CEIDLIOT 0 7The Proceedings of the South Place Ethical Society

Vol. 103 No. 11 E1 December, 1998

Photo: Martin Harris

The scene in Conway Hall's Brockway Room during the Ethical Society's meetingon 27 September 1998 commemorating the 50th anniversary of the arrival of theship 'Windrusli, bringing Caribbean immigrants to Britain. The Secretary of theWindrush Foundation, Arthur Torrington, is flanked by Iwo speakers who hadvolunteered for the RAF and become pilots in World War 11and who returned to thiscountry in the Windrush to live here. (See article on page I 5).

THE HISTORY OF JAZZ FROM NEW ORLEANS TO BE BOPJohn Marsom 3

AM I MY COLLEAGUE'S KEEPER?Joe Cain 9

W1NDRUSH: CHANGING THE FACE OF BRITAINArthur Thrrington 15

OMAGH: THE END OF THE PEACE PROCESS IN NORTHERN IRELAND?John Good 18

LONDON'S VICTORIAN ARCHITECTUREOliver Westmoreland 20

VIEWPOINT: John Rayner

BOOK REVIEW: Martin Green 23

ETHICAL SOCIETY EVENTS 24

SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETYConway Hall Humanist Centre

25 Red Lion Square, London WC IR 4RL. Tel: 0171 242 8034 Fax: 0171 242 8036 Our new website address is: www.ethicalsoc.org.uk

OfficersGeneral Committee Chair Lionel Elton. Vice-Chair Donald Rooum.Hon. Treasurer: Christopher Bratcher. Registrar: Ian Ray-Todd.Hon. Representative: Terry Mullins. Hon Librarian: Diane Murray.

Editor, Ethical Record: Norman Bacrac.

SPES Staff Administrative Secretary to the Society: Marina Ingham Tel: 0171 242 8034Library & Programme Coordinator: Jennifer Jeynes. Tel: 0171 242 8037Hall Manager: Stephen Norley. Tel: 0171 242 8032Lettings Manager: Peter Vlachos.For Hall bookings: Tel: 0171 242 8032

THE G.C. CALLS A SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING OF THE SOCIETY 2M0 pm Sunday, 20 December 1998

Registration from 1.30 pm

The official Agenda of this meeting is being sent out to all members of the Societywith this issue of Ethical Record. For the information of other readers, the meetingis to deal with the question of whether to drop the term South Place (72 years afterleaving that address and moving to Conway Hall and when there were several otherEthical Societies in the country) but still remain The Ethical Society' with all thatthat implies, or whether, as an Amendment to the motion advocates, become a'Society for the Promotion of Ethical Studies', retaining the initials SPES. N.B.

AN IMPORTANT MEETING FOR ALL MEMBERS OF THE SOCIETYThe General Committee has proposed the holding of a number of meetings in thenew year to consider the future direction of the Society and the Conway Hall facility.All members of the Society are urged to participate in these discussions.

The first such meeting has been arranged for the afternoon of Sunday, 17January 1999 at 2.30 pm in the Library of Conway Hall. Members may submit(preferably by 6 January 1999) amy preliminary thoughts they may have to DonLiversedge (Chairman, Policy, Programme and Editorial Committee). A précis ofthese will then be issued to those who request it and will also be available to thosewho attend the meeting. Following these meetings there may be referenda on the twomajor issues referred to above.

SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETYFounded in 1793, the Society is a progressive movement whose aims are:

the study and dissemination of ethical principles based on humanism,the cultivation of a rational and humane way of life, andthe advancement of research and education in relevant fields.We invite to membership all those who reject supernatural creeds and find themselves in

sympathy with our views. At Conway Hall there are opportunities for participation in culturalactivities including discussions, lectures, concerts and socials. The Sunday Evening ChamberMusic Concerts founded in 1887 are renowned. We have a library on subjects of humanist concern.All members receive the Society's journal, Ethical Record, eleven times a year. Funerals andMemorial Meetings are available.

Please apply to the Admin. Secretary for membership, 818 p.a.

2 Ethical Record, December, 1998

THE HISTORY OF JAZZ FROM NEW ORLEANS TO BE BOP

John Marsom Illustrated Lecture to the Ethical Society, 30 November 1997

My programme is an attempt to trace the development of Jazz from somewhatobscure origins in the latter part of the 19th Century through the advent of recordedJazz shortly after the First World War onwards to the 1950s and briefly into morerecent years.

One certain thing about Jazz as we have come to know it, isihat it originatedin America over a century ago from black slaves and their descendants whocombined the rhythm and percussion of African music with the diatonic scale ofEuropean music. Influenced by folk traditions from various ethnic origins, brassband music, church music and ballads, they produced a music which was largelyimprovised and used to accompany many events in their daily lives, such as workingin the fields, parties, dancing, funeral wakes - wherever music was appropriate ineasing life along.

Although it was probably first of all a vocal music, as instruments becameavailable, the people acquired them either for nothing or very cheaply, and learnedto play them in ways which best suited their musical styles and according to theirindividual abilities. After the American Civil War, there was probably a fair numberof military band instruments which became easily obtainable - trumpets, clarinets,trombones, percussion etc. - all of use to the would-be Jazz musicians.

Rag-time was a popular form of dance music which developed alongside Jazz,but differed in that it was written down and played exactly as written, notimprovised. Whilst ragtime and jazz developed side by side, jazz had scope forfurther development, whereas ragtime was a set style. But some of the early jazzmusicians did in fact take the ragtime form as a base for improvisation and furtherdevelopment.

Whilst Jazz is popularly thought to have begun in New Orleans, it was in factmuch more widely found. Although the cultural mix of New Orleans was probablythe main melting pot for its development, jazz was also known to exist from earlytimes in Texas, Mississippi, Florida, and urban centres such as Baltimore, St. Louisand Oklahoma City. In New Orleans, the difference between black and white culturewas somewhat blurred by a wider mix, including Latin immigrants and FrenchCreoles. So one can appreciate how thc many musical influences in Jazz cametogether. Incidentally, it is thought that the word 'Jazz' comes from the French wordjaser meaning to gossip, which is what the musicians did as they interwove andimprovised together.

Although there were many variations, the most typical New Orleans bandconsisted of about six musicians, with trumpet taking the lead, clarinet weavingembellishments and the trombone providing harmonic punctuation. Then therewould be a drummer, brass or string bass player, banjo or guitar, and, if they werelucky, a piano.

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Record One: Sensation Rag, ODJB, London, 1919Having said that Jazz was a black mans music, it is particularly ironic that the firstrecordings of jazz were produced from the year 1917 by a group of white musiciansknown as 'The Original Dixieland Jazz Band'. This was made up of five musicians:Nick La Rocca, cornet; Eddie Edwards, trombone; Larry Shields, clarinet; HenryRagas, piano and Tony Spargo, drums. And to add further to the incongruity, my firstrecord is of this white American band, made in London, England in 1919. You mayfind it somewhat repetitive, but this is typical of the band's work, and the recordingquality is good for such an early, acoustic recording.

Record 2: The Pearls, Jelly Roll Morton, 1926.The ODJB established their popularity in this country when they played for theopening season of the Hammersmith Palais de Danse, which opened in a formertram shed shortly after the first world war.

One of the earliest Creole composers and players of Jazz was the colourfulcharacter, Ferdinand 'Jelly Roll' Morton. He was born in 1890 and died in 1941.More than anyone, I think he demonstrates the transition from the rigidity of ragtimeto the more rubato style of jazz. Although his earliest compositions date from 1902,with King Porter Stomp we have here a somewhat later composition, a piano solorecorded in 1926, called The Pearls.

As well as a considerable amount of solo piano work, Morton also wrote andarranged for groups of musicians; and although one might get the impression that theband was improvising, he composed and wrote down all the solos himself, andinsisted that the music was played exactly as written. This, of course, is quiteexceptional in jazz music.

