The League of Learning Project

Introduction

The purpose of this chapter is to highlight Henry Jones’s reflections on the relationship between power and knowledge by analysing certain elements that, according to Jones, contributed to shaping the political, social, and economic structure of late-nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century Britain. His analyses, as will be outlined in this work, concerned both specific aspects (such as the role of political parties – in his case the Labour Party, the creation of various ethical societies, and the situation of workers), as well as more abstract questions, such as issues relating to democracy and the role of education. Alongside a historical reconstruction of the ideas and events that marked the most important stages of Jones’s life, there were considerations aimed at emphasising the innovativeness of the British thinker’s reflections.

Jones’s speculations on the themes of democracy and political parties are particularly relevant today, especially in the light of the historical context and his belonging to the British idealism movement. He brought forward a strong criticism of the role of political parties and the possibility that, through them, an ideal of the common good could be achieved. This led him to formulate a largely pessimistic view of the state of democracy, which could be remedied, for Jones, only through a moral reform of society and man. His reflections, considering the historical and cultural context, anticipated many of the debates that, in contemporary times, focus on the analysis of the critical aspects of democratic systems. Furthermore, considering the scant scholarly literature on Jones, this work can provide useful coordinates for further research on the thought of an author considered marginal when compared to other better-known British idealists such as Thomas Hill Green, Bernard Bosanquet or Francis Herbert Bradley.

The Freedom of Knowledge

Like most of the authors belonging to the British idealism movement, Jones was particularly interested in the philosophical assumptions underlying the way knowledge operates in the personal, social and political spheres. The subject of knowledge and its value became even more important in light of the events that were about to disrupt world political stability such as the outbreak of the First World War. Indeed, Jones was a direct observer of the enormous role that knowledge played in modern mass democracies and the danger they ran from its manipulation. He held that the way democracy functioned, its stability and its existence derived precisely from the use that was made of knowledge and the way in which it was disseminated within society. For this reason, while giving an absolute value to democracy, Jones was aware that it had two opposite potentials. As he stated: ‘A democracy is capable of being either the worst, or the best kind of rule’ (Jones, 1909, p. 115).

Everything revolved around the way citizens interact, which was the real means of fulfilling their true potential. For Jones, in fact, the very essence of democracy was knowledge disseminated through education and widened through communication. The very role of education consisted precisely in stimulating a sense of inquiry and bringing to light the contradictions of the world (Jones, 1909, p. 206). True democracy operated most authentically when its citizens were educated in the virtue of knowledge (Jones, 1909, p. 78). To be educated in the virtue of knowledge, which was different from being educated in a certain kind of knowledge, was equivalent to providing citizens with the most important of liberties: the liberty to know. Above all liberties, wrote the poet John Milton in his Areopagitica, ‘give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience’ (Hales, 1894, p. 50). Jones believed that Milton spoke well and wisely. According to him, the liberty to know was not only the greatest of all liberties but their condition (Jones, 1915, p. 195). This liberty must be guaranteed and respected by any political authority, and it was no coincidence that when this liberty was lacking, all other liberties and the entire democratic organisation collapsed.

Indicative in this regard was what happened in most liberal democracies of the early twentieth century, including Great Britain. It was only thanks to the solidity of its institutional tradition and certain aspects of its political culture that Britain did not suffer the decline endured by continental democracies. What Jones witnessed during this period was a new event in the history of politics; namely, the manipulation of the masses through the use of political parties, which would later become a powerful instrument in the hands of the first post-war dictators. Jones’s insights in this regard seem to anticipate, in part, the future of democracy and the role of knowledge and communication.

The Structural Problem of Political Parties

According to Jones, there was no doubt that, in a modern mass democracy, the political party was the most appropriate instrument to represent the interests of the entire population. Indeed, as Jones stated: ‘The party is the most effective political entity in the modern State’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 526). However, according to Jones, there were some structural problems within the nature of the political party itself that made its existence and the achievement of its goal a contradiction in terms.

