggle to Free a Slave on the Eve of the Civil War. [New Black Studies.] University of Illinois Press, Urbana [etc.] 2010. xii, 214 pp. Ill. $65.00. (Paper: $24.00.)

In this book about the life and rescue of captured fugitive slave Charles Nalle of Culpeper, Virginia, who was forcibly liberated by African-American abolitionist Harriet Tubman and others during fierce anti-slavery riots in Troy, New York, on 27 April 1860, the author examines the circumstances of Nalle's slavery and escape from Virginia, the reasons why both blacks and whites were prepared to break the law to assist Nalle, Tubman's role in rescuing Nalle, and the ensuing course of events.

Davis, Cynthia J. Charlotte Perkins Gilman. A Biography. Stanford University Press, Stanford, (Calif.) 2010. xxvi, 537 pp. Ill. $65.00; £27.95.

Charlotte Anna Perkins Stetson Gilman (1860–1935), was a controversial American writer and reformer, the author of Women and Economics: A Study of the Economic Relation Between Men and Women as a Factor in Social Evolution (1898), a successful publication on women's economic dependence and domestic confinement. She is best known today, however, for her story “The Yellow Wallpaper”. In this biography Professor Davis has attempted to provide an account of her life and, simultaneously, to give new insight into the roles available to women in public and private life around 1900.

Dennis, Michael. The Memorial Day Massacre and the Movement for Industrial Democracy. Palgrave Macmillan, New York 2010. x, 278 pp. £52.00.

The Memorial Day Massacre, when the Chicago police shot and killed ten demonstrators trying to picket during the 1937 Little Steel Strike, is one of the defining moments in the history of the movement for industrial democracy in the United States and at the same time one of the least known, according to Professor Dennis in this study of the event and its broader social and political context. He explores how this movement for industrial democracy had its roots in the Gilded Age but was eventually defeated by the violent opposition from organized business.

Guglielmo, Jennifer. Living the Revolution. Italian Women's Resistance and Radicalism in New York City, 1880–1945. [Gender and American culture.] The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill 2010. 404 pp. Ill. $39.95.

This book focuses on Italian working-class women who participated in the radical political culture of New York and New Jersey between 1880 and 1945. Tracing two generations of female textile workers, Professor Guglielmo explores how Italian immigrant women drew on Italian traditions of protest to form networks of resistance and political activism, as they organized within the anarchist movement – alongside men, but also on their own in gruppi femminili di propaganda. She argues that their commitment to revolutionary and transnational social movements diminished during the Red Scare, the rise of fascism, and as they became white working-class Americans.

Kennedy, V. Lynn. Born Southern. Childbirth, Motherhood, and Social Networks in the Old South. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore 2010. viii, 277 pp. £34.00.

Linking the experiences of black and white women, in this study Professor Kennedy explores the roles of birth and motherhood in slaveholding families and communities in the Old South to assess how the power structures of race, gender, and class functioned in antebellum southern society. In the first part of the book she focuses on the southern household and how members related to one another; in the second part she examines how southerners used birth and motherhood to negotiate public, professional, and political identities.

King, Martin Luther. “All Labor Has Dignity”. Ed. with intr. by Michael K. Honey. Beacon Press, Boston 2011. xxxix, 224 pp. Ill. (Incl. CD-rom.) $26.95.

Arguing that Martin Luther King's commitment to economic justice was a crucial part of his civil rights agenda, in this volume Professor Honey brings together fifteen lectures about labour issues that King delivered between 1957 and 1968, including his addresses to the United Automobile Workers’ Union (Detroit 1961) and the AFL-CIO Fourth Constitutional Convention (Miami 1961), his Poor People's Campaign speeches, and his “Mountaintop” speech delivered in support of striking black sanitation workers in Memphis. The accompanying CD-rom contains excerpts from King's speeches “The Unresolved Race Question” (1963) and “All Labor Has Dignity” (1968).

Kraft, James P. Vegas at Odds. Labor Conflict in a Leisure Economy, 1960–1985. [Studies in Industry and Society.] Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore 2010. x, 273 pp. Ill. £28.59.

In this book Professor Kraft focuses on labour relations in the Las Vegas resort industry between 1960 and 1985. He examines successful and failed organizing drives, disputes over pay and equal rights, and worker grievances and arbitration, showing how Vegas's service-oriented economy works, revealing how the resort industry's evolution affected hotel and casino workers and challenging common assumptions about service workers by demonstrating that they are not necessarily unskilled, docile, or difficult to organize.

Pierce, Michael. Striking with the Ballot. Ohio Labor and the Populist Party. Northern Illinois University Press, DeKalb 2010. x, 291 pp. Ill. $39.00.

This book focuses on populism in Ohio during a period of labour and working-class unrest in the 1890s. Through case studies of Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Columbus, Professor Pierce examines how Ohio trade unions, especially the United Mine Workers, sought to protect workers’ rights and to reform the state's government through an alliance with the People's (or Populist) Party, challenging historians’ assumptions that Ohio populism was a radical agrarian movement, arguing instead that it was an urban movement, and that industrial workers formed the core of the state's People's Party.

