Afterword: Closing Reflections on the New Politics of Leisure and Pleasure

Abstract

When this book was first proposed, a number of reviewers commented on its viability. It was interesting, said one, ‘but a lot of what they talk about isn’t political’. This was mistaken, on two counts, both of which we hope are clear from reading the book. First, leisure has always been political. Leisure time had to be fought for, in a time of unremitting toil, and then defended. Successive factory and employment acts across a range of coun tries created space within the working week variously for men, women and children but a succession of legislative interventions governed what people, particularly the working class, could do with their leisure time — what they could see or read, what they might ingest or otherwise do with their bodies, whether or not they could place a bet, where they might walk, what they might hear a comedian say from the stage, and so on. In essence, as this book shows, this remains the case — albeit in ways that are undeniably complex. Secondly, the word ‘politics’ has, since the 1960s, acquired a diverse set of meanings which extends far beyond the doings of professional politicians. Indeed, one can draw a useful distinction between a narrow (P1) and broader definitions of politics (P2). In the UK, Politics 1 refers to what happens in the Westminster village, what is discussed daily in the politics pages of the press, during weekly political programmes on the television and so. Politics 2 refers more broadly to all social relations underpinned by the exercise of power and constraint.