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Will China Democratise?
Historian article
Michael T. Davis compares the parallels between the democratic expectations, or possibilities, of modern-day China with Britain's democratic evolution from the eighteenth century to the emerging democracy of the nineteenth century.
The future is an unfamiliar place for historians. Yet we stand on the edge of an historic shift away...
Will China Democratise?
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The Chapel and the Nation
Classic Pamphlet
The Noncoformitst chapel has played a crucial role in the history of the English and Welsh nations. When the great French historian Elie Halevy sought to explain the contrast between the turbulent history of his own country and the peaceful evolution of England in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries...
The Chapel and the Nation
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Film: Finance in Britain and Ireland: 1714 to 1785
Film Series: Power and freedom in Britain and Ireland: 1714-2010
In Episode 5, Professor Anne Murphy (University of Portsmouth) examines the development of finance in Britain and Ireland, from the emergence of the Bank of England during the Nine Years’ War into a system that would facilitate the growth of the British Empire and Britain’s Industrial Revolution.
During this period...
Film: Finance in Britain and Ireland: 1714 to 1785
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Film: Party Politics 1714-1785
Film Series: Power and freedom in Britain and Ireland: 1714-2010
In Episode 2, Dr Robin Eagles (History of Parliament), examines the birth of Britain’s two party system in the form of the Whigs and the Tories; two parties, whose rivalry would define politics in Britain from the Restoration and Glorious Revolution to the middle of the Victorian Age.
During this...
Film: Party Politics 1714-1785
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What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the British Empire and the age of revolutions in the global South
Teaching History feature
The historiography of the British Empire has taken a long course since the era of decolonisation. Political histories of the late twentieth century considered the mechanisms connecting crises at the ‘periphery’ with metropolitan decision-making. One rather overused stereotype was the so-called ‘man on the spot’ pushing empire forward, be they...
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the British Empire and the age of revolutions in the global South
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Introductory film: Lenin - Interpretations
Part of the HA Interpretations Film Series: Power and authority in Russia and the Soviet Union
Log in below to preview the introductory film - available to all registered users of the website.
This open access introductory film forms part of our ongoing film series on Power and authority in Russia and the Soviet Union. All the films are available through the Student Zone with corporate secondary membership. ...
Introductory film: Lenin - Interpretations
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Film: Proto-feminism in Britain and Ireland – 1714 to 1785
Power and Freedom in Britain and Ireland: 1714–2010
In Episode 11, Dr Mary Jo MacDonald of the University of Jyväskylä explores how the end of the Licensing Act, sweeping political change, and a revolution in intellectual culture opened unprecedented opportunities for women to shape political, social, and intellectual life in Britain and Ireland. The film highlights major proto‑feminist thinkers...
Film: Proto-feminism in Britain and Ireland – 1714 to 1785
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Film: Economic and social change – 1714 to 1785
Power and Freedom in Britain and Ireland: 1714–2010
The 18th century represents a pivotal moment bridging early modern Britain with the social, economic and technological transformations of the Industrial Revolution.
In Episode 3, Professor Emma Griffin (Queen Mary University of London), explores this period of invention, innovation and entrepreneurialism, how it affected ordinary families, and its role in the...
Film: Economic and social change – 1714 to 1785
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The Enlightenment
Classic Pamphlet
Can a movement as varied and diffuse as the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century be contained within the covers of a short pamphlet? The problem would certainly have appealed to the intellectuals of that time. Generalists rather than specialists, citizens of the whole world of knowledge, they relished the challenge...
The Enlightenment
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Cavour and Italian Unification
Classic Pamphlet
It may seem a little perverse to write a pamphlet on Cavour in 1972, the centenary year of the death of Mazzini, but no doubt there will be more than one publication on Mazzini to mark the occasion. To pretend that the two men had much in common would be...
Cavour and Italian Unification
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History's big picture in three dimensions
Historian article
More and more historians, from diverse political viewpoints, are now expressing concern at the fragmentation of history, especially in the schools curriculum. The fragmentation of the subject has followed upon the collapse of sundry Grand Narratives, such as the ‘March of Progress', which once swept all of history into a...
History's big picture in three dimensions
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Radiating the Revolution: Agitation in the Russian Civil War 1917-21
Article
When the Bolsheviks seized power in what was essentially a carefully organised coup d’état in October 1917, they seized control only of the levers of central power in the then capital, Petrograd, which had already become the centre of working-class discontent. What they most emphatically did not do was to...