Record 3: Muskat Ramble, Louis Armstrong Hot Five, 1925.One of the best-known personalities of jazz must, of course, be Louis Armstrong.Louis learnt his cornet and later the trumpet playing in a New Orleans orphanage.He combined an outstanding technique with a wonderful gift for improvisation.Later on, of course, he became just as well known for his gravelly singing voice. Hestarted his run of success with another New Orleans stalwart, King Oliver, also aband leader and trumpet player. After a time playing second trumpet to King Oliver,Louis began to outshine his leader and was snapped up by a cultivated and well-educated black bandleader, Fletcher Henderson. Again, Armstrong stood out asbeing well ahead of the othcr musicians, and as well as making recordings withFletcher Henderson, he recorded with other leading musicians of the day. In 1925,he went into the recording studios with his pianist-wife, Lil Armstrong (nee Hardin),Johnny Dodds, clarinet; Kid Ory, trombone and Johnny St Cyr, banjo, to make aseries of recordings as Louis Armstrong Hot Five. This is one of them, MuskatRamble.

Record 4: Bessie Smith, Kitchen Man, 1929.We must not forget the many wonderful singers who contributed so much to themusic of Jazz. Bessie Smith was born in 1895 and died prematurely in a motor caraccident in 1937. She became much acclaimed on the Music Hall, or Vaudeville,Circuit in the 1920s, possessing a powerful voice which was at the same time tunefuland expressive. She normally performed with a small backing group of musicians,often including pianist Clarence Williams. At different times she worked with LouisArmstrong, Jack Teagarden and Benny Goodman, among others. This is one of hermost popular songs, and one which I imagine her audiences enjoyed enormously.You may notice that the sexual innuendo is barely concealed.

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Record 5: At the Jazz Band Ball, Bix BeiderbeckeA white comet player who was a great admirer of Louis Armstrong, but completelydifferent in style, was Leon 'Biz' Beiderbecke. Whereas Louis Armstrong's playingwas always passionate, Bix dealt in understatement and lyricism. Although heplayed in and contributed outstanding solos to the more commercially-inclinedbands of the 1920s, such as Paul Whiteman and Jean Goldkette, his greatestcontributions come from the smaller groups with which he produced someoutstanding recordings. Some of these included the rich and robust sound of AdrianRollini's bass saxophone.

Unfortunately, Biz died prematurely in 1931 at the age of 28, frompneumonia; no doubt linked to the alcoholism with which his latter years wereclouded. But despite his short life, he ranks as a major contributor to jazz, being alsoa composer and pianist. In this next record, be sure to listen for Adrian Rollini's basssaxophone.

There is a British musician and band leader, Harry Gold, now over 90, and asfar as I know still playing (at least he was in February 1997) who many years agowas given Adrian Rollini's bass saxophone. I have heard Harry Gold several timesover the past ten years or so at the Barbican Centre lunchtime jazz session's, playingthis enormous instrument in a manner which belies his years and diminutive stature.There cannot be too many bass saxophones around, and if I am lucky enough to seeand hear him again, I must ask him if it is the same instrument that we can hear onthese marvellous early recordings.

Record 6: Lazy Rhapsody, Duke Ellington, 1932Someone who pursued a remarkably successful career from the mid 1920s until hisdeath in 1974 was Edward Kennedy 'Duke' Ellington, a black composer, pianist andbandleader born in Washington in 1899. Many great names in Jazz have passedthrough Ellington's band, and some of them remained with him from the 1920s tillhis death. In the case of reed player, Harry Camey, this was about 50 years. Asignificant portion of Duke's career was his residency at Harlem's Cotton C/ub inthe 1920s, where the high standards of composition and arrangements, together withfirst-class musicians, won him much acclaim. Throughout his career there have beenmany recordings of his music, and he spent his life touring with his world-famousorchestra. Much of his composing was done on buses, trains, in hotel rooms, sparemoments between performances - whenever the inspiration took him. As with otherbands, particularly the larger ones, written arrangements were provided, but therewere also opportunities for soloists to contribute their own ideas and improvise atcertain points in the arrangements. So to this extent, performances might vary fromtime to time, depending on the inspiration of the musicians, thus giving the music acombination of order and spontenaity. To the jazz enthusiast, the sound of theEllington band is always instantly recognisable. Here we have Lazy Rhapsodyrecorded in 1932. The soloists are: Barney Bigard, clarinet; Duke, piano; HarryCarney, baritone sax; Johnny Hodges, alto sax; Cootie Williams, vocal.

Record 7: Fletcher Henderson: I'm a fool for loving you, 1936I mcntioned Fletcher Henderson earlier as leader of a band in which LouisArmstrong played in the 1920s. It has been said that Fletcher Henderson was toopleasant a man to be a completely successful bandleader, and too educated a man tobe a barrel-house pianist. This may account for his not being quite as widelyregarded as he deserves, although his recording career spanned the years 1921 -1950. Although Henderson was himself a superb arranger, he also employed the

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talents of others. One of these was Benny Carter, who is still alive, and was 90 yearsold this year. He ushered the band into the 1930s. The well-known saxophonistColeman Hawkins was featured in the 1930s, and the outstanding trumpeter, RoyEldridge, can be heard in this recording made in 1936.

Due to his easy-going personality, Henderson had always been too casual andlaid-back as a leader. Towards the end of the 30s, morale dropped and the bandfolded. Hendcrson then joined Benny Goodman as arranger and soloist.

Record 8: Benny Goodman Orchestra, Love me or Leave me, 1936Benny Goodman was a virtuoso clarinettist, who spanned both jazz and classicalmusic worlds. His success owes much to his total professionalism. From playingwith bands such as that of drummer Ben Pollack in the 1920s, and after muchsession-work as a free-lance musician, he formed his big band in 1934. Undoubtedlyconcessions were made to commercialism, and he became known as 'The King ofSwing'. He was a pioneer in mixing black and white talents. As well as colouredarrangers, such as Fletcher Henderson, Benny Carter and Edgar Sampson, heincluded musicians such as Teddy Wilson, Lionel Hampton, Charlie Christian andCootie Williams. He also worked with singer Billie Holliday. His 1930s band had aclassic swing line-up of 4 saxes, 3 trumpets, 2 trombones, drums, piano, bass andguitar, with Benny himself leading on clarinet. Apart from the big bands, he workeda lot with smaller groups, such as the sextet and the well-known Benny GoodmanQuartet: Benny Goodman, clarinet; Lionel Hampton, vibraphone; Teddy Wilson,piano and Gene Krupa, drums.

Goodman's concurrent career as a classical clarinetist included recordingswith the Budapest String Quartet, working with Bela Bartok on Contrasts a workspecially written for him and violinist Joseph Szigeti. He also appeared with theBoston and Chicago Orchestras. Furthermore, he commissioned concertos fromAaron Copeland and Paul Hindemith. Towards the end of his life he appeared at theAldeburgh Festival in chamber music by Mozart and Brahms. At this point, I willplay what I think is a very pleasing recording made in 1936 with the full band. Thiswas a song made popular by the well-known singer of the 20s and 30s, Ruth Etting:Love me or leave me.

Record 9: Ella Fitzgerald with Chick Webb Orch., A Little bit later On, 1936Ella Fitzgerald, who died about a year ago, enjoyed a long and successful careersinging jazz and popular songs. Discovered by Chick Webb in an amateur show, atthe age of 16 in 1934, she soon after joined his band and became the idol of theSavoy Ballroom in Harlem, where Webb reigned supreme. On his death in 1939, shetook over the band. However, the difficulties inherent in running a band forced herto give it up and instead she became a solo performer. She then continued to enjoya successful career almost until the end of her life. Those of you who may know herrenditions of popular songs and show tunes when her voice was at its best in the 50sand 60s may find this 1936 recording of a very young woman somewhat girlish andimmature, but with the solid support of the Chick Webb orchestra it makes for a veryfine recording.

Chick Webb was severely handicapped. He was a hunchback as a result oftuberculosis of the spine, which makes it all the more remarkable that at less that 5feet tall, he became known as one of the greatest and most powerful drummers of alltime. He only lived to be 30 years of age, but there is no doubt that he led one of themost accomplished bands of the 1930s, known for its quality of tone and sheer drive.

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There were band cutting contests at the Savoy Ballroom where two bands would tryto outplay each other alternately. When the Chick Webb Band competed againstBenny Goodman in such a contest, the latter being no slouch, the Webb Band wasjudged the winner.

Back to Benny Goodman again, here is a recording made by the BennyGoodman Sextet in 1941, Good Enough to Keep.

