Senegal

Gueye, Omar. Mai 1968 au Sénegal. Senghor face aux étudiants et au mouvement syndical. Karthala, Paris 2017. 335 pp. Ill. € 24.

The wave of social protest in May 1968 reached Africa as well. Eight years after Senegal became independent, students in Dakar started a protest movement, supported by high school students, workers, and part of the population. Based on archives, some published in the annexes, and testimonies of actors about the events, Professor Gueye retraces the plot and explains the balance of power between the different actors – students, unions, politicians, Christian and Muslim clerics – and the underlying social causes of this revolt. The author describes the confrontation between President Senghor and the trade unions in a context of ideological tension and paradigmatic reconfigurations in Africa in the 1960s following independence.

Argentina

Santella, Agustín. Labor Conflict and Capitalist Hegemony in Argentina. The Case of the Automobile Industry, 1990–2007. [Studies in Critical Social Sciences, vol. 89.] Brill, Leiden [2016]. viii, 237 pp. € 114.00; $137.00.

Based on his PhD dissertation (2008), Dr Santella aims in this book to convey the recent trajectory of consensus and protest in a case from the automobile industry. His objective is to understand how the conflict and class relations that maintain the labour movement have transmuted, and how these processes affected working-class organizational relations and those among automobile workers in Argentina between 1990 and 2005. The author explores these questions from a Marxian approach, arguing that labour unrest persisted among leading industries, though in lesser measure, and that the relative decline of industrial unrest was the result of productive material development and hegemonic regimes.

Caribbean

Roopnarine, Lomarsh. Indian Indenture in the Danish West Indies, 1863–1873. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke [etc.] 2016. xvii, 111 pp. Ill. € 53.49. (E-book: € 41.64).

The British Government allowed Danish planters on St. Croix to import East Indian indentured servants as substitutes for the loss of slave labour during the second half of the nineteenth century. After examining the conditions and circumstances on St. Croix following the abolition of slavery in 1848, the author focuses on recruitment, transportation, plantation labour, repatriation, remittances, and abolition of Indian indentured experience on the island. He also assesses the caste, religion, and gender of the emigrants to observe how these characteristics determined the way the emigrants adapted, accepted, or resisted their indentured servitude. In Chapter seven, he presents the views of contemporary participants living on St. Croix.

Colombia

Echeverri, Marcela. Indian and Slave Royalists in the Age of Revolution. Reform, Revolution, and Royalism in the Northern Andes, 1780–1825. [Cambridge Latin American Studies, vol. 102.] Cambridge University Press, New York [etc.] 2016. xvi, 276 pp. Maps. £64.99. (Paper: £19.99).

Royalist Indians and slaves in the northern Andes engaged with the ideas of the Age of Revolution (1780–1825), such as citizenship and freedom. The goal of this book, originally written as a dissertation, is to explore the significance of changes in legislation for the politics of Indians and the enslaved across Spanish America within the late-colonial context. Based on archival research in Colombia, Ecuador, Spain, and the United States, Dr Echeverri uses criminal documents, speeches, sermons, pamphlets, letters, and orders from the royalist armies to study the conflicts and strategies of Indians and slaves as they developed in the colonial context, the independence period, and through the early years of the Republic.

Ecuador

Becker, Marc. The FBI in Latin America. The Ecuador Files. [Radical Perspectives.] Duke University Press, Durham (NC) 2017. xii, 322 pp. Ill. Maps. $94.95. (Paper: $26.95).

During World War II, the Roosevelt administration placed the FBI in charge of political surveillance in Latin America. Through the Special Intelligence Service (SIS), agents were assigned to combat Nazi influence in Mexico, Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. By 1943, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover shifted the focus of the SIS from Nazism to communism. Professor Becker examines FBI documents from the Ecuador mission to uncover the history and purpose of the SIS intervention in Latin America, with a special interest in what intelligence reveals about leftist organizations and social movements in Latin America.

United States of America

Archer, Emerald M. Women, Warfare and Representation. American Servicewomen in the Twentieth Century. [War, Culture and Society.] Bloomsbury Academic, London 2017. xiv, 238 pp. $92.00.

This book considers the various representations of American servicewomen throughout the twentieth century, and how those representations impact the roles they are permitted to assume. While women have a relatively short history in the American military, their direct participation in war has evolved in the past century, despite the need to overcome societal gender expectations. Though focusing primarily on the American case, Dr Archer also shows how women’s integration in the military differs in other countries, including Great Britain, Canada, and Israel. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the book draws on military history, theory, and social psychology.