First of all, there was a problem of harmonisation between the ideals that held a political state together. According to Jones, these were the ideals of friendship and the common good, and the way in which a political party operated to achieve these ideals (Jones, 1909–10, p. 524). Every political party, however noble its moral ideals may have been, was forced to come to terms with what Jones called the tragedy of human life (Jones, 1914–15), which consisted of the collision of rights with other rights and of lesser good with a greater good. The inevitable contact with reality forced each political party to become the representative of a particular class of interest. This clash limited the vision of a politics oriented towards the pursuit of a common good, i.e. a good that was as comprehensive and inclusive as possible. Thus, the first substantial break between the political state and the citizens whom it represented takes place. In fact, the political party became an autonomous entity in search of survival. This survival relied upon its ability to gather enough votes from a civil population that no longer identified with a common idea of the good but rather with a much narrower and more specific one. A political party was compelled by the demands of democratic life not only to fragment the notion of the common good but also to attempt to separate the common will of the citizens; i.e. to persuade a sufficient number of citizens to identify with its own political programme. There was, therefore, always the danger that institutional conflicts within the chambers of parliaments spread outside, generating what parliamentarianism tended to eschew, namely conflict within society. A possible solution to this problem would lead again to further incompatibilities with the complexity of the political state. Indeed, if the party did not seek a particular good, but a good so general that it could be accepted by all members of civil society, the pursuit of such a good would create similar divisions within civil society when citizens attempted to implement it in practice. The party itself would be ineffective and, therefore, devoid of any reason to exist, dissolving into what Jones called a ‘liquid mass liable at any moment to any change’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 526).

There was thus a lack of consistency between the search for the stability of the political party and the inevitable continuous evolution of the notion of the common good. It was precisely this incoherence between the two parts that led to the manipulation of the masses. In fact, as Jones claimed:

The party must cohere together when the purposes that called it forth have become obscure, if not obsolete. Thus the political party comes to stand men know not well for what. It becomes a name under which men rally, and a symbol for exciting emotions. It appeals to confused prejudices, and employs other methods than those of persuasion by means of argument. It selects its ‘party colours’, and, if it can, invents and sets men singing a ‘party tune’; it insults men’s eyes with ‘posters’ and men’s ears with ‘cries’; and it devotes itself by any method it can invent to a conspiracy of silence about its own defects and to keep its opponent on the rack of criticism. [Jones, 1909–10, pp. 526–27]

The structural inability of a party to control the continuous evolution of civil society was what lay behind the need for parties to regard the mass as a liquid form that could be manipulated according to their own needs. Politicians appealed to the impulses and emotions of citizens because, as Jones pointed out, echoing the words of Graham Wallas, one of the leaders of the Fabian Society, ‘reason has a small effect upon numbers: a turn of imagination, often as violent and as sudden as a gust of wind, determines their conduct’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 527; see also Bolingbroke, 1749; Wallas, 1908). Thus, the politician became a manipulator of the psychology of the masses and, as Jones stated, ‘the medium in which the politician works dye his hands’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 527).

The tendency for political parties to manipulate the masses was something Jones found within the British Conservative and Labour parties. The former, as Jones stated,

has sought to excite the nation with fear of invasion; implied shallow loyalty on the part of our Colonies; attributed mad dreams of isolation to our Irish neighbours; and prophesied ‘the end of all things’ – the invasion of the privacies of life, the loosening of domestic ties, the corruption of the spirit of independence, the destruction of thrift, the abolition of private property, the ruin of our industries and commerce, and the general decadence of the national character. [Jones, 1909–10, p. 538]

Although in a different way than the Conservative Party, which manipulated the population for a narrow range of mainly economic interests, even the Labour Party employed the same manipulative means. The Labour Party shaped its policy by appealing to the particular interests of a specific social class. It did this by transcending the moral message implicit in its policies, a message that represented a far more inclusive idea of the common good than that of the Conservative Party. Jones was fully aware that ‘the class they [the Labour Party] represent is the largest, that its needs are greatest, and that its rights have been most of all postponed and neglected in the past and must be respected much more in the future’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 539). Nevertheless, the Labour Party no less betrayed the principles of rectitude in statesmanship; i.e. they stood for a lesser good than that of the state as a whole (Jones, 1911–12, p. 177). Acting in the interests of a class, the Labour Party did not appreciate that it had reduced the state to the morally crude world of industrialism (Jones, 1909–10, p. 536). Each party represented a specific type of social class, which might have been the more or less numerous or the more or less powerful. Yet, the same radical flaw, Jones argued, ‘runs through the methods whereby all the political parties elicit the will of the citizens’ (Jones, 1909–10, p. 540). For good or bad purposes, directly or indirectly, all citizens were constantly subject to an attempt to manipulate their will. Thus, according to Jones, ‘it is evil to taint the very spirit of citizenship, by the deliberate pursuit of any interest less broad than that of the nation as a whole’ (p. 540).

Democracy was served not by those who shaped the will of the people, but by those who made the will, using Jones’s expression, an ‘enlightened will’ (p. 540). The will of the population must not be directed in any other way than towards every aspect of knowledge. For this reason, Jones placed a supreme value on free and universal education and committed a large part of his energies, intellectual and material, to ensuring that all citizens had access to the most liberal education possible.