Record 10: Four Brothers, Woody Herman Orch., 1946Woody Herman was another clarinetist whose career ?panned much the same yearsas Goodman's. He also played saxophone, favouring the alto sax, and had severalsuccessful bands during the 30s and 40s. He became aware of the need to give hisband of the mid-40s a more modern image, and with the arrival of new arrangers,such as Neil Flefti, Ralph Bums and Jimmy Giuffre, a more modern sound emerged.In 1946 hc recorded 'Four Brothers' in an arrangement by Jimmy Giuffre. TheseFour Brothers arc the saxophone section of: Stan Getz, Zoot Sims, Herbie Steward;tenor saxes - and Serge Chaloff, on baritone sax. This piece was significant inestablishing a warm, full voicing of the reed section, due to the fine arrangement,and this was punctuated by dramatic brass passages.

Throughout the late 1950s, Woody Herman led smaller units, but in 1960formed another big band, and continued to lead successful big bands into the 1980s,almost up to his death in 1987. Another instance of Jazz meeting the classics was in1946 when Woody Herman performed at Carnegie Hall the Ebony Concerto, a workspecially written for him by the Russian composer, Igor Stravinsky.

Record 11: Embraceable You - Charlie Parker, 1947In the mid 40s, certain other musicians besides Woody Herman saw the need tomove Jazz on somewhat, and develop new musical ideas and forms. People such asCharlie Parker, Dizzie Gilespie and Miles Davis, by experimenting with chordsequences and different melodic approaches, sometimes improvising to such anextent that original themes and tunes were hard to spot, produced a style of jazzwhich became known as 'Be Bop'. Many of the older style musicians detested it,some tried to adapt without success, one or two managed to transcend, but thesewere few and far between. It was a style in which saxophone and trumpet weregreatly to the fore, but the clarinet was more or less redundant. Bands were usually5 or 6 in number, and typically consisted of saxophone, trumpet, drums, double-bassand piano. Sometimes a trombone would be used, or perhaps electric guitar - therewere often variations. Much of the music was at breakneck speed, with complex runsand lengthy.solos: but I have chosen a recording at a much easier pace and of modestduration. This fcatures Charlie Parker, alto sax; Miles Davis, trumpet; Max Roach,drums; Duke Jordan, piano; and Tommy Potter, bass. The tune is 'EmbraceableYou', although you may not instantly recognise it.

Record 12: Just a Gigolo, Reinhardt & Grapelli, 1949All the music you have heard so far has been by American musicians. Naturally, jazzspread to many other parts of the world - Europe in particular - and in some caseslocal brands of the music were developed. The violin in not often heard in jazz, butthe French musician, Stefan Grapelli, with Belgian Gypsy guitarist, DjangoReinhardt, together led a group known as The Quintet of the Hot Club of Francewhich produced an exciting and infectious brand of music that becameinternationally renowned, and remained popular from 1934 though to the 1950s.Reinhardt was one musician who in 1947 switched from acoustic to electric guitar

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and embraced 'Be Bop'. He adapted well to the style, but will still be bestremembered for his earlier recordings with Grapelli and the Hot Club of France.

Stefan GrapeIli in the 1970s recorded with Yehudi Menhuin some verysuccessful violin duets of popular songs, and also continued his jazz career untilquite recently. Although still living at the age of 89, I don't think he enjoys goodhealth now, and I have not heard of him playing in the last year or so. I have chosena 1949 recording called 'Just a Gigolo'.

Record 13: Billie Holliday, Solitude, 1950.This next item is in fact sung by Billie Holliday, the third and last of the great jazzsingers I have selected today. Miss Holliday led a life full of personal problems, butwith her very individual style, used the fairly narrow range of her voice to greatartistic effect. Among her gifts were a unique and intuitive sense of timing, and herability to make credible the most banal of tin pan alley tunes. Here however, wereturn once again to a Duke Ellington number, an all-time classic. Billie Hollidaysadly died in 1959 aged 54.

Record 14: Confessin' - Thelonius Monk, 1965Another of Jazz music's great individualists was Thelonius Monk, a black pianistwho, although he emerged from the Be Bop era, was very much his own man. Unlikemany of his contemporaries, he came from a comfortable home, and showed littleinterest in music until he was about 20, when he began to study the subject. Hismethod of playing defies comparison, and is definitely that of an intuitive soloist, asyou will hear from this recording of 'Confessin'. Generally speaking, people eitherhate it or love it.

Record 15: Chick Corea & Gary Burton: What Game shall we play today?1974We come now to the last record, which features an artist who started his career withmusicians from the Be Bop era. He played with trumpeter Miles Davis, amongstothers, and then went on to make a name for himself in the 1970s through to thepresent day. Chick Corea is a talented keyboard player, playing both the piano andelectronic instruments. Here he can be heard on piano with Vibraphonist GaryBurton in a track from his LP, 'Crystal Silence'. The piece is, for whatever reason,called 'What Game Shall we Play Today?'

I have recently learned that Chick Corea has also recorded Mozart Piano Concertos!

The Philosophical Society of England

Monday, 18 Jan 7pm. The Value and Uses of Philosophy(Discussion)

Monday, 1 Feb 7pm. A Darwinian View of Philosophy(Neil Munro)

Meeting at the Slurping Toad, 35/6 Ludgate Hill, London.

8 Ethical Record, December, 1998

AM I MY COLLEAGUE'S KEEPER?Participation in peer review is both smart and proper

Joe Cain University College London

Lecture to the Ethical Society, 21 June 1998

Peer review is central to the machinery of modem research and scholarship. It is akey criterion for judging first-class from second-rate, whether that be for articles,journals, books, or research proposals - and now even films and Web sites.Manuscripts that fail peer review are relegated to low-status outlets. Grant proposalsthat fail peer review simply go unfunded. Such is the prestige of peer review thatjobs literally depend on it. When my employer assesses job performance in thispublish-or-perish world, only peer-reviewed output counts. The rest is mere practicefor the premier league. What accounts for this? What's in peer review that invests itwith so much authority?

Part of the answer is obvious: peer review means approval. Approval byindependent experts. It means your ideas have been considered closely by a peer, afellow specialist - someone who understands what you're talking about and has theexpertise to assess rigorously your presentation against the facts, methods, andexperiences of the field. Passing peer review means you've passed muster. It meansyour thinking has been certified. It's not certified to be correct, but certified to meritconsideration, to be worth discussion. Of course, any fool can print their ideas, butto get those ideas published in Nature first you must satisfy its reviewers.

Favouritism, Nepotism and VendettasThough peer review is central to academic machinery, some recent studies -combined with numerous widely reported anecdotes and the general gossip withinprofessorial circles - raise serious questions about its day-to-day value asindependent quality control.' Commonly claimed in these reports, favouritism,nepotism, and vendettas are rampant. Moreover, pressed with demands for their ownproductivity, reviewers regularly provide only cursory inspection of documents.Elsewhere, editors and funding panels must filter out from peer assessmentscommentaries that promote competing agendas or that seem merely crasspartisanship. And, authors fear competitors serving as reviewers, as they might pinchunpublished data or scoop conclusions.

If these reports are (even somewhat) true, Academe has a serious problem: itseems that peer review today risks bringing us neither much quality nor muchcontrol. With so much invested in this process, its integrity is of paramountimportance. If researchers and scholars systematically withdraw from peer review,academic research loses whatever status review otherwise delivered. Scholarshiploses the certificates it previously offered; readers lose thc ability to assume theliterature meets a rigorous professional standard.

Most of the problems related to today's crisis in peer review stem from acollapse in social contracts between researchers and various communities in whichthey are members. Researchers increasingly feel no bond to participate in peerreview processes (other than to extract for themselves its certifications). Moreover,researchers increasingly feel their investments in those processes translate less andless into tangible products or into results advancing their own enterprises. In short,it doesn't seem to make a difference. Added to this, institutions and collaborating

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partners offer little encouragement for taking time away from pushing the research front ahead. An afternoon spent writing reviews means an afternoon lost on the next paper, the next grant, the next patent filing, or the next fortune-making innovation.'

This degradation of any sense of obligation to community - this rise ofprofessional individualism - can be effectively countered with two lines ofargument: obligations inherent in social contracts and appeal to self-interest.