Barrett, James R. Forew. by David R. Roediger. History from the Bottom Up & the Inside Out. Ethnicity, Race, and Identity in Working-Class History. Duke University Press, Durham (NC) [etc.] 2017. xix, 283 pp. $94.95. (Paper: $26.95).

In this study, Professor Barrett rethinks the boundaries of American social and labour history by investigating how the personal lives of working-class, radical, and immigrant people intersected with their activism and religious, racial, ethnic, and class identities.

Concerned with the personal stories of the working class, the author examines all aspects of individual subjective experiences, from their personalities, relationships, and emotions to their health and intellectual pursuits. His subjects include American communists, blue-collar cosmopolitans, and figures in early twentieth-century anarchist subculture. He also details the Americanization of immigrant workers via popular culture and their development of class and racial identities.

Carr, Robert Owen with Dirk Johnson. Working Class to College. The Promise and Peril Facing Blue-Collar America. University of Illinois Press, Champaign (IL) 2017. xx, 202 pp. $19.99.

Many economically struggling families today see college as academically, culturally, and financially unattainable. While working-class young people need a college degree to earn a living wage in today’s economy, financial obstacles and a belief that the system benefits only the comfortable and connected seem to place a university education off limits. The author, who established the Give Something Back Foundation, exposes an educational class divide that threatens the American dream of upward social mobility. The book addresses ways to reduce college costs and shares the inspiring accounts of those who have endured all sorts of hardship and have struggled to enter college and graduate.

Fett, Sharla. Recaptured Africans. Surviving Slave Ships, Detention, and Dislocation in the Final Years of the Slave Trade. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill (NC) 2017. xv, 290 pp. Ill. Maps $35.00. (E-book: $19.99).

In the years before the Civil War, enslaved Africans from illegal slave ships were brought into temporary camps at Key West and Charleston. In this study, Professor Fett reconstructs the social world of these recaptives and recounts the relationships they formed to survive. Focusing on shipmate relations rather than on naval exploits or legal trials and by analysing the experiences of both children and adults of varying African origins, the author shares the history of recaptive Africans. She examines the state of recaptivity as a distinctive variant of slave-trade captivity and situates the recaptive story within the broader diaspora of Liberated Africans throughout the Atlantic.

Johnson, Dale L. Social Inequality, Economic Decline, and Plutocracy. An American Crisis. [Critical Political Theory and Radical Practice.] Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke 2017. vi, 274 pp. £104.50; € 139.99.

This book aims to promote understanding of America by exploring counter-hegemony to the rule of capital and offering guidelines for strategizing change proceeding from the dialectic of What Is and What Ought to Be. Professor Johnson analyses neoliberal global order and its political expressions through discussions of the dominance of finance capital in the late twentieth century. He examines the triumph of ideology, the closing of avenues to reform, the problem of the captive state, and a sociological analysis of rule by divide and conquer. The book concludes with a look at the history of movement politics in culture, the arts, economics, and politics.

Johnson, Rashauna. Slavery’s Metropolis. Unfree Labor in New Orleans during the Age of Revolutions. [Cambridge Studies on the African Diaspora.] Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2016. xxi, 236 pp. Ill. Maps £64.99.

New Orleans became a major American metropolis as its slave population surged. Contrary to the stereotype of rural, localized, isolated bondage in the emergent Deep South, daily slavery experiences in New Orleans were global and interconnected. This book uses slave circulations throughout New Orleans between 1791 and 1825 to map the social and cultural history of enslaved men and women and the rapidly shifting city, nation, and world in which they lived. Professor Johnson elaborates on emigration from the Caribbean to Louisiana during the Haitian Revolution, commodity flows across urban-rural divides, multiracial amusement places, the local jail, and freedom-seeking migrations to Trinidad following the War of 1812.

Look for Me in the Whirlwind. From the Panther 21 to 21st-Century Revolutions. Sekou Odinga, Dhoruba Bin Wahad, Shaba Om, and Jamal Joseph. Ed. by dequi kioni-sadiki and Matt Meyer. Forew. by Imam Jamil Al-Amin. Afterw. by Mumia Abu-Jamal. PM Press, Oakland (CA) 2017. xvi, 628 pp. Ill. $26.95.

In 1969, twenty-one members of the New York branch of the Black Panther Party were arrested on multiple charges of violent acts and conspiracies. The Panther 21 trial revealed the illegal government activities that led to imprisonment on false charges and assassinations of Black liberation leaders. Solidarity for the twenty-one ensured publication of their collective autobiography containing the entire original manuscript from 1971 and new commentary from surviving members of the twenty-one. Photos from the private collections of the authors provide essential parts of a hidden and missing-in-action history. Beyond the mythologized Panther narrative, the authors explain how and why the Panther legacy is still relevant today.