The Project for an Ethical Society

The individuality of man was sacred and to be protected, Jones asserted, just as, despite all social changes, the distinction ‘between meum and tuum’ had to be guaranteed (Jones, 1905, p. 285). Progress, Jones reiterated, did not occur through the destruction of social relations among men or through their indistinct union, but only through a moralisation of the individualities and relationships that distinguished them from each other. Moral education in the principles of citizenship was the indispensable element for understanding the complexity of relationships existing in the modern state, in which, with increasing intensity, industrial, commercial, and religious organisations developed. Membership in these organisations completely absorbed the existence of individuals. Yet, in modern societies organised through representative groups, this risked translating into a weakening of the role and value of the individual. The individuals were victims of forces they could not control, which collided with each other and created a sense of personal powerlessness that would paralyse their will (Jones, 1905, pp. 287–88).

Individuals could not be allowed to replace personal selfishness with class selfishness and thus leave the representation and protection of their interests in the hands of those who wanted to manipulate them (Jones, 1905, p. 291). What Jones deeply despised about modern civic life was that the interests of a single trade should decide the choice of rulers and that those devoted to the choice of rulers themselves were completely unaware of the practices of private virtue and the obligations of citizenship. The state, he asserted, ‘is not safe unless public opinion is enlightened opinion’ (Jones, 1905, p. 292). The alternative to the rampant crisis of educational methods and the dynamics of a politics of his day that was too oriented towards economic problems was envisioned by Jones in the creation of an ethical society. This was the premise that drove him to participate actively in the initiatives of the London Ethical Society (LES), the first and most important ethical society in Britain. The LES arose, not by chance, but because of cultural collaborations within the Anglo-Saxon world and the decisive influence of the leading exponents of British idealism, such as John Henry Muirhead, Bosanquet, and John Stuart Mackenzie (Adler, 1890; 1894). Thus, Muirhead recalled in his autobiography:

The Ethical Culture movement had been started in America ten years before under the leadership of Dr. Felix Adler. […] Able men were attracted to the movement, W. M. Salter, William James’s son-in-law, Burns Weston, the future editor of the International Journal of Ethics, John Graham Brooks of Harvard [… and others]. In 1885 Graham Brooks came to England […] and found willing ears to the suggestion of a London Ethical Society. In Bonar’s diary, under the date May 19, 1886, mention is made of a meeting in his house in Hampstead ‘to talk of a proposed ethical course at Toynbee Hall next winter and afterwards’ and, under date June 8th, of a meeting of the ‘Ethical Society’ at University Hall, attended by MacDonald, F. C. Montague (brother of C. E.), Goodwin, Professor of Latin at University College, L. P. Jacks, myself and others. [Harvey, 1942, pp. 74–75; see also Gordon & White, 1979, p. 83; Spiller, 1934, p. 2]1

This society partly echoed the ideals that had led Thomas Davidson to create, in 1883, the Fellowship of the New Life, an association inspired by Rosminian teachings (Lataner, 1957) and a philosophy strongly centred on the belief in a God who is immanent within the world (DeArmey, 1987; see also Good, 2004). Indeed, the two organisations shared the same goal, namely a reform of society based on the values of ethics and Christian religion that transformed the logic of competition into one of cooperation. However, unlike the American ethical societies of the same name, initiated by Felix Adler, the British ones were characterised, as Muirhead himself asserted, by a peculiar feature. Although both were inspired by the dictates of religion, British ethical societies were managed and represented by professional philosophers who were less inclined towards the dogmas of religion and more oriented towards transforming belief into action (Harvey, 1942, p. 75). In this tendency, they were guided by Bradley’s maxim expressed in the ‘Concluding Remarks’ of the Ethical Studies: ‘But in religion, despite appearances, we have to believe that something is real. We must have an inward assurance that the reality is above the facts’ (Bradley, 1876, p. 302).

The importance of the religious aspect (as adapted to the canons of ethical and social reform) carried some significant consequences, such as the conviction, shared by Jones himself, of a unique structure of reality that transcended any kind of opposition between extremes. Albeit seemingly narrowly philosophical in nature, this element had very important implications for the evolution of British politics. It was no coincidence, in fact, that in the Presidential Address of the Ethical Society in 1897, the British idealist Edward Caird presented his work Individualism and Socialism, stating: ‘There is a great and growing force of thought and experience which is steadily beating down the noise of faction, and gaining ground for wider and more comprehensive views’ (Caird, 1897, pp. 19–20). Caird’s position was shared by all of the exponents of British idealism who belonged to the various ethical societies founded on the model of the Ethical Society. It was at the heart of a critique of all those who had deserted the unitary commitments proposed by the society, creating, in turn, models of societies focused again on oppositions of extremes.

