The Age of Urban Democracy

This is part of a series of mostly narrative-based, general accounts of English history from Anglo-Saxon times to the present, weaving together politics, society, economics, religion, and foreign affairs into a single whole.

This survey first appeared in 1979, as England 1868-1914: the Age of Urban Democracy. It covers all aspects of the period in which English society acquired its modern shape—industrial rather than agricultural, urban rather than rural, middle class rather than aristocratic in the control of political power, and democratic in its institutions.

It deals with the period in three big chronological swathes (1868-1880; 1880-1901; 1901-1914), each section then looking at economic life, social life, town life, cultural life, government, domestic policy, and imperial and foreign policy. It is a textbook, helping students master a huge amount of material through its clear structure, sensible judgements, and approachable style.

For this revised edition, the footnotes and bibliographic material have been fully updated to take account of recent scholarship; the text itself is only lightly revised. The entire book has been reset in a larger and more reader-friendly format.