Preston, Charles. Nobody Called Me Charlie. The Story of a Radical White Journalist Writing for a Black Newspaper in the Civil Rights Era. Monthly Review Press, New York 2010. 379 pp. $21.95.

This is a memoir, with the names of persons and places changed, of the years between 1943 and the early 1960s, during which the author, a white journalist, Communist Party member and an activist in the NAACP, worked as a regular employee on the staff of one of the oldest American black newspapers, the Indianapolis Recorder. This “autobiographical novel”, now published for the first time, presents a picture of black culture and the common racism of those years. The word “Charlie” in the title refers to a derogatory word black people used for whites.

China

Loh, Christine. Underground Front. The Chinese Communist Party in Hong Kong. Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong 2010. xii, 360 pp. Ill. £30.50.

Although the Chinese Communist Party is the ruling party of China, its presence in Hong Kong remains a sensitive subject. Using mainly published sources, the author of this book, a lawyer who was a member of the Hong Kong Legislative Council between 1992 and 2000, tells the story of the role the CCP has played in Hong Kong since the Party's foundation in 1921. The volume includes a survey about the Hong Kong public's attitude towards the Party, as well as lists and biographies of key public figures.

India

Subramanian, Dilip. Telecommunications Industry in India. State, Business and Labour in a Global Economy. Social Science, New Delhi 2011. xiii, 685 pp. Rs 895.00; £50.00.

The central question in this study of the growth and decline of the state-run Indian Telephone Industries (ITI) over the course of more than half a century (1948–2009) is how the socio-technical system of production in a state-controlled firm shapes the relations between its main actors: state, management, union, and workers. Combining business history and labour history, drawing on (badly maintained) company files and interviews, Professor Subramanian aims to qualify the dynamics of change in the globalizing Indian economy. See also Samita Sen's review in this volume, pp. 307–310.

Talib, Mohammad. Writing Labour. Stone Quarry Workers in Delhi. Oxford University Press, Oxford [etc.] 2010. xiv, 278 pp. Ill. Maps. £30.00.

This is an ethnographic study of Indian stone quarry workers in Pul Pehlad, a village on the outskirts of Delhi. Based on fieldwork conducted between 1983 and 2008, it documents the living conditions, experiences, struggles, and views of an occupational group at the lower limits of subsistence. By constructing this account of their lives from their own narratives, the author intends to portray these people as active negotiators of their own circumstances, rather than as mere victims. See also Jan Lucassen's review in this volume, pp. 310–313.

Indonesia

Jones, Eric. Wives, Slaves, and Concubines. A History of the Female Underclass in Dutch Asia. Northern Illinois University Press, DeKalb 2010. xi, 186 pp. Ill. $38.00.

Based on criminal proceedings and testimonies by women who appeared before the Dutch East India Company's (VOC) Court of Aldermen in Batavia (modern-day Jakarta, Indonesia), this study of ordinary women in the early modern Dutch East Indies aims to shed light on the world of women in the multi-ethnic Dutch Asian underclass, and to challenge assumptions about gender and the law by revealing how varying levels of female power could generate violence and criminality. While the book focuses on the eighteenth century, it includes two dozen unidentified photographs of nineteenth-century Asian women.

Iran

The Left in Iran 1905–1940. Ed. by Cosroe Chaquèri. [Revolutionary History, Vol. 10, No 2.] Merlin Press, Pontypool 2010. 457 pp. £19.99.

This volume, the first of two planned issues of Revolutionary History devoted to the history of workers’ movements in Persia and Iran, features more than forty documents ranging chronologically from 1906 to 1931 and including correspondence between Archavir Tchilinkirian and Karl Kautsky, Protocol No 1 of the Social Democratic Conference (October 1908), a report on the First Congress of the Iranian Communist Party (June 1920), an essay by Archavir Tchilinkirian on “Constitutional Persia” (1910), and an undated report by the British diplomat Reginald Bridgeman on “The Rise of Persia”. The volume opens with four introductory articles by Dr Chaquèri.

South Korea

Lee, Jin-kyung. Service Economies. Militarism, Sex Work, and Migrant Labor in South Korea. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis [etc.] 2010. viii, 305 pp. $27.50.

Using literary and popular cultural sources as well as sociological research, in this book Professor Lee examines South Korean military labour in the Vietnam War, female sex work and sexualized service labour for domestic clients, South Korean prostitution for US troops, and migrant labour from Asia in contemporary South Korea from the mid-1960s to the present. Focusing on gender, sexuality, and race, the author depicts the South Korean economic “miracle” as a global and regional articulation of industrial, military, and sexual proletarianization.

Austria

Gasser, Wolfgang. Erlebte Revolution 1848/49. Das Wiener Tagebuch des jüdischen Journalisten Benjamin Kewall. Unter Mitarb. von Gottfried Glaβner. [Quelleneditionen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, Band 3.] Böhlau Verlag, Oldenbourg Verlag, Wien [etc.] 2010. 540 pp. € 49.80.