Appeal to Self-interestParticipation in peer review operates on two levels. First, an author agrees to submittheir work - a finished manuscript, a research proposal, or the like - to evaluation bya sample of peer experts. Second, as experts themselves, researchers agree to serve,if asked, as evaluators of other work. Such evaluation is assumed to be rigorous andindependent. It also is assumed to be confidential - between writer and reviewer -with an editor or administrator mediating the process.

To obligate an individual is to assert a must. And, it asserts that certainsanctions will follow if obligations go unmet. Appeals to self-interest are far lessstringent, leaving contributions optional but weighed against certain cost-benefitassessments. Consider self-interest and peer review first. Carrots before sticks.

Consider self-interests when an author agrees to submit their work toevaluation. In terms of the work at hand, self-interests are served in plenty. Forinstance, the author gains expert advice and has their work examined for mistakes(be they simple or major, superficial or profound). Submission for review also opensthe possibility of a reviewer offering constructive criticism, identifying existingresearch along similar lines that has been overlooked, or disclosing otherwiseunavailable information about related research. As such, the rewards for submissionto review may become immediate and robust.

If thc work at hand benefits, so too does the author. Errors identified beforegoing public mcans an author can avoid looking foolish, careless, or of dubiousexpertise. Conversely, knowing scrutiny will come means authors are likely to bemore thorough and self-critical in their written products. Both avenues translate intobetter finished products, and thus both offer compelling selfish reasons forindividuals to seek peer review.

Careers gain, too. Well-produced research is appreciated. Reviewersremember superb manuscripts and projects. Such impressions inevitably impingeinto the daily chatter of colleagues and the informal circuit of information withindisciplines. Reputations can be made and supplemented, intellectual territory may beclaimed, priority can be informally bolstered, and collaborations or careerpromotions may result. Peer review for publication usually involves two to fourcolleagues of various career stages. Review panels for funding typically involveeight to sixteen usually senior or highly productive colleagues. Displaying one'sexpertise in these circles may be a very good idea indeed.

An author's status changes with peer review in a particular way. Suchevaluation carries with it a process of validation, of legitimation. That stamp ofapproval means expert peers respect one's work at least enough to believe it meritsor requires consideration. As such, a researcher becomes certified, eligible for thehigh table of community discourse. That's good for a researcher's own reputation,of course. Also selfishly, it's a kind of status employers love to note, and should the

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negotiation about one's position became an issue, it's precisely the kind of weightthat might tip a balance.

Thus, good reasons can be found for defending submission to peer revieweven from a perspective of ruthless self-interest. But this is only half the problem.Can self-interest also be used to defend the participation in the evaluating aspects ofthe enterprise, in the reviewing of one's peers? Leaving aside unwholesomemotives,' five justifications rise to the fore.

Advocate for one's own standards: First, in acting as an evaluator of peerrescarch, one serves not only as a deputy for the field (in some ethereal sense) butalso as an advocate for one's own standards. Here is the opportunity to reject lowand sub-standard work, i,e., work you yourself find poorly or inappropriate. Highpersonal standards can thus enter a research field. As a corollary, reviewers have theopportunity to interject new facts, techniques, and conclusions into a field's researchdomain by recommending - or insisting - an author make certain allowances oranswer certain queries on those matters. This deputy function provides anopportunity for reviewers to lead, rather than follow.

Maintain integrity of the field's knowledge base: Second, the absence of peerreview risks the absence of a quality control mechanism for a field's literature, andtherefore, for a field's knowledge base. The corrcsponding loss of accumulation-asany standard of rigour cannot be assumed-means one's own projects are put at risk.No researcher works without some recourse to that knowledge base. And, noresearcher today has the capacity or patience to verify that base first-hand. Serviceas a peer reviewer contributes to maintaining the integrity of knowledge within afield. It thus allows for the general and provisional accumulation of knowledge andfacilitates the extension of one's own research program. In short, it means aresearcher can assume certain things to be true and can move ahead from there.Nobel prizes are not awarded for re-inventing wheels.

Maintain integrity of validation: Third, loss of rigorous peer review risks lossof validation even to researchers of the highest calibre. Passing lowly and poorproducts degrades the outlets in which they appear and the institutions that serve assponsors. Researchers have little patience for errant and unreliable information.Reputations sag quickly under such strain, and reputations for low standards areinfectious. Once an outlet gains notice for occasional lapses of quality, the slide canbe rapid and wholesale. Reviewers using the same outiets for their own work maysuffer as a corollary: when the standards of an outlet are unpredictable, the validityof all contributions can become suspect.' Guilt by association cuts both ways.

High reputation leads to increased access: Fourth, researchers within acommunity often are well aware of who provides rigorous, reliable, confidential, andconstructive examinations of scholarly materials. Those deputies are regularlysought out for advice and comment. For these deputies, such a preference offerssubstantial access to the cutting edges of research and thinking within a field. Itprovides the potential of steering research, for linking projects of possible synergy,for moving oneself into the social and intellectual centre of a field. Helpful adviceor constructive criticism as a reviewer in effect may be a substantial investment inone's own access to information contributing in the long run to an expandingresearch program, reputation, and career prospects.

Preserve professional autonomy: Fifth, funders increasingly insist on high,immediately tangible value for their support. As a mechanism for quality control,

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peer review offers a means for validating claims about results - not only tocolleagues but also to funders both current and prospective. The failure of peerreview mechanisms to maintain rigour risks eroding a profession's capacity to self-certify, to serve as the arbiters of reliability. In the absence of this capacity, fundersmight very well impose an external mechanism for certification so as to guaranteevalue for their expenditures.

Witness the massive administrative infrastructure surrounding use of animalsin scientific research. This comes because those researchers are unable to producean internal mechanism for rigorous adherence capable of persuading politicalconstituencies they have matters well in hand. Autonomy was lost because self-regulation to a prescribed standard could not be guaranteed. Compare this to the nearcomplete lack of external control for human research in the world's space programs.Here, patrons operate with the impression that professionals in the field are actingsensibly and responsibly, rigorously self-policing. Autonomy is thereby preserved.

Obligations Inherent in Social ContractsFollowers of this discussion no doubt will find the reliance on self-interest theoryovercommiting and insufficient. Certainly there are other categories of appeal whenconsidering peer review. One - a far more controversial approach - is to ground thatappeal in the theory of social contracts. Such an appeal emphasises the notion ofcontractual obligation and follows four distinct lines.

Social contract implicit in research funds: Most narrowly, when a researcheraccepts funds for a project, that researcher agrees to undertake the work responsiblyand reliably. In short, to serve the contract well and in good faith. But grants forresearch are more than simply pay-for-work contracts. There's an implicit socialdimension, too. Consider scientific research. Normally, a funder earmarks supportfor scientific research into certain problems because it was previously convinced bythat community's claims about its expertise in acquiring and producing relevantknowledge. The community claims a special, superior epistemological status on thematter, and the funder displays its confidence in those claims with its offers offinancial support. (The Medical Research Council, for example, generously fundsscientific research into HIV - rather than funding witch doctor research into HIV,psychic research into HIV, and so on - because it's convinced of science's superiorpotential for producing meaningful information.) Part of science's specialepistemological status derives from its quality control mechanisms, such as peerreview. These help to ensure publications are reliable, cumulative, and good valuefor money.

What's key here is that part of the reason a funder awards support to ascientist's proposal for work rests in the connections the researcher makes to thatspecial epistemology. In the process of using that connection for support, researchersdirectly bind themselves into a social contract. That contract obliges them to deliverthe product as epistemologically promised, i.e., complete with certification throughpeer review. The special access to funds comes with a price of prescribed standardsof scrutiny.

Social contract implicit in association: This contract, obligation, specialstatus line of argument provides a second avenue of defence for morally obligingparticipation in rigorous peer evaluation. Again, consider scientific research.Scientists regularly use recourse to community standards when asserting thesuperior status of their knowledge about a phenomenon. When doing so, they imply

12 Ethical Record, Decernber, 1998

they hold membership in that community and imply they are linked to itsepistemology. Speaking 'as a scientist' or offering a 'scientific opinion' againinvokes a social contract between oneself and the community such that one is boundby its obligations as much as one benefits from its rights and privileges. Membershipmay be open, but it is not free. Speaking as a scientist morally obliges a researcherto act as a scientist, too. This means subscribing to its ideals, including participationin rigorous and honest peer review.

