THE EMERGENCE AND MEANING OF SOCIALIST PLURALISM

Socialist pluralism grew between 1900 and 1925 within the British labo r movement, notably around Harold Laski and the guild socialists such as G.D.H. Cole. Its criticisms of state monism and organized capitalis m have roots in writers as different as Proudhon, Sorel, Lord Acton, J ames, Spencer, Gierke and Maitland. Socialist pluralism wanted to tran scend the representative system by means of functional federalism. Tha t led it to enter the debate over the creation of self-governing econo mic and political institutions in the 1960s.