This volume contains the diary of the Jewish journalist and private teacher Benjamin Kewall, which covers the period between 27 August 1848 and 31 May 1850. In addition to writing extensively about the Vienna Revolution of 1848/1849, which he witnessed personally, Kewall described his immediate surroundings, offering both a multifaceted view of revolutionary Vienna and a rare insight into the opinions and convictions of a liberal Jew and journalist in revolutionary times. The original text, which was written in German but with Hebrew characters, was salvaged from a waste heap in the 1950s. It has now been transcribed and published for the first time, with a lengthy 140-page introduction.

Kern, Florian. Der Mythos Anno Neun. Andreas Hofer und der Tiroler Volksaufstand von 1809 im Spiegel der Geschichtsschreibung (1810-2005). [Konsulat und Kaiserreich, Band 1.] Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2010. ix, 181 pp. € 37.20.

In 1809 a rebellion in Tyrol turned into an insurrection headed by the farmer and wine merchant, Andreas Hofer. In the end the rebellion was crushed by Napoleon's troops, and Hofer was executed. In this book Dr Kern studies the changing representations of “the Year Nine”, the rebellion, and Hofer's personality in public opinion and historiography over the past two centuries.

France

Cardoza, Thomas. Intrepid Women. Cantinières and Vivandières of the French Army. Indiana University Press, Bloomington [etc.] 2010. xiv, 295 pp. Ill. $39.95.

Cantinières and vivandières were women who, as non-combatant spouses of active-duty soldiers, served as official, uniformed combat auxiliaries of French army units from 1793 to the eve of World War I, living, travelling, and fighting with their units in the wars from the Revolution through colonial campaigns in Algeria, Mexico, West Africa, and Indo-China. Using unpublished as well as published primary records, in this study Professor Cardoza describes these women's daily lives, social origins, recruitment experiences, business dealings, behaviour on the battlefield, marriage and family life, retirement and death.

Cheney, Paul. Revolutionary Commerce. Globalization and the French Monarchy. [Harvard Historical Studies, vol 168.] Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.) [etc.] 2010. xii, 305 pp. £36.95; € 45.00; $49.95.

The discovery of the Americas and the rise of Europe's Atlantic economy brought unprecedented wealth, shifted the political balance among European states, and threatened age-old social hierarchies embedded within them. The French developed a “science of commerce”, aiming to benefit from the new wealth while containing its revolutionary effects. Drawing on the writings of Montesquieu and other philosophes, diplomats, and merchants, in this study Professor Cheney explores the political economy of globalization in eighteenth-century France and offers a new interpretation of the relationship between capitalism and the French Revolution.

Delphy, Christine. Un universalisme si particulier. Féminisme et exception française (1980-2010). Éditions Syllepse, Paris 2010. 348 pp. € 22.00.

The articles reprinted in this collection were first published between 1980 and 2009 as interviews, contributions to debates in (feminist) newspapers, columns in Le Monde and Politis, and editorials for the review Nouvelles Questions Féministes, of which Professor Delphy is a founding editor. Covering highlights in the history of French feminism, the texts discuss issues such as the tenth anniversary of the Mouvement de libération des femmes en France, co-education, French society's hostile responses to feminism and women's studies, prostitution and violence against women, post-colonial France, and the headscarf controversy.

Ducoulombier, Romain. Camarades ! La naissance du parti communiste en France. Perrin, Paris 2010. 428 pp. € 23.00.

In this book Dr Ducoulombier argues that the origins of the French communist party (PCF), following the historic rift at the socialist congress of Tours in December 1920, were deeply influenced by the shock of World War I and the political crisis of 1914 following the assassination of Jean Jaurès in 1914. Questioning the thesis proposed by Annie Kriegel in the 1960s (that the birth of the PCF was “accidental”), he argues that the PCF in fact resulted from efforts by a new generation of militant socialists to revive a socialism discredited by the War.

Mann, Keith. Forging Political Identity. Silk and Metal Workers in Lyon, France, 1900–1939. [International Studies in Social History, Vol. 16.] Berghahn Books, New York [etc.] 2010. xiv, 264 pp. Ill. £58.00.

Based on archival research and drawing on social science literature on social class and identity, this book about the French labour movement and worker political identity focuses on metal and silk workers in Lyon between 1900 and 1939, two occupational groups who developed different patterns of political practices and bore distinct political identities. Professor Mann also examines how gender relations influenced industrial change, skill, and political identity.

Mischi, Julian. Servir la Classe Ouvrière. Sociabilités militantes au PCF. [Collection “Histoire”.] Presses universitaires de Rennes, Rennes 2010. 341 pp. € 19.00.

In this historical and sociological study of French communist militants’ sociability from the 1920s to the 1970s, Dr Mischi examines the French communist party (PCF) at its local bases in the departments of Allier, Isère, Loire-Atlantique, and Meurthe-et-Moselle. Using PCF documents and interviews, he analyses party militants’ activities in town districts, villages, and factories and their involvement in trade unions and local networks, arguing that communist militancy at this level was not monolithic but manifold, influenced not only by central party instructions but also by militants’ everyday experiences.

Germany

Buschak, Willy. Franz Josef Furtwängler. Gewerkschafter, Indien-Reisender, Widerstandskämpfer. Eine politische Biografie. [Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für soziale Bewegungen. Schriftenreihe A: Darstellungen, Band 45.] Klartext Verlag, Essen 210. 271 pp. Ill. € 39.95.

