This absorbing account of the life and work of Clara Collet, a leading economist, statistician and champion of women's employment, is the first biography of this remarkable woman and reveals through Collet's diaries her fascinating personal life. An early female university graduate (1880), then teacher, she campaigned for the secondary education provision of girls at a time when it was negligible. Her other major contribution was in raising the status of working-class women, becoming a Commissioner for the Royal Commission on Labour (1892). She was close to the family of Karl Marx, particularly with Eleanor Marx, and with Beatrice Webb. Her enduring friendship with the cult Victorian author George Gissing deeply influenced his writing. Her working relationships with Charles Booth, Lloyd George, Ramsay MacDonald and Winston Churchill are also celebrated

This absorbing account of the life and work of Clara Collet, a leading economist, statistician and champion of women's employment, is the first biography of this remarkable woman and reveals through Collet's diaries her fascinating personal life. An early female university graduate (1880), then teacher, she campaigned for the secondary education provision of girls at a time when it was negligible. Her other major contribution was in raising the status of working-class women, becoming a Commissioner for the Royal Commission on Labour (1892). She was close to the family of Karl Marx, particularly with Eleanor Marx, and with Beatrice Webb. Her enduring friendship with the cult Victorian author George Gissing deeply influenced his writing. Her working relationships with Charles Booth, Lloyd George, Ramsay MacDonald and Winston Churchill are also celebrated

Between 1880 and 1920 many women researched the conditions of social and economic life in Western countries. They were driven by a vision of a society based on welfare and altruism, rather than warfare and competition. Ann Oakley, a leading sociologist, undertook extensive research to uncover this previously hidden cast of forgotten characters. She uses the women’s stories to bring together the histories of social reform, social science, welfare and pacifism. Her fascinating account reveals how their efforts, connected through thriving transnational networks, lie behind many features of modern welfare states and reminds us of their powerful vision of a more humane way of living – a vision that remains relevant today.

This second volume of essays on nineteenth and twentieth century economic thought, complements the first and continues the high standards of scholarship and academic rigour.

This reference book, containing the biographies of more than 1,100 notable British women from Boudicca to Barbara Castle, is an absorbing record of female achievement spanning some 2,000 years of British life. Most of the lives included are those of women whose work took them in some way before the public and who therefore played a direct and important role in broadening the horizons of women. Also included are women who influenced events in a more indirect way: the wives of kings and politicians, mistresses, ladies in waiting and society hostesses. Originally published as The Europa Biographical Dictionary of British Women, this newly re-worked edition includes key figures who have died in the last 20 years, such as The Queen Mother, Baroness Ryder of Warsaw, Elizabeth Jennings and Christina Foyle.

George Gissing's work reflects his observations of fin-de-siècle London life. Influenced by the French naturalist school, his realist representations of urban culture testify to the significance of the city for the development of new class and gender identities, particularly for women. Liggins's study, which considers standard texts such as The Odd Women, New Grub Street, and The Nether World as well as lesser known short works, examines Gissing's fiction in relation to the formation of these new identities, focusing specifically on debates about the working woman. From the 1880s onward, a new genre of urban fiction increasingly focused on work as a key aspect of the modern woman's identity, elements of which were developed in the New Woman fiction of the 1890s. Showing his fascination with the working woman and her narrative potential, Gissing portrays women from a wide variety of occupations, ranging from factory girls, actresses, prostitutes, and shop girls to writers, teachers, clerks, and musicians. Liggins argues that by placing the working woman at the center of his narratives, rather than at the margins, Gissing made an important contribution to the development of urban fiction, which increasingly reflected current debates about women's presence in the city.

Charles Booth's pioneering survey, Life and Labour of the People in London, published in 17 volumes between 1889 and 1903, was a landmark in empirical social investigation. His panorama of London life has dominated all subsequent accounts: its scope, precision and detail make it an unrivalled source for the period. Mr. Charles Booth's Inquiry is the first systematic account of the making of the survey, based upon an intensive examination of the huge Booth archive. This contains far more material than was eventually published, in particular on women, work, religion, education, housing and social relations, as well as on poverty. While the book acknowledges the leading role of Booth himself, it highlights the significance of the contributions of his associates, including Beatrice Potter (Webb), Octavia Hill, Llewellyn Smith and G.H. Duckworth. Life and Labour of the People in London is a founding text of both social history and modern sociology. It has however commonly been misunderstood and frequently misused. Mr. Charles Booth's Inquiry sets the survey in perspective and demonstrates the richness of the Booth archive and its potential for modern scholarship in both history and the social sciences.