Loza, Mireya. Defiant Braceros. How Migrant Workers Fought for Racial, Sexual, and Political Freedom. [David J. Weber Series in the New Borderlands History.] University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill (NC) 2016. xiii, 237 pp. Ill. $85.00. (Paper: $29.95; E-book: $19.99).

In this book, Professor Loza sheds light on the private lives of migrant men who participated in the Bracero Program (1942–1964), which allowed hundreds of thousands of Mexican workers to enter the United States on temporary work permits to alleviate the labour shortage in agriculture and the railroad industry. Focusing on their transnational union-organizing efforts, the sexual economies of both hetero and queer workers, and the ethno-racial boundaries among Mexican indigenous braceros, the author reveals how these men defied perceived political, sexual and racial norms. Basing her work on more than 800 oral histories, she carefully differentiates between the experiences of mestizo guest workers and those of the Mixtec, Zapotec, Purhepecha, and Mayan labourers.

Lussana, Sergio A. My Brother Slaves. Friendship, Masculinity, and Resistance in the Antebellum South. [New Directions in Southern History.] University Press of Kentucky, Lexington (KY) 2016. 225 pp. Ill. $50.00.

This book explores how enslaved men formed their own culture through a range of recreational pursuits similar to those enjoyed by their white counterparts, such as drinking, gambling, fighting, and hunting. Dr Lussana addresses nuanced manifestations of resistance to slavery in the private lives of enslaved men. Based on autobiographies of and interviews with former slaves, the author reveals how these men developed an oppositional community in defiance of slaveholder regulations and shows that their efforts were intrinsically linked to forms of resistance at a larger scale.

Marx, Karl [and] Friedrich Engels. The Civil War in the United States. Ed. and with an Introd. by Andrew Zimmerman. International Publishers, New York 2016. (First ed. 1937). xxxiv, 219 pp. $14.00.

The American Civil War shaped Marx’s and Engels’s understanding of social revolution and international politics. A complete revision of the 1937 edition of the Civil War writings of Marx and Engels, this volume incorporates new texts by Marx and Engels, as well as by US authors including Communist Union Army officer Weydemeyer and African American scholar and activist Du Bois. Editorial guidance throughout the volume helps readers understand both Marxism and the Civil War through insightful letters, newspaper articles, and philosophical expositions and shares the insights of Marx, Engels, and others on the US Civil War, as well as the history of slavery, freedom, race and class, communism and capitalism.

Meyer, Stephen. Manhood on the Line. Working-Class Masculinities in the American Heartland. [The Working Class in American History.] University of Illinois Press, Urbana (IL) [etc.] 2016. xiii, 247 pp. $95.00. (Paper: $28.00; E-book: $25.20).

In the early twentieth century, industrialization upended notions of gender and work identity in working-class men. In their resistance to technical change and managerial domination, working-class men responded by creating new male identities that blended a rough masculinity of violence, racism, and sexism with a respectable masculinity that aspired to join the middle class, striving to form unions and to provide a living for their families. Drawing on archival material, the author recreates in detail a social milieu and masculinity expressed not only in violence and sexism, but also as a wellspring of the fortitude necessary to maintain one’s dignity.

Milkman, Ruth. On Gender, Labor, and Inequality. [The Working Class in American History.] University of Illinois Press, Urbana (IL) [etc.] 2016. x, 308 pp. $95.00. (Paper: $28.00).

This collection of eleven essays presents four decades of Professor Milkman’s essential writings, tracing the parallel evolutions of her ideas and the field she helped define. The introduction frames her interrogation of historical and contemporary intersections of class and gender inequalities in the workplace and the efforts to challenge those inequalities. The first chapters focus on women’s labour during the Great Depression and World War II. In the second half of the book, the author turns to the past fifty years, a period that saw a dramatic decline in gender inequality. She concludes with a previously unpublished essay, comparing the impact of the Great Depression with that of the Great Recession on women workers.

Sinha, Manisha. The Slave’s Cause. A History of Abolition. Yale University Press, New Haven (CT) [etc.] 2016. xiv, 768 pp. Ill. $25.00.

This book is a comprehensive new history of the abolition movement in a transnational context and illustrates how the abolitionist vision linked the slave’s cause to the redefinition of American democracy and human rights across the globe. Dr Sinha broadens the scope on the abolition movement beyond the antebellum period, recasting it as a radical social movement, in which men and women, black and white, free and enslaved, found common ground in causes ranging from feminism and utopian socialism to anti-imperialism. Drawing on extensive archival research, the author documents the influence of the Haitian Revolution and the centrality of slave resistance in shaping the ideology and tactics of abolition.

