Making Aristocracy Work: The Peerage and the Political System in Britain 1884-1914

by Andrew Adonis

Overview

Making Aristocracy Work explores the political role and activities of the peerage, both inside and outside Parliament, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Adonis examines the House of Lords and its practices during this period, and offers a new interpretation of the constitutional crisis of 1909-1911. He reassesses the strengths and weaknesses of the Lords, questioning its effectiveness as a revising chamber, but at the same time clearly demonstrating the way it functioned in terms of constitutional tradition. He also examines the non-parliamentary activities of the peerage: their roles in local government and the civil service, and their part in the governing of the empire.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198203896
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	07/29/1993
Series:	Oxford Historical Monographs
Pages:	324
Product dimensions:	5.63(w) x 8.75(h) x 1.01(d)

About the Author

Nuffield College, Oxford

Editorial Reviews

"This is a model monograph, exhaustively researched, tightly organized, and as cleverly written as such a study can be."—American Historical Review

"Accomplished."—Times Literary Supplement

"A welcome addition...[S]cholarly and thorough."—Contemporary Review

"Formidably researched and constantly fascinating."—Observer

"Based on exemplary research into a broad array of private papers, and written with grace, wit, and a nice sense of irony, the book provides a fresh assessment not just of the aristocracy, but of Unionist politics generally."—Albion

From the Publisher