In this political biography of the German trade unionist and socialist Franz Josef Furtwängler (1894–1965), Dr Buschak sketches the eventful life and capricious career of this enigmatic character in the German labour movement, whose prominence in the resistance movement against the Nazi regime has hitherto remained largely underexposed in historiography. The author, who published a biography of the Dutch international trade-union secretary Edo Fimmen in 2002 (IRSH, 48, pp. 302f.), argues that Furtwängler, who travelled through India in 1926/1927, was one of the first in Europe to predict India's advent as a leading industrial power.

Das waren Wintermonate voller Arbeit, Hoffen und Glück… Die Novemberrevolution 1918 in Grundzügen. Hrsg. Heidi Beutin, Wolfgang Beutin, [and] Ralph Müller-Beck. [Bremer Beiträge zur Literatur- und Ideengeschichte, Band 58.] Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2010. 164 pp. € 23.20.

The seven contributors to this volume focus on lesser-known aspects of the German November Revolution of 1918, for example, the events of that year in Austria; how the trade-union leader and parliamentarian Carl Legien and Kurt Tucholsky regarded the Revolution; Kurt Hiller and the Politische Rat geistiger Arbeiter; women's emancipation and the November Revolution; and expressionism as revolution. The volume opens with a chronology and an assessment of the November Revolution as a complex event between a revolution “from above” and “from below” by editor Wolfgang Beutin.

Frölich, Paul. Autobiografia. Dalla Lipsia operaia di fine ‘800 all'azione di marzo del 1921. Edizioni Pantarei, Milano 2010. 254 pp. € 20.00.

Frölich, Paul. Autobiographie. Parcours d'un militant internationaliste allemand: de la social-démocratie au parti communiste. Éditions Science Marxiste, Montreuil-sous-Bois 2011. 257 pp. € 15.00.

These memoirs by Paul Frölich (1884–1953), a founding member of the German Communist Party KPD in 1919 and participant in the Munich Räterepublik of 1919, document the rise of the German communist movement, as well as that of German social democracy, from the late nineteenth century onward. The memoirs were written at the request of the International Institute of Social History but remained unpublished, probably because they proved too long for the intended inclusion in the International Review of Social History. They are now published for the first time, in Italian and French translations, with added bibliographies of Frölich's publications and an index.

Kallenberg, Vera. Von “liederlichen Land-Läuffern” zum “asiatischen Volk”. Die Repräsentation der ‘Zigeuner’ in deutschsprachigen Lexika und Enzyklopädien zwischen 1700 und 1850. Eine wissensgeschichtliche Untersuchung. [Zivilisationen und Geschichte, Band 5.] Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2010. 161 pp. € 34.40; £31.00; $51.95.

This study traces the meaning of “Zigeuner”, the German term for “gypsy”, in German-language encyclopaedias between 1700 and 1850. Before 1780, according to Dr Kallenberg, it was a collective term that referred to various groups of “voluntary vagabonds” considered criminal and dangerous, in contrast to vagabonds who were condemned to vagrancy by poverty. During the period around 1800, however, the term changed from being a predominantly social to an ethnic category, where “gypsies” came to be regarded as the “inner Orient” of “civilized Europe”.

Maciejewski, Jürgen. Amtmannsvertreibungen in Baden im März und April 1848. Bürokratiekritik, bürokratiekritischer Protest und Revolution von 1848/49. [Europäische Hochschulschrifte, Reihe III, Geschichte und ihre Hilfswissenschaften, Band 1067.] Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2010. 509 pp. Ill. € 74.60.

During the German Revolutions of 1848–1849 the Grand Duchy of Baden was a centre of radical activities. In this dissertation (University of Konstanz, 2006) about the bureaucracy of Baden in the period before and during the revolutionary period, Dr Maciejewski closely examines Baden's administrative structure, and gives a detailed account of the revolutionary events in Baden and the protests in its separate administrative centres, arguing that the bureaucracy and the criticism against it gave rise not only to the revolution in Baden but also to the administrative reforms of 1863 there.

Major, Patrick. Behind the Berlin Wall. East Germany and the Frontiers of Power. Oxford University Press, Oxford [etc.] 2010. xii, 321 pp. £99.00.

Although the Berlin Wall was long synonymous with the Cold War, from 1945 to 1961 East Germany remained without a wall. Covering the entire history of the GDR from 1945 to 1989 and focusing on the Berlin Wall, Professor Major in this “everyday history of high politics” offers an interlocking political, social, and cultural history of the impact on the East German population of national division and the border closure. He argues, for example, that “Beatlemania” and not Kennedy, and ordinary letter-writers rather than dissident elites ultimately brought down the Wall.

Steiner, André. The Plans That Failed. An Economic History of the GDR. Transl. from the German by Ewald Osers. [Studies in German History, Vol. 13.] Berghahn Books, New York [etc.] 2010. viii, 227 pp. £35.00.

Concentrating on the macro-economic rather than the enterprise level, in this economic history of the GDR Professor Stein examines the origin and institutional development of the planned economy as an alternative to the Western system; the economic decisions of the SED leadership; and the consequences of the specific shape of the planned economy and the SED's economic policy. He argues that it was the GDR's economic model that led to failure, not the country's starting conditions and the obstacles to growth.