Radiating the Revolution: Agitation in the Russian Civil War 1917-21
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Film: Power and Protest in England – 1714 to 1785
Film Series: Power and freedom in Britain and Ireland: 1714-2010
In Episode 7, Professor Carl Griffin (University of Sussex) discusses the changing landscape of England as enclosure accelerates, transforming the social dynamics of the countryside as peasants become wage labourers and their rights to use the ‘common land’ is diminished.
Professor Griffin reflects on this period of protest over enclosure,...
Film: Power and Protest in England – 1714 to 1785
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After the Uprising of 1956: Hungarian Students in Britain
Historian article
Much has been written during the last 50 years about the events leading up to and during the Hungarian Uprising of 1956. Less consideration has been given to the students who arrived in Britain as refugees. During the weeks following the Soviet intervention in Hungary around 25,000 people were killed...
After the Uprising of 1956: Hungarian Students in Britain
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The Englishness of George Orwell
Podcast
George Orwell is best known for Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty Four - one book an allegory of The Russian Revolution, and the other a science fiction dystopia about a globalized world. Before these two last works, the heart and soul of Orwell's writing had been about England and the...
The Englishness of George Orwell
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To what extent was the failure of denazification in Germany 1945-48 a result of the apathy of the allies?
Historian article
To blame the failure of the denazification process in postwar Germany entirely on a vague and generalised concept such as apathy is simplistic and does not stand up to serious scrutiny. Denazification was one of the most ambitious attempts ever at provoking an artificial revolution; it is reasonable to assume...
To what extent was the failure of denazification in Germany 1945-48 a result of the apathy of the allies?
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Alexander II
Classic Pamphlet
The ‘great reforms' of Tsar Alexander II (1855-81) are generally recognised as the most significant events in modern Russian history between the reign of Peter the Great and the revolutions of 1905 and 1917. The most important of Alexander's reforms, the emancipation of he serfs in 1861, has been described...
Alexander II
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The Resistable Rise of Napoleon Bonaparte
Article
Malcolm Crook examines the remarkable ascent to power of Napoleon at the turn of the nineteenth century. The great Bicentenary of the French Revolution of 1789 may be drawing to a close, but that of Napoleon is about to commence. So now is an opportune moment to present a critical...
The Resistable Rise of Napoleon Bonaparte
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Immigration and the making of British food
Historian article
Panikos Panayi explores the way in which immigration has transformed British eating habits over the last two centuries, whether through the rise of the restaurant and the development of eating out, or the culinary revolution at home.
Those people who voted to leave the European Union in 2016 because of...
Immigration and the making of British food
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Leopold von Ranke - Pamphlet
Classic Pamphlet
Leopold von Ranke (21 December 1795 - 23 May 1886) was a German historian and a founder of modern source-based history. According to Caroline Hoefferle, "Ranke was probably the most important historian to shape historical profession as it emerged in Europe and the United States in the late 19th century." ...
Leopold von Ranke - Pamphlet
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British Christians and European Integration
Historian article
Despite Britain’s longstanding membership of the European Union, the question of ‘Europe’ continues to loom large in the nation’s politics. Whilst the economic pros and cons of Britain ‘joining’ the euro might be understood by only a select few, that issue provides for the many an opportunity to debate Britain’s...
British Christians and European Integration
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Hungarian Nationalism in International Context
Historian article
All aspects of Hungarian nationalism – with one exception, which I shall consider later – had more or less similar counterparts elsewhere in Europe; but the blending of those elements yielded a unique constellation. Moreover, the ingredients of this mixture proved highly disruptive for central Europe, indeed at times for...
Hungarian Nationalism in International Context
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Film: Lenin's legacy
Film Series: Power and authority in Russia and the Soviet Union
With his body was embalmed and building high statues were erected to him Lenin’s memory seemed secured for ever. Yet how did his memory and his actual legacy differ? Did he really set the course for a future better Russia, or were his ideas of revolution better on paper than...
Film: Lenin's legacy
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Film: Lenin and the Russian Civil War
Film Series: Power and authority in Russia and the Soviet Union
Revolution is never simple. Lenin and the Bolsheviks quickly found that not everyone in Russia or outside of it approved of their new radical agenda. Russia was plunged into a civil war of devastating circumstances. How would its new leader manage and how much were the needs of the people...
Film: Lenin and the Russian Civil War
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Film: Stalin - Early Life
Film Series: Power and authority in Russia and the Soviet Union
Joseph Stalin was born Joseph Besarionis dze Jughashvili in 1878 into a poor family in Gori, Georgia, part of the then Russian Empire. Stalin attended the Tbilisi Spiritual Seminary while his own radicalism grew, before joining the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party. He edited the party's newspaper, Pravda, and raised funds for Vladimir Lenin's Bolshevik faction through...
Film: Stalin - Early Life