Social contract to contribute what is of most value to society: The third useof social contract theory is much wider and certainly more controversial. Membersof a society - the people who interact in its social space, make use of its facilities,infrastructure, and opportunities, and claim membership - have an obligation tocontribute to its advancement. This is not simply a matter of paying one's way, suchas through prompt payment of taxes, donations to charity, and conformity to laws.There's more. One benefit specialised researchers draw from their societies is thatluxury of specialisation. The best repayment for that luxury is one that makes gooduse of the skills derived from its activity. In other words, because society makesrcsearch specialisation possible, the best way to satisfy one's return obligation tosociety is to make the best use of those special skills. In serving as an honest,rigorous, independent referee, the contract is not only served but served so as tomaximise the return to society and to contribute most to its additional advancement.'

Social contract to promote ideals of Academy: Finally, also controversially,claims to membership in the Academy also bind researchers via a social contract. Toclaim to be a scholar is to claim adherence to certain core principles of the Academy.These involve intellectual freedom. First is the principle of universal participation:access to knowledge must be open to all; all are free to contribute to its growth.Second is the right to dispute: dissent is allowed, even encouraged.

Crucially, the unfettered right to contribute that these principles assert does notimply the unfettered right to contribute everything. With the privilege of accesscomes obligation. Contributions and discourse are bound by principles of reason,decorum, and fair play. Thus, for example, contributors have no rights to contributearguments with errors in logic, conclusions reaching far past their empirical warrant,or claims manifestly contrary to fact (such as 'the moon consists of green cheese).Each violates the rules of discourse.

To ensure participants meet their obligations - and so are eligible for itsprivileges - the Academy imposes peer review as the best means for quality control.This process is intended to check the validity of logic, that conclusions are withinreach of the data, that evidence is methodologiCally sound, and that manifest errorsare avoided. Claiming membership in the Academy is to claim not only an adherenceto the principles of rcason, decorum, and fair play. It also is to claim a willingnessto contribute to the means of quality control, to the monitoring of others who claimthe imprimatur of the Academy. This is a packaged deal, not a la carte.

Claiming membership in the Academy also implies a willingness not only toabide by but also to defend the core principles of universal participation and right todispute. Neglecting participation in peer review risks these principles dissolving.

Consider this example. Articles for Nature meet a high standard because thejournal imposes significant quality control via the mechanism of peer review.Removal or decline of expert review means a loss of quality control. To keep its high

Ethical Record, December, 1998 13

standard, Nature will seek alternative means to verify the quality of incoming work.For example, it might restrict the right of submission to a small group of certified,known to be reliable experts, which may have the consequence of violating theAcademy's core principles of universal participation and right to dispute. So,Nature's effort to maintain high standards - certainly laudable in isolation - may havea violently detrimental effect on intellectual freedom. All this is risked when peerreview is widely treated as a trivial element of the research enterprise.

ConclusionThe point of this analysis is to develop justifications for a very simple claim. Asresearchers, contributors to the production of knowledge, and members of theAcademy we need to restore respect for rigorous, independent, honest peer review.Otherwise, we risk a serious erosion in the value of our common enterprise.

Long-term efforts to restore this respect will come only from withinprofessional training. Just out of University, junior researchers may know a vastamount of content in their professional fields. But there's more to the business ofresearch and the Academy than content. Budgets and grantsmanship. Publicationsand conferences. Long-term planning and project management. Politics andcollaboration. Community service and social contracts. A lucky student is one whoglimpses these while pursuing their degree. However, most process-orientatedprofessional development currently is left either to accidental experience or toapprentice-style training in a postdoctoral environment. We learn, supposedly, bywatching the masters. This will no longer suffice.

The business of research largely is kept invisible to students and non-professionals. I fear that in the process, we're missing an opportunity to instill valuescrucial for the maintenance (or reinstallation) of high-integrity workingenvironments which serve us all. They also go a long way towards rcpaying ourobligations to the societies that surround us with the luxury to do the things many ofus love most dearly: thinking, learning, and struggling to understand.

W. Stewart and N. Feder. 1987. 'The Integrity of the Scientific Literature,'Nature 325 (15/1/87): 207-214.Time spent reviewing someone else's manuscript, I was once told,

is time away from my next publication.3 Examples would be (1) so that a reviewer may appropriate unpublished data,

or (2) so that a project or publication can be stalled while competing workgains priority.

4 This currently is the case with the World Wide Web. With pages of suchradically uneven reliability, the working assumption of most scholars is to beextremely wary if not personally acquainted with the source's author. This alsois useful for explaining why institutions within Academe are loathe to creditWeb productions as legitimate publications. No mechanism currently existsfor quality control or independent assessment.One's own work - made possible through the privilege of a society -presumably advances society; one's service to the obligation - the helping ofothers - advances it additionally.

The views expressed in this journal are not necessarily those of the Society.

14 Ethical Record, December, 1998

WINDRUSH: CHANGING THE FACE OF BRITAIN

Arthur Torrington,Secretary to the Windrush ftundation

Lecture to the Ethical Society, 27 September 1998

On 27 May 1948, five hundred people sailed from the Caribbean on the SS 'EmpireWindrush' in search of a better future. The ship arrived at Tilbury Docks, Essex, on21 June 1948. It was the beginning of a change to the face of Britain.

For centuries people have travelled to other lands in search of trade, riches,new frontiers, etc. For instance, in about AD 210, Libyan born Septimus Severus,Emperor of Rome, arrived in this country to inspect Hadrian's Wall where a unit ofEthiopians was stationed at Aballava (now Burgh-by-Sands) near Carlisle.

Writing in the early decades of the 8th century, the Venerable Bede (the Anglo-Saxon historian) said that the people of Britain - Celtic families - had invited Anglesand Saxon armies (Germanic people/tribes) to assist them in their battles with theScots and Picts. The warriors did not only fight for the Britons but also decided tooccupy parts of England. The defeat of the Britons at Hastings in 1066 resulted inthe emigration of people (mainly from Normandy, Northern France) who broughtmany changes to local customs, religion etc.

In the past five hundred years millions of people have travelled to and fromAfrica, Europe and Britain, thence to the New World. Ships carried settlers, slavesand cargo for sale or exchange. Some religious people left Europe in search of landswhere they could worship their God in peace and safety.

MayflowerThe ship Mayflower carried the Pilgrim Fathers, a group of former Church ofEngland separatists to North America where they founded Plymouth Colony, thefirst permanent British settlement in New England. Thc group consisted of 101 men,women and children who set sail from Plymouth, England, on 16 September, 1620.The Mayflower was used to change the face of Massachusetts. 21 December, 1620is still celebrated in New England as Torefather's Day. In the years that followedthere were many battles with the indigenous people (American Indians); but thesettlers survived. The year 1635 saw the opening of the first public school in NorthAmerica, the Boston Latin School. In 1636 Harvard, the oldest University in NorthAmerica, was founded. Today, the State of Massachusetts boasts manyachievements; it has produced President John F. Kennedy and other importantfigures in American history. The State has a vibrant economy, great educationalinstitutions, etc.

From the 17th century Britain has been a world power. This was due to thesuperior strength of her army and navy that consisted also of black soldiers, sailorsand others who served the King and Country. When the country needed men andwomen to fight in the Great War (1914-18), and in thc 1939-45 World War, youngmen from the West Indies also enlisted. Thousands lost their lives to liberate Europefrom Nazi occupation, even though black people were not entirely free in their owncountries. The Second World War left Britain almost in ruins, and it requiredrebuilding. The need for workers was urgent.

Ethical Record, December, 1998 15

Empire WindrushIn mid May 1948, adverts appear in Trinidad and Jamaican daily newspapers sayingthat a troopship was leaving for the United Kingdom and the passage was £28. 10shillings. It was an opportunity not to be missed. The SS Empire Windrush was onits way back to England, and 500 West Indians took up the offer. They did not knowwhat to expect in the UK, except that jobs might be easily available. None of themfully understood the significance of that historic journey. It is interesting to knowthat about 25% of the passengers were promised jobs with the Royal Air Force, 30%were ex-servicemen and women who were hoping to obtain work somewhere in theUK, and about 45% journeying in faith.