Die vergessene Revolution von 1918/19. Hrsg. von Alexander Gallus. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2010. 247 pp. € 24.90.

In this volume about the “forgotten” German Revolution of 1918–1919, one of the nine contributors reflects on memories and interpretations of the Revolution; another seeks to explain the “astonishingly quiet” disappearance of the German monarchy. Others examine the concept of “the people” in the 1919 consultations about the constitution; the Dolchstoss myth and the Revolution; gender, citizenship, and the right to vote; the Kieler Institut für Weltwirtschaft; the KPD in its first year; the end of World War I and the isolation of the German Revolution; and the significance of the Revolution in German history.

Great Britain

Barron, Hester. The 1926 Miners’ Lockout. Meanings of Community in the Durham Coalfield. [Oxford Historical Monographs.] Oxford University Press, Oxford [etc.] 2010. xv, 314 pp. £79.00.

This study examines how Durham's miners and their families experienced the miners’ lockout of 1926, the biggest British industrial dispute of the twentieth century, and how they conceptualized and identified with a “mining community”. Dr Barron explores collective values and behaviours, focusing particularly on tensions between identities based on class and occupation and the rival identities that could disrupt the creation of a cohesive community. She argues that despite the differences arising from gender, age, religion, and respectability, the Durham coalfield community continued to display the solidarity for which miners were renowned.

Beers, Laura. Your Britain. Media and the Making of the Labour Party. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Mass.) [etc.] 2010. x, 258 pp. Ill. £22.95; $29.95; € 27.00.

In this book Professor Beers focuses on the importance of political language and presentation in forging Labour's public identity and broadening the party's constituency. She traces Labour's rise as a movement for working-class men to its transformation into a national party that achieved a landslide victory in 1945, and argues that Labour's national leadership was pivotal in the effective use of popular journalism, the BBC, and film to communicate that Labour represented not only its traditional base but also women, office workers, and professionals.

Cohler, Deborah. Citizen, Invert, Queer. Lesbianism and War in Early Twentieth-Century Britain. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis [etc.] 2010. xxii, 296 pp. Ill. $25.00.

Incorporating cultural histories of pre-war women's suffrage debates, British sexology, women's work on the home front during World War I, and discussions of interwar literary representations of female homosexuality, in this study of female masculinity Professor Cohler relates the emergence of lesbian representations to the decline of empire and the rise of eugenics in England, arguing that the production of modern lesbian subjectivity in the interwar years stems from racial and imperialist anxieties, as well as from shifts in wartime opportunities for women.

Eagles, Stuart. After Ruskin. The Social and Political Legacies of a Victorian Prophet, 1870–1920. [Oxford Historical Monographs.] Oxford University Press, Oxford [etc.] 2011. xii, 304 pp. £60.00.

This study is about the social and political influence of the prominent Victorian art and social critic John Ruskin (1819–1900). Exploring the histories of the Guild of St George and the Ruskin societies, the university settlements, and the early Labour Party, Dr Eagles traces how Ruskin inspired leading activists and thinkers to help reform Britain's social and political culture between 1870 and 1920. He argues that the value of Ruskin's specific proposals was less important than his opposition to modern industrial capitalism and the ideology that reinforced it.

Green, David R. Pauper Capital London and the Poor Law, 1790–1870. Ashgate, Farnham [etc.] 2010. xviii, 279 pp. Ill. Maps. £60.00.

This study of the changing administration of poor relief in London during the period before and after the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 is less about pauperism as such than about the relationships between place and policy and the actions and intentions of the individuals involved in the operation of the Poor Law – as overseers and guardians, as paupers, and as paid officials. Dr Green also analyses how relief practices functioned in the context of transformations in London's economic and social geography as well as in the political and ideological contexts within which the Poor Law operated.

Keohane, Nigel. The Party of Patriotism. The Conservative Party and the First World War. Ashgate, Farnham [etc.] 2010. x, 250 pp. £60.00.

In this book about the British Conservative Party and World War I Dr Keohane not only aims to fill the historiographical gap created by an “overemphasis” on the Party's rival Liberal and Labour parties but also, by analysing the Party's approaches to war and military strategy, coalition and leadership, Irish Unionism, the rise of Labour, patriotism, anti-socialism, and electoral reform, to demonstrate how the Conservative Party was able to respond effectively to the challenges of “total war” by refining a wartime patriotism that ensured its unity as a party, helped define its electoral fortunes, and shaped ideological cohesion.

Killingray, David with Martin Plaut. Fighting for Britain. African Soldiers in the Second World War. James Currey, Woodbridge [etc.] 2010. xi, 289 pp. Ill. £45.00.

During World War II, 500,000 African troops served as combatants and non-combatants in the British colonial forces and the South African Defence Force in campaigns in the Horn of Africa, the Middle East, Italy, and Burma. Largely based on taped oral interviews and soldiers’ letters, this book describes their experiences: the ways they were recruited, army life and discipline, the new skills they acquired, battle experience, the social impact of war service, and their hopes and disappointments on demobilization.