White, Ahmed. The Last Great Strike. Little Steel, the CIO, and the Struggle for Labor Rights in New Deal America. University of California Press, Oakland (CA) 2016. xi, 398 pp. Ill. $85.00; £70.95. (Paper: $29.95; E-book: £24.95).

In May 1937, 70,000 workers walked off their jobs at four large steel companies known collectively as Little Steel. In the first part of this book, Professor White examines the forces that instigated and shaped the course of the strike. In the second part, he describes the strike, from its chaotic beginnings, through the sequence of clashes and political intrigues that punctuated the grinding struggle on the picket lines, to its eventual collapse in the summer of 1937. After considering why the strike failed, in the third part he covers the aftermath of the conflict, including efforts to prosecute the companies under the new labour law.

China

Chen, Shuang. State-Sponsored Inequality. The Banner System and Social Stratification in Northeast China. Stanford University Press, Stanford (CA) 2017. xviii, 342 pp. Maps. $65.00.

This book explores social-economic processes of inequality in nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century rural China. Drawing on rich source materials, Professor Chen provides a comprehensive impression of the rise of a social hierarchy, in which the state classified immigrants to the Chinese county of Shuangcheng in distinct categories, each associated with different land entitlements. The Shuangcheng story illustrates the question regarding the extent to and way in which the state reached into and transferred local society. The tensions embodied in the unequal land entitlements shaped the identities of immigrant groups, and this social hierarchy persisted, even after the establishment of the People’s Republic in China. See also Agostino Sepe’s review in this volume, pp. 161–163.

Gescher, Jeanne-Marie. Becoming China. The Story Behind the State. Bloomsbury, London [etc.] 2017. xxxiii, 738 pp. Ill. Maps. £36.00.

This book presents the story of how China became the state it is today, and of how its worldview is based on what came before. The book is divided into three parts. The first part extends from the ancient past to the revolution in 1911. The second section explores the journey from 1911 to the early twenty-first century. Given the vast differences between cities and villages in China, these stories are told in two separate parts. The third section describes the early years of the twenty-first century until 2014, capturing the different perspectives of the Chinese Communist Party, the people and the intellectuals in three separate chapters.

India

Hasan, Mushirul. Roads to Freedom. Prisoners in Colonial India. Oxford University Press, New Delhi [etc.] 2016. x, 276 pp. £25.99.

In this book, the author examines the history of prison and prisoners in colonial India. Based on archival research, the conditions of the prisoners are presented, as are their visions for the freedom movement and the various aspects of prisons in the subcontinent. By focusing on the lives and motivations of political prisoners, Professor Hasan positions their experiences within Indian nationalism and explores the notions of the political protest and resistance during the first half of the twentieth century. The work also deals with the differences between Indian and European prisons, as well as the conception of criminal classes in the colony, thereby providing a historical context to the contemporary Indian prison system.

Mann, Michael. Wiring the Nation. Telecommunication, Newspaper-Reportage, and Nation Building in British India, 1850–1930. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2017. xxii, 298 pp. £32.99.

The telegraph profoundly transformed the global press landscape at the turn of the nineteenth century. In British India, after the Great Rebellion of 1857–1858, the concept of a shared cultural community was lost. In the decades that followed, telegraphically disseminated news played a leading role in shaping an all-India public sphere, in the process resurrecting the unified nation idea, which formed the basis of the anti-colonial struggle launched soon afterwards. Professor Mann traces the social, cultural, and political consequences of the telegraph in colonial India, as this new mode of communication emerges not only as a technological marvel, but also as a force with the power to influence an entire nation.

Turkey

Die türkische Bourgeoisie – Ursprung, Entwicklung, Gegenwart. Ed. by Meral Avci and Wolfgang Gieler. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2017. 169 pp. € 30.80; £23.00; $33.95.

Since the takeover by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2002, Turkey has been experiencing political and economic changes. This collection of seven essays is about the origins and development of the Turkish bourgeoisie. The first two chapters present a general explanation of the concept of the bourgeoisie and apply this concept to the cases in Turkey. The next contributions chronologically trace the history and significance of the bourgeoisie from the origins in the Ottoman Empire, the period of the Young Turks, the early decades of the Republic, World War II and the transition to a multi-party system, and the later period of the rise of the conservative Muslim entrepreneur.

Yemen

Um, Nancy. Shipped but Not Sold. Material Culture and the Social Protocols of Trade during Yemen’s Age of Coffee. [Perspectives on the Global Past.] University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu (HI) 2017. xiv, 198 pp. Ill. $64.00.