Many of them did not have enough money to pay for rooms in hotels orhostels. So it was a Jamaican, Baron Baker, who took the responsibility of arrangingaccommodation for the settlers. In 1944, he had joined the Royal Air Force. After theSecond World War, most of the West Indian servicemen and women were demobbedand sent back to the Caribbean. Baron had remained in London. Major Keith (anofficial from the Colonial Office) told him of the Windrush settlers, as Baron was ina position to assist them when they landed. The Colonial Office had made nopreparation for them, and it was Baron who suggested the use of Clapham CommonDeep Shelter. He told Major Keith, 'The Air Raid Shelter had been used to houseItalian and German prisoners of war, and even myself, when I came to Londonsometimes and could not find accommodation. So why not open it for the people onthe Windrush?'

On the evening of 22 June 1948 the shelter housed 236 Windrush settlers. Thedecision to open it was important in the making of Brixton as a multi-racialcommunity. The shelter was less than a mile away, and most of the settlers foundlodgings in thc London Borough of Lambeth. They were among the first group ofCaribbean people to journey to the UK in search of a better future. Those who settledhere during and after the end of slavery had little or no influence in bringing abouta change to the face of Britain. The nation remained monocultural until June 1948.

Black communities have existed mainly in Liverpool, London, Cardiff andBristol for over 400 years. African slaves had been taken there since the 17thcentury, and after slavery was abolished in 1834 many of them made their homes inthose cities. But, their communities were perennially rendered powerless by local(and national) authorities, and thugs who made their lives uncomfortable.

Black DiasporaIn the 'Introduction' to a booklet published in 1988 to commemorate the 40thanniversary of the Windrush landing at Tilbury Docks, Open University ProfessorStuart Hall (a Jamaican) wrote: The great wave of post-war migration from theCaribbean to the UK can be symbolically said to have begun with that fatefulvoyage.' The history of the black diaspora in Britain beings here.

For each one of the Empire Windrush's passengers, this was a uniqueexperience which (as we learn from their memoirs) changed their individual livesprofoundly. Yet it was also a key episode in the history of the Caribbean peoplesand their long, complex and tortuous relationship to the United Kingdom. Theumbilical connection between Britain and its Caribbean territories, forged overfour hundred years of history and spanning slavery, colonisation and de-colonisation, can be glimpsed in the very fact that Carthbean people in such large

16 Ethical Record, Decembec 1998

numbers had volunteered to fight, and often to die, in the 'European' warthousands of miles away from their homeland.

Yet many of these volunteers, whether returning on leave or to 'have a look-see', decided to make the one-way trip back. We cannot, I believe, understand thisdecision or indeed the decision of thousands of Caribbean people, and after them,people from the Asian subcontinent, to follow them, without some sense of whatthey were leaving and what they were coming back to.

They were leaving behind a homeland, not yet liberated from direct colonialrule, where the flag of Empire still flew, making them not full citizens of their owncountry but subjects of a colonising nation. They were leaving behind theimmense poverty of the countryside, the teeming un-and under-employment of thecolonial city (Kingston), the declining estates of Britain's 'sugar colonies' - oncethe jewel in the crown of the 'West India interest', and now destined to become thesymbol of a one-crop declining monoculture. A land where, for all itsextraordinary natural beauty, its vivacity, the vigour of popular life and culture,its range and diversity of peoples and cultures, the opportunities for ambitiousyoung people and the prospects for their children, especially if they came from the'lower orders', were nil.

What they were coming to was certainly not a 'Mother Country', a land ofmile and honey, where the streets were paved with gold. Those who had served inHis Majesty's forces knew better than that. But, though the path for black menand women was uncertain, there were opportunities, life chances - chances to betaken by those who were willing to gamble with the future because they had somuch at stake and so little to lose.'

StruggleThe Windrush settlers and others who arrived later had to struggle to survive inBritain. They endured prejudice, discrimination and harassment. Inspite of these,many individuals have made progress economically, educationally, and otherwise -against the odds. The 1950s was a challenging decade. Like the Pilgrim Fathers, thesettlers were drawn into fights with some of the indigenous people (teddy boys andothers); but the settlers survived. It came as a shock to the latter that their 350 yearBritish heritage was not fully appreciated in the UK, whereas European and Russianimmigrants and refugees were readily accepted. The settlers therefore concluded thatbeing black British was not an important factor to the general public.

The mid-I960s saw some improvements in living conditions. In 1965 the firstRace Relations Act was passed, but a few years before, it was not unusual for somelandlords to display signs like 'Room to let. No Irish, No coloureds, No dogs'. In1968, another Race Relations Act was passed. But the 1976 Act went further, givingadditional rights to members of minority groups who were treated less favourablythan others because of their race, colour, ethnicity, or nationality. Opinions are stilldivided as to the effectiveness of the three Acts, and the role played by theCommission of Racial Equality over the years.

More OpportunitiesNevertheless there is evidence that the 1976 Act has helped to create moreopportunities for black people. They have played important roles in the life of thiscountry - in local and central government, public service, sport, community service,equal opportunities, commerce, race relations, education, trade unions, arts,

Ethical Record, Decembee 1998 17

entertainment, music, fashion, culture and in many other areas. Political history wasmade in 1987, as four black labour MPs were elected to the House of Commons.Unsuccessful attempts had been made by David Pitt (later Lord Pitt) in 1959 and1970, and by other candidates after him. Black voices in Parliament are necessary toensure that our point of view is heard. The Windrush journey was undoubtedlyworthwhi le.

The 50th anniversary of the land at Tilbury Docks has been a major occasionnot only for Caribbean people, but also for the British people generally. The UK hasbecome a multi-cultural/multi-racial society, a situation that would have beenunthinkable in June 1948. It was not until the 1980s that there was nationalacknowledgement of this fact. The 1991 British Census shows a population of 54.9million. It includes 0.9 million Black and 1.8 million Asian people whosecontribution to the well being of this country is more significant that their numbers.

CelebrationThe Windrush celebration has been an occasion not only for looking back 50 years,but also for looking forward to the 21 st century and debating the future of thechildren and grandchildren of those who first laid a foundation for them in Britain.

AFTER OMAGH: IS THIS THE END OF THE PEACE PROCESS IN NORTHERN IRELAND?

John Good Lecture to the Ethical Society, 18 October 1998

The Good Friday agreement was probably the most significant event in Anglo-Irishrelations since the Westminster Treaty signed by Lloyd George, Winston Churchill,Michael Collins and others in 1922. That Treaty was followed by a murderous civilwar in the Irish Free State and 50 years of Orange rule in six of the nine counties ofhistoric Ulster.

Eamonn de Valera, the founder of the political party now in power in theRepublic, Fianna Fail, unleashed that civil war by refusing to accept the partition ofIreland, although it was ratified by a majority of the Irish parliament, the Dail. BertieAherne, prime minister of the Republic and leader of Fianna Fail, is now party to theagreement that is hoped will end the civil war between Unionists and Nationalists inso-called Ulster.

Much of the social, political and economic situation which existed between the1920s and 1970s has gone for good. The Republic now enjoys a standard of livinghigher than that of Britain and is the most rapidly growing economy in Europe.When I left Ireland in 1950, the population was 2,800,000 and still declining. It isnow 3,600,000 and half the population is under 25. The Republic was neverremotely socialist although the Labour Party there has been in coalitions with thetwo big bourgeois parties, Fine Gael and Fianna Fail.

The Six Counties, as the Northern Ireland statelet is called in the Republic,had, until the 1970s at least, superior social services and more jobs, if only for theUnionist Protestants. Until the 1970s the Catholics were systematicallydiscriminated against in employment and encouraged to leave the Province. Englandreceived most of the emigrants from the Republic and the Six Counties. Two millionleft the Republic between 1940 and 1960, although some eventually returned.

18 Ethical Record, December, 1998

The Unionist working class were the key element in maintaining the separateexistence of the Six Counties. They had some characteristics in common with the'poor white', largely Baptist population of the Bible Belt regions of the UnitcdStatcs. The Unionist working class identified with what they felt were the values andinterests of the people of the mainland. The Unionist masses had little or noknowledge of the history or culture of four-fifths of the country they inhabited. Theyfelt superior to the Catholics in the same way that whites felt superior to blacks inthe southern states of the USA.

