First Published in 1989 London Jewry and London Politics 1889-1986 is
a study of the relationship between the London Jewish community, the
London County Council, and the Greater London Council. Geoffrey Alderman
draws on a wealth of primary and secondary material to illuminate a
dialogue that began, a hundred years ago, in a mood of great optimism
and co-operation, but which ended, in the early 1980s, in a welter of
insults and antagonisms. Alderman adopts a chronological approach,
looking first at the Jewish involvement in London government prior to
the establishment of the London County Council in 1889. He then analyses
the contribution made by London Jewry to the periods of progressive
control and conservative rule. With the arrival of Jewish immigrants
from Eastern Europe the nature of the Jewish electorate underwent
considerable change and Alderman describes how the government exploited
prejudice against the Jewish community causing LCC to adopt blatantly
antisemitic policies. The Labour victory of 1934 was in part due to the
Jewish vote, but the period of Labour rule was a disappointment and an
anticlimax. This illuminating account of hundred years is an essential
read for scholars and researchers of British history.
