a)   Origins of the British New Left

The most comprehensive study to date of the early British New Left is Kenny (1995). Lin Chun (1993) covers both early and later New Left currents. Dworkin (1997) focuses on the analysis of culture. Archer (1989) is a useful collection of assessments and recollections by protagonists. Studies of the work of individuals include Newman (2002), Higgins (1999), and Elliott (1998).

There is a notable lack of studies comparing the British New Left with counterparts elsewhere: Young (1977) does so to some degree but in my view misunderstands the nature of the British New Left. For the New Left’s attitude toward Marxism, see Forgacs (1989) and Davis (2006).

• Archer, Robin, et al., eds. Out of Apathy: Voices of the New Left Thirty Years On. London: Verso, 1989.
• Chun, Lin. The British New Left. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1993.
• Davis, Madeleine. “The Marxism of the British New Left,” Journal of Political Ideologies 11, No. 3 (October 2006): 335–58.
• Dworkin, Dennis. Cultural Marxism in Postwar Britain: History, the New Left and the Origins of Cultural Studies. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997.
• Elliott, Gregory. Perry Anderson: The Merciless Laboratory of History. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minneapolis Press, 1998.
• Forgacs, David. “Gramsci and Marxism in Britain,” New Left Review 176 (July/August 1989):70–88.
• Higgins, John. Raymond Williams: Literature, Marxism and Cultural Materialism. London: Routledge, 1999.
• Kenny, Michael. The First New Left: British Intellectuals After Stalin. London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1995.
• Newman, Michael. Ralph Miliband and the Politics of the New Left. London: Merlin, 2002.
• Young, Nigel. An Infantile Disorder? The Crisis and Decline of the New Left. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1977.

b)   1968 in Great Britain

Research on extra-parliamentary movements in Britain during the 1960s is still in its infancy. There is no reliable archived-based historical study on the British protests in the later 1960s and early 1970s. Most of the literature on the British “1968” is unsophisticated from a conceptual point of view and unquestioningly adopts contemporary interpretations. Nick Thomas (2002) offers a good inroad into the British debates in the 1960s. For social change in Britain during the 1960s, see Donnelly (2005). Nick Thomas (1997) provides a rare study of the protests in the later 1960s. Despite its rather unstructured nature, Sandbrook (2006) offers numerous useful anecdotes and details.

A rather generic sociological perspective on British social movements can be gleaned from Lent (2001). Nehring (2005) embeds the protests of 1968 in the general history of protest in post–World War II Britain, and Nehring (2006) highlights the importance of pacifist traditions for British extra-parliamentary protests. The politicization of popular culture and consumerism still awaits its historian, however. Dworkin (1997) offers a succinct analysis of the interaction between New Left thought, history writing, and the emergence of cultural studies in Britain during this period.

Anecdotal evidence on the “long 1960s” can be gleaned from Green (1988 and 1998) on subculture, and from relevant passages in Marwick (1998). Rowbotham (2001) and Ali (2005) present memoirs that offer an excellent inroad into the cognitive orientations, networks, and experiences of activists.

• Ali, Tariq. Street-Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties. London: Verso, 2005.
• Donnelly, Mark. Sixties Britain: Culture, Society and Politics. London: Pearson, 2005.
• Dworkin, Dennis. Cultural Marxism in Postwar Britain. History, the New Left and the Origins of Cultural Studies. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1997.
• Green, Jonathon. Days in the Life: Voices from the English Underground 1961–1971. London: Pimlico, 1988.
• Green, Jonathon. All Dressed Up: The Sixties and Counterculture. London: Pimlico, 1999.
• Lent, Adam. British Social Movements: Sex, Colour, Peace and Power. London: Macmillan, 2001.
• Marwick, Arthur. The Sixties: Cultural Revolution in Britain, France, Italy, and the United States, c. 1958–c.1974. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
• Nehring, Holger. “The Growth of Social Movements,” in A Companion to Contemporary Britain, 1939–2000, ed. Paul Addison and Harriet Jones. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005, 389–406.
• Nehring, Holger. “The Politics of Security. The British and West German Protests against Nuclear Weapons,” Ph.D. diss., Oxford University, 2006.
• Rowbotham, Sheila. Promise of a Dream. London: Penguin, 2001.
• Sandbrook, Dominic. White Heat: A History of Britain in the Swinging Sixties. London: Little, Brown, 2006.
• Thomas, Nick. “The British Student Movement from 1965 to 1972.” Ph.D. diss., University of Warwick, 1997.
• Thomas, Nick. “Challenging Myths of the 1960s: The Case of Student Protest in Britain,” Twentieth Century British History 13, no. 3 (2002): 277–97.