They were ignorant of the part played by the Anglo-Irish Ascendency in there-creation of Irish national consciousness. Indeed, they were for the most partunaware of the very existence of the class from whom Parnell, Dr Douglas Hyde,W.B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, Erskine Childers and the Presbyterian Irishrevolutionaries like Wolfe Tone plus dozens of others emerged. Of the four IrishNobel Prize winners for Literature, three were Protestant Ascendency stock.

A significant element in the relations between Britain and Ireland is that thecolonisation of tthe 26 counties of the Republic was by settlers from England. Thecolonisation of six counties of Northern Ireland was mainly Calvinist, i.e.Presbyterian, largely Scottish, settlers. English or Anglican relations with theindigenous Catholic population were generally easier than the relations between thePresbyterian settlers and the native Catholics they dispossessed. Most of the Anglo-Irish aristocracy were Church of Ireland, i.e. Anglican. English names are morecommon today in Ireland even than Irish names in England.

Omagh is the Tinting PointNow finally, the Irish problem, which began in 1169 with the Normans who hadnames life Fitzgerald, Fitzmaurice, Fitzsimons etc, may be settled. Britain and theincreasingly wealthy Republic are members of the European Union. The Irish areadopting the common European currency enthusiastically and well ahead of Britain.They have been milking the EEC for ten times as much money as they ever paid intoit. They send their cleverest manipulators to Brussels and they have alwayscultivated the 44 million Irish in America and welcomed USA presidents.

The dourness of the Paisleyite Calvinistic loyalism has never been attractivein Britain, not even in most of Scotlimd, which is incidentally showing distinct signsof readiness to take back the independence they gave up in 1707. An amusingsymptom of the difficulty of explaining or justifying Irish loyalism is the regularspectacle on TV of regiments of men in bowler hats and wearing orange sashesmarching solemnly to assert their non-lrishness. A French friend asked me recentlyif the men in bowler hats wanted to look like Englishmen!

My guess, as someone who lived in Dublin until I was twenty three, and whoremembers the 1930s and 1940s and whose parents were English is that Omagh isthe turning point: people north and south are overwhelmingly in favour of peace.That is even more true of thc Republic, increasingly prosperous, where almost 100per cent of the population is hostile to perpetrators of boming outrages. The Irishrevolutionaries who achieved Irish indepedence were not indiscriminate terrorists.There will probably be other atrocities because there are fanatics and more Catholicshave been murdered for purely sectarian reasons then Protestants, but the worst, onehopes, is over. The Nobl Prize for peace shared between Catholics and Protestantsexpresses the hope of civilised people everywhere.

Ethical Record, December 1998 19

LONDON'S VICTORIAN ARCHITECTURE - LAISSEZ-FAIRISM SUPREME

Oliver Westmoreland Lecture to the Ethical Society, 1 November 1998

Princess Victoria came to the throne in 1837. London was much smaller then than itis now. Kensington and Hammersmith in the west were still largely countryside; theNash terraces round Regent's Park constituted a northern outpost of the West Endmetropolis; Hampstead and Highgate were well out in the wilds, considerably lessdeveloped than they are today. Whilst the East End was already tolerably welladvanced in its creation, south of the river extensive development had not yetreached as far as Wandsworth, Battersea and Brixton in the West or Deptford andGreenwich in the east. By the end of Victoria's reign, 64 years later in 1901, Londonhad expanded very considerably.

Back in the 18th century, Samuel Johnson had famously declared that 'Whena man is tired of London he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life canafford.' Clearly then by the Georgian era London had already acquired that vitalcharacter that it has today: that combination of crowdedness and variety that makesit a unique English city. In the Victorian period, this was no less the case. The authorof an anonymous guidebook of 1851 writes with elegant power:

London, 'Busy, Clamorous, Crowded, Imperial, London,' may be considerednot merely as the capital of England, or of the British Empire, but as themetropolis of the civilised world - not merely as the seat of Government, whichextends its connections and exercises its influence to the remotest point of theearth's surface - not merely as containing the wealth and the machinery by whichthe freedom and the slavery of nations are bought and sold - not merely aspossessing a freedom of opinion, and a hardihood in the expression of thatopinion, unknown to every other city - not merely in taking the lead in everyinforming science' and in every useful and embellishing art - but as beingforemost, and with out a rival, in every means of aggrandisement, and enjoymentof everything that can render life sweet and man happy...

It is alike the abode of intelligence and industry, the centre of trade andcommerce, the resort of the learned and inquiring, that spot that has given birthto and where have flourished the greatest kings, statesmen, orators, divines,lawyers, warriors, poets, painters and musicians; besides historians who haveimmortalised them. It is the refuge of the oppressed, the poor and the neglected;the asylum of the unfortunate or the afflicted; and the abiding place of him whowishes to advance his fortune, or further his progress in the arts, sciences,literature, or any pursuit that ennobles man and dignifies his nature...

Indeed London is now not merely the largest city in the known world, but itexceeds in opulence, splendour and luxury (perhaps in misery), all that ever wasrecorded of any city.'

In our century, we don't seem to write with such style and panache.Incidentally, it is rather an interesting point that London has from its verybeginnings, whatever its absolute size, been regarded as a large and overwhelmingplace. The Anglo-Saxons who conquered Roman Londinium (the size of a 20thcentury village) are said to have found it so; thus they refused to live there. As inmost things, it is the relative rather than the absolute that is significant.

20 Ethical Record, December 1998

Anyway, the expansion of London in both size and population in the Victoriaera was of a similar magnitude to that of the Georgian period; and the former wasnot much more than half the duration of the latter. In 1837 the population was lessthan two million; by 1901 it was about four-and-a-half million.

Further, London not only continued to expand outwards, as it had done withthe Georgians, but to some extent it expanded upwards as well - although notablynot to thc same degree as did some American cities in the late 19th century. Thepurpose-built apartment block in London was a Victorian innovation and, indeed,one of the most important of their architectural contributions. Although apartmentbuildings were already an established feature of some Scottish cities, they wereaccepted in London only unwillingly - by the higher social classes at any rate. Butcome they did and, in the last two decades of the period, to a large extent - and in anextraordinary variety of styles. Also, like much of Victorian society, there was asocial hierarchy evident - high-class apartment buildings were redbrick; low-classones yellowbrick. The purpose-built office block and grand department store werealso Victorian innovations. Thus London became taller and in some ways moreimposing; in these ways it developed from its Georgian antecedents.

Of course it was different in other ways as well. One difference, amongst otherthings was in its architectural style. The Georgians, despite a certain interest inGothick [with a (1c1and various other more exotic styles, were mainly classicists,not only in their architecture but in their general culture. The early Victorians tended,more or less, to follow the Georgian lead in architectural style, but with moderatelaissez-faire tendencies.

But tastes wcre changing; Georgian architectural idcas and buildings were, insome quarters at any rate, becoming unpopular. By the mid-Victorian period, the1860s, clear differences were emerging. The Gothick Revival which the Georgianshad begun had by now become far stronger; simultaneously, classical architecturalideas were breaking down. Victoria eclecticism (beautiful or notorious, dependingon your point of view) was now beginning to show significantly. The typically laterVictorian (and, in London, very un-Georgian) motif of the bay window had begunto appear. The bay window is one of the most significant aspects of Victorianarchitecture - one of the defining features that makes it what it is.

In the 1870s, architectural changes were truly revolutionary. Stucco, whichhad been enormously popular for houses since the 1820s, disappeared; in its placecame plain brick - red brick particularly. The red-and-white aesthetic of the exteriorsof buildings engendered by red brick and white painted woodwork (and sometimeswhite stone) became another late Victorian hallmark. The crowded, intenseornateness that we associate so much with the late Victorians was born in thisdecade. It was also in this decade that the Queen Anne Revival and DomesticRevival began their significant supplanting of the old main choice between Gothicand classical. The shape of buildings changed: gables and large chimneys were in,Gothic lwithout a 'le] and classical motifs declined.

