Reinventing Peace: David Davies, Alfred Zimmern and Liberal Internationalism in Interwar Britain

Abstract

The interwar body of thought known as `idealism' has largely been read and understood - some would say parodied - through the work of E.H. Carr in his classic, The Twenty Years' Crisis. One of the consequences has been to sideline the contribution of writers such as Norman Angell, Leonard Woolf and Alfred Zimern, opponents of Carr and dedicated liberal internationalists. Zimmern in particular attempted to develop a version of liberal internationalism that emphasized the advancing role of the League of Nations in establishing an international framework of law, as well as the continuing importance of the British Commonwealth in securing a framework of international standards of civilization. His project - like that of other liberals after 1919 - may have been doomed to failure in the turbulent inter-war period and the years of the Cold War. However, in the post-Cold War era, many of his ideas, developed in another age, seem increasingly relevant.