In the early decades of the eighteenth century, Yemen hosted a bustling community of merchants. In this book, Professor Um examines the cargo they were shipping: eastern spices, porcelain, coffee, Arabian horses, cotton, silk and woollen cloth, and ordinary provisions, such as food, beer, medicine, and furniture. These varied goods were not just commodities intended for sale in the marketplace but, as featured in the archives of the Dutch and East India Companies and local records, were offered, exchanged, consumed, and utilized by international merchants and local trade officials in a number of socially exclusive practices affirming their identity, status, and commercial obligations and sustaining their considerable trading privileges.

New Zealand

Salmond, Anne. Tears of Rangi. Experiments across Worlds. Auckland University Press, Auckland 2017. xi, 511 pp. Ill. (Nzl.) $65.00.

Six centuries ago, Polynesian explorers arrived in New Zealand, where they rapidly adapted to new conditions. Four centuries later, European explorers adapted to their new home there as well. In this remote archipelago, settlers from Polynesia and Europe (and elsewhere) have clashed and forged alliances and have fiercely debated what is real and what common sense. In this book, Professor Salmond considers New Zealand as a site of cosmo-diversity, a place where multiple worlds engage and collide. Beginning with an inquiry into the early period of encounters (1769–1840), Salmond investigates such clashes and exchanges in key areas of contemporary life (e.g. waterways, land, the sea, and people).

Eire – Ireland

The Cambridge Social History of Modern Ireland. Ed. by Eugenio F. Biagini and Mary E. Daly. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2017. xiii, 635 pp. Ill. £74.99. (Paper: £21.99).

Covering three centuries of demographic and economic changes, this textbook is an authoritative and comprehensive view of the shaping of Irish society, at home and abroad, from the famine of 1740 to the present day. This edited volume is divided into three parts. Part one considers geography, occupations, and social classes. Part two is about people, culture, and communities. Part three deals with emigration, immigration, and the wider Irish world. In thirty-three essays, international scholars survey key changes in population, the economy, occupations, property ownership, class, and migration and consider interactions of individuals and the state through welfare, education, crime, and policing.

O’Carroll, Aileen [and] Don Bennett. The Dublin Docker. The Working Lives of Dublin’s Deep-Sea Port. Irish Academic Press, Newbridge 2017. vi, 280 pp. Ill. € 24.99.

This richly illustrated book is a social and occupational history of the Dublin docker from the mid-nineteenth century to the 1970s. The authors draw from ethnographic interviews with dock workers, minutes, and documents produced by docker and stevedore organizations and secondary sources. The first chapters focus on hiring daily labour at the “reads”, the various strategies employed by the dockers in their pursuit of a day’s work and the skilled nature of dock work. In Chapter three, the docker is located within the history of Dublin. Dockside labour relations and trade union history are addressed in Chapter four. Chapter five considers the childhood and social life of those growing up with docker fathers. The final chapters consider the myths and traditions of the Dublin dockers.

France

Broch, Ludivine. Ordinary Workers, Vichy and the Holocaust. French Railwaymen and the Second World War. [Studies in the Social and Cultural History of Modern Warfare.] Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2016. xviii, 280 pp. Maps. £64.99.

De-sanctifying the depiction of railwaymen in the book Cheminots as heroic saboteurs, Dr Broch reveals the daily lives of these workers who accommodated the Vichy regime and cohabitated with the Germans by placing workers and industry in the centre of the conflict. The author revisits histories of resistance, collaboration, and deportation in Vichy France through the prism of the cheminots. Intertwining the history of the working classes with Holocaust history, she highlights sensitive accounts and memories under Vichy and the post-war period. The cheminots supported both the French nation and the German military apparatus, exemplifying the complexities of personal, professional, and political life under occupation.

Diebolt, Claude [and] Faustine Perrin. Understanding Demographic Transitions. An Overview of French Historical Statistics. [Population Economics.] Springer, New York [etc.] 2017. xviii, 176 pp. Maps. € 121.89. (E-book: € 95.19).

This book studies the demographic transition process that has been key in the economic development of Western countries. Focusing especially on France, the first clear case of fertility decline in Europe, in Chapter one, the authors cover the evolution of demographic variables there over the past 200 years, in particular that of marriage patterns. To understand the changing demographics, the authors investigate in Chapter the evolution of the female labour force, in Chapter three the educational investments, and in Chapter four the evolution of gender roles and relations.

Kaplan, Steven L. Raisonner sur les blés. Essais sur les lumières économiques. Fayard, Paris 2017. 868 pp. € 35.00. (E-book: € 33.99).