Yet the situation was nothing if not complicated. Both Gothic and classicismsurvived, in one way or another, to the end of Victoria's reign - indeed, classicismwas beginning its Baroque Edwardian resurgence in the last years. Gothic remainedthe main style of choice for churches all through the era. The term 'Battle Of TheStyles' is one that is applied to different periods of English architecture, and perhaps

Ethical Record. Deceniber, 1998 21

to no period more deservedly than the latter part of Victoria's reign. Occasionally(and rather oddly from a late-20th-century point of view) the Battle Of The Stylestook on a political dimension: Tories were supposed to have a predilection forGothic; Whigs for classicism.

The late Victorian period was one of enormous, even incredible, inventivenessin architectural style and design - the more so when viewed in the context of itsrather sober Georgian and early Victorian antecedents. There were no longer'correct' styles of building; to put it plainly, anything went. Despite their reputationfor Puritanical and straightlaced (and perhaps hypocritical) social morals, theVictorians' architecture in London - and indeed elsewhere - was anything butstraightlaced. It was an enormous explosion of individuality; but not, some peoplewould argue, of taste. Perhaps we are now far enough away from the Victorian erato be able to make useful judgements on this - then again, perhaps we are not.

I am much indebted in the preparation of this talk to Donald I Olsen for hisexcellent book The Growth of Victorian London.

VIEWPOINT

British Foreign Policy Since 1945Tom Rubens' talk (ER Oct and Nov 98) embraced numerous issues. May I commentbriefly upon some of the economic factors, firstly upon the prime cause of ourecological problems. Tom, and many others, place much of the blame on theactivities of the multi-nationals. But these organisations are only the servants of theenormous appetites of the advanced nations. To place all the blame upon the multisis to blame the agents and to ignore the guilt of the principals, the ravenous demandsmade by the enormous populations of the advanced nations.

These nations have set up democratic governments which they instruct tosuppress discussion upon population restraint, and to provide their electorates withever increasing standards of living, regardless of consequent effects upon othernations, upon the environment, and upon posterity. And though democracy'has yetto show itself capable of rational and responsible government, its supporterscontinue to attempt to encourage its adoption universally.

The other issue I should like to raise is, who is primarily responsible for thirdworld poverty? Every nation has only a limited supply of resources. If a nationallows its population to expand without regard to' its resources, then the averagewealth per capita is inevitably small, and a proportion of the population falls intopoverty. Then along come the multi-nationals with wage offers no higher than arenecessary to obtain employees. Some say the the multis should offer higher wagerates than those set by the law of supply and demand. But economic systems aredynamic, not static. If a change is made, there will be consequent changes to otherfactors within an economy. An increase in wage rates encourages the adoption ofmechanisation, and the reduction of employment. Third world poverty arises fromexcessive populations with regard to the third world's developed resources; it is aproblem of their making, not of ours.

John Rayner - N. Wembley, Middlesex

22 Ethical Record, Decemben 1998

BOOK REVIEW Martin Green

What Everybody Really Wants to Know About Money, by Frances Hutchinson. JohnCarpenter, 2 The Spendlove Centre, Charlbury 0X7 3PQ, 12 (post-free).

Frances Hutchinson is an economic historian at Bradford University and this is a veryimportant book that will be ignored by writers on politics and economics. She claims thatsince economists have little understanding of the nature of money, they assume that it isjust a conventional neutral alternative to barter, whereas money is now traded for its ownends and has become the universal measure of good and bad.

Unfortunately, the challenge to the Western acceptance that laissez-fairecapitalism has some foundation in immutable law is extremely difficult to formulate in aworld that assumes that because the political parties that favoured communism have beendiscredited, socialism is unworkable. Therefore, while the challenge made by theprotagonists of social credit is perfectly valid (and the author is among them), it isdifficult to see how any progress can be made here in a world dominated by politicalforms of government that embrace capitalism.

It is worth reminding ourselves that the economic theory that underwritescapitalism is based on a few statements made by people such as Jeremy Bentham andAdam Smith over 150 years ago. The former proclaimed that 'It is the greatest happinessof the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong', and that pain andpleasures are the 'sovereign masters' governing man's conduct; the latter, 'It is not fromthe benevolence of the butcher, the brewer or the baker, that we expect our dinner, butfrom their regard for their own interest'.

These and similar statements are the justification for the acceptance of theimmutable laws of economic theory, which has become an academic discipline withpretensions to the rigour of scientific examination.

For it is true to say modern economics prides itself as a science, a study of thephenomena of the market-place. However, the market-place is not a naturalphenomenon, such as the weather, but a market dominated by the acquisition of money,and which is subject to the control or otherwise of governments, the governments thatown the central banks and print and control the supply of money itself.

Quite simply, whereas socialism posits a belief that man can improve his lot bycommon effort, capitalism implies that man can improve his lot only by exploiting hisfellows.

It is worth reminding ourselves that NATO is not so much an organisation ofmutual defence against an unseen enemy as the military arm of Western capitalism,dominated by the USA. Also, as Alan Freeman, in a Chapter he has contributed to thebook reminds us, the US, which is 'the sleeping policeman of the new world order', viathe International Monetry Fund, the World Bank, World Trade Organisation and morelatterly the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade, has the largest trade deficit in worldhistory.

Finally, remember what Peter Mandelson said shortly before the last election:'New Labour should aim for a robust model of capitalism that will equip Britain for therigours of the global market in the 21st century... It will be unique to Britain'scircumstances and it will be an adaptation of market capitalism, not the radicalalternative to it for which some are still searching'. Perhaps the Millennium Dome willbe the new South Sea Bubble.

Ethical Record, December, 1998 23

PROGRAMME OF EVENTS AT THE ETHICAL SOCIETY The Library, Conway Hall Humanist Centre, 25 Red Lion Square, Holborn, WC I

Tel: 0171 242 8037 No charge unless stated

DECEMBER 1998Sunday 1311.00 am THEODOR ADORNO - THINKER FOR OUR TIMES.

Stephen Kupfer presents An Introduction to Adorno's pessimisticanalysis of modernity.

3.00 pm EDWARD AVELING AND ELEANOR MARX. Terry Liddle offers a centennial appraisal of secularist and Marxist colleagues.

Sunday 2011.00 am A SEASONAL DISCOURSE. Barbara Smoker.

2.00 pm SPECIAL GENERAL MEETING (for Members only)

followed by

:it*** A WINTERVAL PARTY ****

At about 3.30 pm - £2.00 per head - all welcome

JANUARY 1999Sunday 1011.00 am ETHICAL ISSUES IN VIRTUAL REALITY. Niran Abbas

(Birkbeck College). (to be confirmed)

3.00 pm TOPICAL DISCUSSION with Terry Mullins

Sunday 1711.00 am THE THREAT OF THE MULTINATIONALS. Tom Rubens

examines the world-wide threat to democratic practice and economicjustice posed by multinational corporations and suggests ways ofovercoming this danger.

2.30 pm THE FUTURE OF THE SOCIETY AND CONWAY HALL(Members only)

73rd CONWAY MEMORIAL LECTURE Professor FRED ROSEN, The Bentham Project, University College London PHILOSOPHICAL IDEAS IN POLITICS - Bentham, Blair and Beyond

7.00 pm, Thursday, 25 February 1999 (Professor Rosen is a leading authority on Bentham's utiliarian ethics.)

SOUTH PLACE SUNDAY CONCERTS AT CONWAY HALL - 630 pm Tickets EttDecember 13 THE MUSICKE COMPANY E

SCARLATT1: Salve Regina', MONTEVERDI: taudate Dominum%CAVALLI: '0 bone Jest,' , J.S. BACH: '0 Jesuicin sass, 0 jesulein mild%

December 22 EMPEROR STRING QUARTET with IAN FOUNTAIN (piano)MOZART: K.478, BEETHOVEN: Op.18/4, DVORAK: A Op.81.

January 10 CHAGALL PIANO TRIOSAINT-SAINS: Op.18, PAUL ARCHBOLD: Trio (World Premiere), DVOBAK:Op.65.

January 17 EROICA STRING QUARTETBEETHOVEN: Op.95, MENDELSSOHN: Op.13, SCHUMANN: Op.41 No.3.

Season's programme from D. Morris, PO Box 17635, London NI 2 8WN (send S.A.E.)Published by the South Place Ethical Society, Conway Hall, 25 Red Lion Square, WC I 4RL

Printed by J.G. Bryson (Printer) Ltd, 156-162 High Road, London N2 9A5 ISSN 0014 - 1690