The Land Question in Britain, 1750–1950. Ed. by Matthew Cragoe and Paul Readman. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke [etc.] 2010. xiv, 281 pp. $85.00.

Based on a conference held at the University of Hertfordshire in 2005, this volume brings together fourteen essays on the use and ownership of land in Britain, offering a synoptic treatment of the land question in British politics between 1750 and 1950. The themes of the collection include the common field landscape and the impact of enclosure; Chartism and the land; the failure of land reform in early Victorian Britain; the land question in Victorian Wales, Scotland, and Ireland; the urban land question; and socialism and the land question.

Martin, Jane. Making socialists. Mary Bridges Adams and the fight for knowledge and power, 1855–1939. Manchester University Press, Manchester [etc.] 2010. viii, 256 pp. Ill. £60.00.

Mary Bridges Adams (1855–1939) was a British labour activist and a campaigner for improvements in working-class education; during World War I she was involved in the European anti-war movement and campaigns in support of the right of asylum. By reconstructing the life of this now virtually forgotten woman in this study, Professor Martin aims to bring fresh insights into the history of British socialism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Masters, Charles Walter. The Respectability of Late Victorian Workers. A Case Study of York, 1867–1914. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle-upon-Tyne 2010. xii, 311 pp. £44.99; $67.99.

Focusing on the working classes of York in the period from 1867 to 1914, this book, based on a dissertation (University of York, 2010), examines respectability within the context of everyday working-class life. Dr Masters analyses gender-based notions of the male breadwinner and female homemaker, exploring themes such as the standard of living and the “decent wage”, budget, (food) purchases and forms of saving, the working-class home, and the meaning of goods and children as cultural ambassadors. He also considers the role of self-help organizations (trade unions, friendly societies, and co-operatives), working-class religiosity, and leisure and recreation.

Mills, Catherine. Regulating Health and Safety in the British Mining Industries, 1800–1914. [Studies in Labour History.] Ashgate, Farnham [etc.] 2010. viii, 284 pp. Ill. £60.00.

In this study of the British coal and metal mining industries, the hazards involved for the miners, and the emergence and increase of state responsibility for safer and healthier working practices, Dr Mills examines why, after the 1850 Act for the Inspection of Coal Mines in Great Britain brought tighter legislation in coal mining, metal miners continued to work without government-imposed safety and health regulations until the early 1870s. She explores, for example, the importance of heightened visibility of coal mining disasters and the significance of organized labour in gaining health and safety concessions in coal mining.

The Right to Learn. The WEA in the North of England 1910–2010. Ed. by Jonathan Brown. WEA, London 2010. 132 pp. Ill. £14.99.

This volume, celebrating the centenary of the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA) in the north of England, tells the story of how the WEA pioneered democratic adult learning across this area. In the first part, six contributions present an outline of the origins and development of the WEA's Northern District. The twelve chapters in the second part focus on various themes, vignettes, and people, for example, the Pitmen Painters (a group of working-class artists), the Women's Education Programme, trade-union education, and WEA tutor Roger Till, some of whose memoirs (1950–1976) are featured here.

Rodgers, Christopher P., Eleanor A. Straughton, Angus, J.L. Winchester [a.o.]. Contested Common Land. Environmental Governance Past and Present. Earthscan, London [etc.] 2011. xii, 227 pp. Ill. Maps. £60.00.

This book presents studies from an interdisciplinary research project to investigate the sustainable management of common land, highlighting the social, historical, and legal factors relevant to the development of strategies for the future management of common lands. The first part of the volume charts the history of common land in England and Wales from 1600 to 1965; the second part consists of four case studies of common lands in Cumbria, North Yorkshire, Powys, and Norfolk. See also Tine De Moor's review essay in this volume, pp. 269–290.

Italy

Alibrandi, Giuseppe. Il libertario dei Nebrodi. [Due tarì, vol. 45.] Pungitopo, S.l. 2010. 125 pp. Ill. € 15.00.

This book tells the story of Antonino Puglisi, Francesco Martino, and Leo Giancola, three anarchists from Librizzi, a village in the Nebrodi mountains of Sicily. The author, who published several works on Sicilian popular traditions and movements, focuses mainly on Antonino Puglisi, who was incarcerated by the fascist regime and died in a mental hospital in Messina in 1942, and Leo Giancola, who emigrated to New York in 1921, where he worked for the Italian anarchist newspaper, Adunata dei refrattari.

Eugenio Colorni. Dall'antifascismo all'europeismo socialista e federalista. A cura di Maurizio Degl'Innocenti. [Società e Cultura, vol. 62.] Piero Lacaita Editore, Manduria [etc.] 2010. 324 pp. € 18.00.

The socialist and anti-fascist Eugenio Colorni (1909–1944) co-authored the Ventotene Manifesto, the founding text of the Movimento Federalista Europeo. Ten contributors to this volume, which is based on a conference held in Rome in 2009 to commemorate Colorni's birth, focus on various aspects of Colorni's activities, including his intellectual work, his participation in the Resistance, the Centro Interno Socialista (a clandestine organization briefly headed by Colorni), and European federalism. The collection opens with a 100-page introduction to Colorni's life and concludes with a chapter on papers related to Colorni in the Italian state archives.

