Radical and/or respectable: coverage of radical politics in The Times and the Manchester Guardian in interwar Britain

Abstract

Abstract A major issue for campaigners for radical political programmes is the question of publicity. A vibrant literature has emerged examining the ways in which the Labour party developed a media strategy and cultivated their own newspapers and links with established media organizations in mid twentieth-century Britain. However, the role of the quality press in helping make the radical respectable in the interwar and Second World War period merits more attention. This article provides a detailed analysis of internal developments at The Times and the Manchester Guardian to explain how both papers came to promote radical policies.