Laissez-faire against state interventionism is one of the themes that confronted the great thinkers of the eighteenth century, such as Diderot, Galiani, Turgot, and Necker. The economists, as the physiocrats called themselves, became influential around Louis XV and would transform the world of ideas. The first attempts to apply the idea of freedom through radical reforms in the field of supply led to serious social, economic, political, and cultural crises. Dr Kaplan examined the writings and correspondences of the protagonists to answer questions on how to reconcile market and regulation, freedom, and equality. In doing so, the author offers a renewed vision of eighteenth-century France and the history of ideas.

Zancarini-Fournel, Michelle. Les luttes et les rêves. Une histoire populaire de la France de 1685 à nos jours. La Découverte, Paris 2016. 995 pp. € 28.00. (E-book: € 16.99).

In France, 1685 was an infamous year, marked by the adoption of the Code Noir establishing the legal foundations of slavery à la française and revoking of the Edict of Nantes, which, until then, had protected the Protestants. The author takes this date as a starting point to write a people’s history of modern and contemporary France by focusing on the lives of nameless women and men, minorities, and subordinates. Professor Zancarini-Fournel retraces the history from below, including that of the colonized people from the West Indies, Guyana, and Reunion to Africa, New Caledonia, or Indochina, and of the migrants who took part in shaping the country. See also Ad Knotter’s review in this volume, pp. 146–148.

Germany

Cornils, Ingo. Writing the Revolution. The Construction of “1968” in Germany. [Studies in German Literature, Linguistics, and Culture.] Boydell & Brewer, Rochester (NY) [etc.] 2016. x, 315 pp. $90.00. (E-book: $29.99).

In Germany, the concept of “1968” is synonymous with the German Student Movement and is viewed as a liberalization, a myth, a second foundation, or an irritation. This book demonstrates that seeking unity in the ideas associated with “1968” has become an obsession for a cultural elite of intellectuals, writers, and opinion makers. Dr Cornils argues that writing about 1968 in Germany does not concern historical events, but is instead a moral touchstone of social group identity, intended to perpetuate a utopian agenda. The author brings together the historical and media representations of the movement and challenges the way 1968 has been instrumentalized as a powerful imaginary and symbolic capital in cultural and political debates.

Gester, Jochen. Auf der Suche nach Rosas Erbe. Der deutsche Marxist Willy Huhn (1909–1970). Die Buchmacherei, Berlin 2017. 627 pp. (Incl. CD-ROM.) € 22.00.

The twentieth-century working-class movement was a powerful force, although the main political struggles, social democracy, and Bolshevism deprived it of its emancipatory potential and rendered it subject to a new domination. Willy Huhn is one of the few socialist theorists who tried to discern Marxism in the spirit of Rosa Luxemburg in post-war Germany in the confrontation with social democracy and Bolshevism. Dr Gester has drawn up a detailed biography, which helps readers understand how Huhn was politically socialized, and how his learning process developed, which eventually made him a protagonist of anti-authoritarian socialism. The CD-ROM contains nearly thirty documents written by Huhn.

Karcher, Katharina. Sisters in Arms. Militant Feminisms in the Federal Republic of Germany since 1968. [Monographs in German History, vol. 38.] Berghahn Books, New York 2017. xii, 163 pp. Ill. $110.00.

Few figures in modern German history are as central to the public memory of radical protest as Ulrike Meinhof. Dr Karcher shows that Meinhof was one of many German women who supported revolutionary actions from the 1960s onwards, and in this book investigates how feminist ideas were enacted by West German leftist organizations, from the infamous Red Army Faction to less well-known groups, such as the Red Zora. She analyses their confrontational and violent tactics in challenging the abortion ban, opposing violence against women, and campaigning for solidarity with Third World women workers. Though these groups diverged ideologically and tactically, all demonstrated the potency of militant feminism.

Linne, Karsten. Von Witzenhausen in die Welt. Ausbildung und Arbeit von Tropenlandwirten 1898–1971. Wallstein, Göttingen 2017. 526 pp. Ill. € 44.90.

The German colonial school in Witzenhausen (North Hessen) had a monopoly on training tropical farmers in Germany. Dr Linne traces the history of this educational institution from its beginnings in 1898 through the end of its independence in 1971. The author elaborates on three main issues: the organizational development, the education of the students, and their subsequent lives and career paths. The colonial school in Witzenhausen illustrates German twentieth-century history in a nutshell. Since most of its graduates were mainly active abroad, the school is also a knowledge base and strategically pivotal from the colonial era to today’s debate on international aid.

Mierzejewski, Alfred C. A History of the German Public Pension System. Continuity amid Change. Lexington Books, Lanham (MD) 2016. xxvii, 415 pp. $120.00. (E-book: $114.00).