Massara, Katia e Oscar Greco. Rivoluzionari e migranti. Dizionario biografico degli anarchici calabresi. Pref. di Maurizio Antonioli. [Strumenti per la ricerca storica, vol. 5.] BFS Edizioni, Pisa 2010. viii, 248 pp. € 24.00.

Largely based on the Dizionario biografico degli anarchici italiani (see IRSH, 52 (2007), p. 193), this reference work comprises 564 biographies of anarchist men from Calabria, many of whom migrated to North and South America, mainly to New York and Buenos Aires. Almost all Calabrian anarchists who migrated to Argentina became members of the Federacion Obrera Regional Argentina. Some others went to Spain to fight on the side of the anti-fascists during the Spanish Civil War. The volume opens with a substantial introduction by the editors and concludes with indexes of places, professions, and persons.

Santucci, Antonio A. Antonio Gramsci. Transl. by Graziella Di Maruo with Salvatore Engel-Di Mauro. Preface by Eric J. Hobsbawm, Foreword by Joseph A. Buttigieg. Editor's note by Lelio La Porta. Monthly Review Press, New York 2010. 207 pp. $15.95.

In this intellectual biography of Antonio Gramsci, an English translation of Antonio Gramsci. Guida al pensiero a agli scitti (1987) the author (1949–2004) discusses Gramsci's political writings, the Letters from Prison, the Prison Notebooks, and an essay named “End-of-Century Gramsci”, the first chapter from Santucci's book Gramsci (1996). The volume concludes with a biographical chronology of Antonio Gramsci and biographies of such political figures as Palmiro Togliatti, Leon Trotsky, and Filippo Turati.

The Netherlands

Kos, Anton.Van meenten tot marken. Een onderzoek naar de oorsprong en ontwikkeling van de Gooise marken en de gebruiksrechten op de gemene gronden van de Gooise markegenoten (1280–1568). [Middeleeuwse studies en bronnen, vol. 125.] Verloren, Hilversum 2010. 445 pp. Ill. € 33.00.

This is a study of the origins and development of the common lands, or marks, of Het Gooi, a region in the centre of the Netherlands, and the commoners’ use rights from 1280 to 1568. See also Tine De Moor's review essay in this volume, pp. 269–290.

Vera, Henricus Louis Maria…dat men het goed van den ongeboornen niet mag verkoopen. Gemene gronden in de Meierij van Den Bosch tussen hertog en hertgang 1000–2000. Uitgeverij BOXPress, Oisterwijk 2011. 474 pp. (Incl. CD-rom.) No price.

In this dissertation (University of Nijmegen, 2011) on the waste lands, or commons, of the Meierij (bailiwick) of Den Bosch in the present Dutch province of Noord-Brabant between 1000 and 2000, Dr Vera examines the development of the rights to the common grounds in the context of the changing landscape, advances in agriculture, and the rise of the institutions involved. The included CD-rom contains the entire dissertation.

Poland

Fidelis, Malgorzata. Women, Communism, and Industrialization in Postwar Poland. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge [etc.] 2010. xiv, 280 pp. Ill. £55.00.

In the early 1950s during rapid industrialization in Poland, women were encouraged to enter jobs traditionally performed by men. By 1956, however, such jobs were depicted as contradictory to women's reproductive capacities. Focusing on the experiences of women in three Polish textile and coal-mining communities during the transition from Stalinism to post-Stalinism in the mid-1950s, in this study Professor Fidelis examines the constantly shifting state policies on employment and gender equality, arguing that gender politics was a powerful instrument in negotiating the political and national legitimacy of the communist regime.

Metz-Göckel, Sigrid, Senganata Münst, [und] Dobrochna Ka̡wa. Migration als Ressource. Zur Pendelmigration polnischer Frauen in Privathaushalte der Bundesrepublik. Verlag Barbara Budrich, Opladen [etc.] 2010. 366 pp. € 29.90.

This study focuses on Polish women who commute between their homes in Poland and households in the German Ruhr region, where they are employed mainly as cleaners and care workers. Drawing on interviews with forty commuting women, the authors of this volume examine the commuters’ motives, their networks, their precarious working conditions, how they organize their own households in Poland, and how this particular form of migration affects gender relations.

Portugal

Neves, Hermano. Como triumphou a republica. Subsidios para a historia da revolução de 4 de outubro de 1910. Letra Livre [etc.], Lisboa 2010. 143 pp. Ill. € 12.00.

The Portuguese revolution of 5 October 1910 brought about the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of the first Portuguese republic (1910–1926). This is a facsimile edition of a book which was based on newspaper articles about the Republican Revolution by Hermano Neves, a journalist who had covered the revolutionary events for the newspaper O Mundo. Neves’ successful book features verbatim reports of conversations and is illustrated with pictures of the protagonists, bombs, and bomb making. This new edition opens with a brief introduction about Hermano Neves and other chroniclers of the Revolution of 1910.

Russia – Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

Caroli, Dorena. Histoire de la protection sociale en Union soviétique (1917–1939). Préface de Roberto Sani. L'Harmattan, Paris 2010. 315 pp. € 28.50.

