Economic History 161

tributing hardships evenly and during the war already pre-
pared the ground for the later social revolution.1017

Y ECONOMIC HISTORY

Many of the books mentioned in the previous section deal
also, of course, with this period 'e.g. nn. 848, 850, 865, 880 .
There is little enough to add. Most of the problems have not
yet, as it were, achieved historical status by ceasing to be
immediately relevant, and they are therefore still subject to
the sway of the economist. One such economist has collected
his influential articles.1018 Pollard has attempted a no doubt
premature general survey.1019 How tentative this sort of work
must be is shown by Aldcroft's efforts to rescue Britain's
economic growth from the charge of being pitifully inade-
quate, only at once to find his arguments and figures modified
in a downward direction by Dowie.1020 The unexpectedly
swift economic recovery sifter the 1931 crisis - a question still
under discussion - is once more considered by Richardson
who comes to the conclusion that an earlier long-term develop-
ment was merely interrupted by the crisis.1021 (Some inter-
ruption.) There have been several good business histories.
Wilson has raised the story of soap and margarine to a new
level, and Coleman has done the same for that of silk and
rayon.1022 These are massive achievements of a new kind of

1017 Richard M. Titmuss, Problems of Social Policy. 1950. Pp. xi, 596. -
S. M. Ferguson and H. Fitzgerald, Studies in the Social Services.
1954. Pp. ix, 366ff. Rev: EHR 69, 69of.

ids A. C. Pigou, Aspects of British Economic History> i$18-1925. L:
Macmillan: 1947. Pp. viii, 251.

I01f Sidney Pollard, The Development of the British Economy^ 1914 -1950.
L: Arnold: 1962. Pp. ix, 422. Rev: EHR 79, 637; EcHR* 15, 562^

lose Derek H. Aldcroft, 'Economic Growth in Britain in the inter-
war years: a reassessment*, EcHR* 20 (1967), 311-26. -J. A.
Dowie, 'Growth in the inter-war period: some more arithmetic',
ibid. 21 (1968), 93-112.

losi H. W. Richardson, 'The basis of economic recovery in the
nineteen-thirties: a review and a new interpretation*, EcHR* 15
(1962-3), 344-63.

iota Charles H, Wilson, A History of Unilever: a study of economic growth