This book offers a comprehensive institutional history of the German public pension system from its origins in the late nineteenth century to the major reform period in the early twenty-first century. Drawing on a wide range of sources, Professor Mierzejewski provides a balanced account of how the pension system has coped with major challenges, such as Germany’s defeat in two world wars, inflation, the Great Depression, the demographic transition, political risk, reunification, and changing gender roles, showing that while the pension system has changed to meet all these challenges, ties between work, contributions, and benefits have endured.

Protest in Hitler’s “National Community”. Popular Unrest and the Nazi Response. Ed. by Nathan Stoltzfus and Birgit Maier-Katkin. [Protest, Culture and Society, vol. 14.] Berghahn Books, New York [etc.] 2016. x, 275 pp. Ill. $130.00; £92.00 (Paper: $34.95; £24.00).

The purpose of this book is to investigate the influences of popular unrest in Hitler’s National Community, focusing on the response of National Socialism to unrest and protest, rather than on the reasons for that protest. The contributions examine circumstances in which Germans were motivated to protest, as well as the conditions determining the regime’s response. Workers, women, and religious groups all convinced the Nazis to appease rather than repress. Expressions of discontent increased during the war, and Hitler remained willing to compromise in governing the German Volk as long as he thought the Reich could salvage victory. The contributions in this book are followed by ten appendices of illustrative source material.

Great Britain

Beattie, Derek. How the Other Half Lived. Ludlow’s Working Classes. Merlin Unwin, Ludlow 2016. 187 pp. Ill. £14.99.

Living conditions among the working classes of Ludlow lagged far behind those in much of the country. In this richly illustrated book, Dr Beattie explores this history of the bulk of the population for the period 1850–1960, elaborating on the housing and living conditions among most of the Ludlow working masses, who were often forced to dwell in cramped, overcrowded properties. Disease, especially TB, was rife, countless houses lacked access to running water, and outhouses were shared by several families. The book is based on documents and photos from local archives and numerous interviews.

Marshall, Peter. Foreword by John P. Clark. William Godwin. Philosopher, Novelist, Revolutionary. PM Press, Oakland (CA) 2017. xxiv, 509 pp. Ill. $29.95.

William Godwin (1756–1836) was an exponent of philosophical anarchism, an original moral thinker, a pioneer in socialist economics and progressive education, and a novelist. Living at the epicentre of radical and intellectual London during the French Revolution, he commented on some of the most significant changes in British history. Shaped by the Enlightenment, he became a key figure in English Romanticism. This comprehensive study is based on extensive published and unpublished materials. Dr Marshall places Godwin firmly in his social, political, and historical context, tracing the origin and development of Godwin’s ideas and themes and offering a critical assessment of his works.

Pit Props. Music, International Solidarity and the 1984–85 Miners’ Strike. Ed. by Granville Williams. Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom (North), [s.l.] 2016. 152 pp. Ill. £12.99.

This book highlights the ongoing resonance of the struggle by British miners in defence of jobs and communities. One section focuses on the links between music, politics, and protest. Another chapter tells the story of international support. Also covered is the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign, resolute in its pursuit of a full public inquiry into the role of the police on 18 June 1984. The book concludes with an analysis of the privatization of the electricity supply industry, describing how the failure to pursue a coherent energy policy has led to swathes of the industry being controlled by foreign companies.

Rees, John. The Leveller Revolution. Radical Political Organisation in England, 1640–1650. Verso, London [etc.] 2016. xxi, 490 pp. Maps. £25.00. (Paper: £11.99).

The Levellers, arising from the explosive tumult of the 1640s and the battlefields of the Civil War, are central figures in the history of England’s democracy. This collective biography of the Leveller leadership traces their paths through the English revolution, examining their practical and intellectual co-operation and their different backgrounds, political ideas, and strategies, as they emerged in the course of the revolution. The lives, actions, and ideas of the leading figures give us insight into what kind of political organization or movement they were and the degree to which their ideas and actions shaped the events of the 1640s and 1650s.

Thomlinson, Natalie. Race, Ethnicity and the Women’s Movement in England, 1968–1993. [Palgrave Studies in the History of Social Movements.] Palgrave Macmillan, London 2016. xiv, 272 pp. £99.95.

This book is an archive-based account of the charged debates about race in the women’s movement in England during the second wave. Examining both the white and the black women’s movement through oral histories and research in feminist periodicals, Dr Thomlinson aims to uncover the historical roots of long-standing tensions between black and white feminists. The author gives a broad overview of activism on the part of both black and white women, and examines the black feminist critique of white feminists as racist, how white feminists reacted to this critique, and why the women's movement was unable to engage with the concerns of black women.