This is a revised and translated version of Un Welfare State senza benessere. Insegnanti, impiegati, operai e contadini nel sistema di previdenza sociale dell'Unione Sovietica (1917–1939) (2008), which was annotated in IRSH, 54 (2009), p. 329. See also Anna Borisenkova's review in this volume, pp. 298–300.

Rendle, Matthew. Defenders of the Motherland. The Tsarist Elite in Revolutionary Russia. Oxford University Press, Oxford [etc.] 2010. xii, 274 pp. £58.00; $99.00.

This book, based on a dissertation (University of Exeter, 2003), examines how Tsarist elite groups, especially the nobility, experienced and reacted to the February and October Revolutions of 1917. Although increasingly disillusioned with events, according to Dr Rendle, elites were not solely counter-revolutionary, and rarely wanted a return to the regime of Tsar Nicholas II. They aimed, however, to assume control over the revolutionary process to promote their own interests, which fostered fears of counter-revolution amongst the lower social classes, thus radicalizing the popular mood and paving the way for the Bolsheviks.

Smith, Mark B. Property of Communists. The Urban Housing Program from Stalin to Khrushchev. Northern Illinois University Press, DeKalb 2010. xii, 240 pp. Ill. $40.00.

This book, based on a dissertation, analyses the mass urban housing programme in the Soviet Union from 1944 to 1964, as well as the relationship between individual ownership and welfare in the Soviet state. Drawing on archival and press materials, legal tracts, motion pictures, novels, and personal accounts, Dr Smith, challenging the assumption that the housing programme was a post-Stalin phenomenon, discusses its wartime and late-Stalinist origins and its intensification under Khrushchev, arguing that the Soviet housing programme invested the individual resident with substantial rights of possession.

Spain

Cazorla Sánchez, Antonio. Fear and Progress. Ordinary Lives in Franco's Spain, 1939–1975. [Ordinary Lives.] Wiley-Blackwell, Chichester [etc.] 2010. xi, 279 pp. Ill. € 50.00.

This book focuses on the experiences of Spanish citizens during Franco's dictatorship. The author relates how political violence and repression were experienced, and how the regime created and manipulated fear; he describes the social cost to ordinary Spaniards of the regime's socio-economic policy and the mass emigration that ended the traditional, rural way of life; and how social, demographic, and economic forces helped accelerate changes in values. The last chapter, which covers Franco's final years, shows how Spaniards liberated themselves by planting the roots for Spain's transition to democracy.

Escrivá Moscardó, Cristina. La escuela iluminada 1931–1939. L'eixam Edicions, València 2010. 141 pp. Ill. (Incl. CD-rom.) € 25.00.

During the Second Republic, substantial educational reforms were carried out in Spain, including the introduction of co-education, secularist principles, open-air education, school camps, and new didactic methods. This volume, a catalogue accompanying a travelling exhibition organized by the Asociación Cultural Instituto Obrero, brings together texts, memoirs, and photographs documenting the experiences of Spaniards in these reformed schools between 1931 and 1939, as well as bibliographies of contemporary and present-day literature. The accompanying CD-rom contains additional photographs.

López Calle, Pablo. Del campo a la fábrica. Vida y trabajo en una colonia industrial. Catarata, Madrid 2010. 127 pp. Ill. € 16.00.

Focusing on the El Léon cement factory, founded in 1909 in Matillas, near Guadalajara, Spain, and the industrial colony built near the factory, this book, based on a dissertation (Madrid 2004), analyses the role of industrial paternalism in the transformation of peasants into factory workers. After an introductory sketch of the harsh living and working conditions among the peasantry of the Alcarria region at the end of the nineteenth century, Professor López, drawing on interviews with former inhabitants and factory workers, describes conditions at the factory and reflects on the relationship between the organization of the production process and that of the workers’ lives and community.

Negre, José. Recuerdos de un viejo militante. Tierra de fuego, La Laguna [etc.] 2010. 121 pp. € 5.00.

The Catalonian militant syndicalist typographer José Negre (c.1870–1939) was the first general secretary of the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) and the last general secretary of the Catalonian anarcho-syndicalist federation Solidaridad Obrera, the foundation for building the CNT. This volume contains the first chapter of Negre's unfinished personal account of the foundation of Solidaridad Obrera in 1907, the Revolution of July 1909 and its repression during the “Semana Trágica”, with a thirty-page introduction on José Negre's life and early Spanish anarcho-syndicalism.

Switzerland

Kalt, Monica. Tiersmondismus in der Schweiz der 1960er und 1970er Jahre. Von der Barmherzigkeit zur Solidarität. [Social Strategies, Vol. 45.] Peter Lang, Bern [etc.] 2010. xii, 570 pp. € 70.90.

In this book, based on a dissertation (University of Basel, 2006), Dr Kalt examines the third-world solidarity movement in Switzerland during the 1960s and 1970s, in particular the German-Swiss solidarity movement, which had its roots in the church and in student circles. Drawing on the voluminous body of texts produced by that movement and discussing concepts such as “third-worldism” and “developmentalism”, this is primarily a discourse history of the solidarity movement.