The Troubles in Northern Ireland and Theories of Social Movements. Ed. by Lorenzo Bosi and Gianluca De Fazio. [Protest and Social Movements.] Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam 2017. 240 pp. € 95.00.

This volume explores the intersection of social movement scholarship and research on divided societies by inspecting the troubles in Northern Ireland. Divided over four sections, the eleven contributions investigate specific aspects of the Troubles from different theoretical and methodological perspectives. The first section examines the years of the Civil Rights Movement and its larger political and media context. The second section is about unionist and loyalist contentions and deals with both peaceful collective action and violent strategies inside the Protestant community. In the third section, the republican movement is analysed, from recruitment and mobilization inside prisons to the emergence of feminist republicanism. The fourth section covers non-sectarian mobilizations, involving movements that do not align with the ethnonational cleavage.

Greece

Papastephanakē, Lēda. Hē phleva tēs gēs. Ta metalleia tēs Helladas, 19os–20os aiōnas. Vivliorama, Athēna 2017, 392 pp. Ill. [English abstract]. € 25.00.

Since the nineteenth century, mining has been an important export-oriented sector of the Greek economy. In this book, Dr Papastefanaki elaborates on mining activity in relation to the state, the various companies, labour markets and labour relations, gender, technology, management, and organization of mining operations. The study is based on archival sources from Greece and France, published sources and personal memoirs and literary accounts. Data have been drawn from the Statistical Tables (1909–1972). The author thereby explores various aspects of the mining-quarrying companies in Greece and highlights the importance of mining activities for the Greek economy.

Russia / Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

Ivanova, Galina [and] Stefan Plaggenborg. Entstalinisierung als Wohlfahrt. Sozialpolitik in der Sowjetunion 1953–1970. Aus dem Russischen von Lukas Mücke und Shirin Schnier. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt am Main [etc.] 2015. 280 pp. € 34.90.

Until 1953, socialism in the USSR led to mass poverty, reduced consumption, and miserable living conditions. The central thesis here, states Professor Plaggenborg in the preface to this book co-authored by Dr Ivanova, is that de-Stalinization in the Soviet Union had two key elements: the end of industrial development as the exclusive focus and an attempt to alleviate the misery of large parts of the population. From 1956, social policy became a central component of de-Stalinization, as need and poverty had become impossible to ignore. In the Brezhnev era, social policy peaked, and, according to the authors, the authorities set up a Soviet welfare state model. See also Julia Obertreis’ review in this volume, pp. 166–169.

Spain

Chastagnaret, Gérard. De fumées et de sang. Pollution minière et massacre de masse en Andalousie – XIXe siècle. [Bibliothèque de la Casa de Velázquez, vol. 69.] Casa de Velázquez, Madrid 2017. xxiv, 423 pp. Ill. Maps. € 25.00.

In 1888, thousands of miners and inhabitants of the surrounding villages protested the toxic fumes produced by the Rio Tinto Company, which seriously affected public health, agriculture, and the environment. The army fired without warning into a peaceful crowd, killing nearly 200. Based on archival sources, this book positions the drama in a decade of local struggles while investigating the strategies and responsibilities of the various powers. The outcome of the crisis was the fear instilled in the rural and working populations of the basin and the offensive by the companies to secure suspension of the injunction that ordered progressive suppression of the fumes.

López Barahona, Victoria. Las trabajadoras en la sociedad madrilena del siglo XVIII. ACCI ediciones, Madrid 2016. 356 pp. € 19.00.

In this book, the world of labour is analysed in Madrid and its surroundings in the eighteenth century through work done by women as related to domestic units, trade corporations, state institutions, and the labour market. The study offers an overview of the female occupational structure and examines more than ten occupations corresponding to the three key sectors in the urban economy (services, commerce, and industry). It also features an analysis of the evolution of female employment compared with other peninsular and European cities throughout the period.

Switzerland

Elsig, Alexandre. Die Aktionsliga der Bauarbeiter. Der Anarchismus erobert die Genfer Baustellen der Zwischenkriegszeit. Bahoe Books, Wien 2017. [French ed. 2015.] 175 pp. Ill. € 24.00.

The Action League of Construction Workers (LAB), founded in Geneva in the late 1920s, became a constant threat to employers. Direct action (e.g. brawling, destruction, and sabotage) was pivotal in their practices. Despite arrests and convictions, the outcome of these actions was the rise of collective labour agreements. Based on articles from the anarchist press, in particular Le Réveil anarchiste and L’Ouvrier du bois et du bâtiment, the history of the LAB, though the story of a small group of activists, is symbolic of the struggles, conflicts, and contradictions experienced by trade union and anarchist movements in Switzerland and abroad during the interwar period.