The LES broadly mirrored the project underlying the creation of Davidson’s Fellowship; namely, it was a society conceived as an interconnection of groups and individuals guided by the same set of ethical conviction, without the provision of any rationalised and hierarchical order within it. However, the commitment to foster the creation of solid foundations for common life based on the principle of mutual aid and the enhancement of the spiritual value of existence did not seem to have been endorsed by all members of such societies. In 1884, just one year after the creation of the Fellowship, some members expressed dissatisfaction with ideas that they believed were too anchored in the spiritual realm to contribute substantially to the change of the material world. The Fabian Society was thus founded by those who left the Fellowship in its early years (Pease, 1916; see also Cole, 1961; MacKenzie & MacKenzie, 1977; Palazzolo, 1999). This included several original members of the Ethical Society, such as James Ramsay MacDonald (Manton, 2003). The rupture, as George Bernard Shaw recalled, was due to the overly abstract nature of the communal ideas of the Fellowship and various ethical societies of the time, which, according to the opinions of Sidney Webb, were unable to draw together a group of intellectuals that would be capable of influencing the country’s political choices (Armytage, 1961). Thus, while the intention of ethical reformers was to spiritually reorganise the character of citizens, that of Fabian reformers focused on the material aspect of human life, directing their energies towards changing the economic disparities of workers and identifying themselves as exclusive bearers of the socialist message (Pease, 1916, p. 32).

The criticisms that Jones directed towards the Fabians concerned precisely the claim of centralising their reformist message and their willingness to replace the spiritual focus with the material one. In particular, Jones reproached those who had tried to reduce and channel the reformist elements of Christianity into the theoretical constructs of socialism, thus distorting Caird’s appeal to a comprehensive world view. A prominent exponent of this orientation was Reginald John Campbell, the founder of the New Theology Movement, who served on the executive of the Fabian Society from 1908 to 1909 (Pease, 1916, p. 187). In 1902, in the pages of The Hibbert Journal, Campbell published ‘The Aim of the New Theology Movement’,2 celebrating the Christian aspects of socialism and the positive turn in viewing the problems plaguing modern industrial societies as something that could be addressed through direct action on social policies (Campbell, 1906–07). To these positions, Jones responded with the article ‘Divine Immanence’, in which he decisively rejected attempts to reduce the dictates of religion to an immanent historical process (Jones, 1906–07). Socialism was viewed as a means to interpret the message of religion, but it did not represent the religion itself. Immanence was something else entirely, Jones asserted, and could not be reduced to analogy (Jones, 1906–07, p. 750).

Despite being exclusively religious in nature, Jones’s reasons were useful tools when interpreting the causes of negative considerations towards the Fabians and the distinction that Jones himself drew between a form of ‘true and false socialism’ (Jones, 1909–10). In fact, his belief in the immanence of the Christian message transformed the abstract principles of socialism into objective truths, relegating the aspect of moral reform of character to the background. The marginalisation of the moral problem, already highlighted by Bosanquet (Bosanquet, 1895; see also Ball, 1896; Bosanquet & Bosanquet, 1896), risked producing a further mechanistic view of the state without resolving the problem of conflict. Moreover, in the creation of a socialist state, it also risked an egalitarian reduction of men to merely material level, thus deceiving them into believing that they have achieved that ‘Kingdom of God upon Earth’ (MacGiffert, 1906–07) through a simple rebalancing of socio-economic realities.

Jones was aware of this risk and warned against the danger of false socialism, a few years later, in his ‘The Corruption of the Citizenship of the Working Man’ (1911–12). The publication of this work ignited a heated debate within the pages of The Hibbert Journal. Jones’s essay became the subject of numerous criticisms from both socialists and the Labour Party, which by this stage had become the political voice of many Fabians.

A ‘Wise’ Democracy

Jones argued that a truly democratic society was the place for criticism, growth and, therefore, reform, because the greater the possibility of giving voice to even the smallest of complaints, the fewer were the dangers of undermining the foundations of society (Jones, 1919b, p. 159). Thus, according to Jones, two different types of democracy could exist, yet they were diametrically opposed to each other. The first one was what Jones referred to as ‘ignorant’ or ‘selfish democracy’ (Jones, 1919b, p. 173). An ignorant democracy was one that manipulated the masses, and the distinction of the masses into abstract classes made the manipulation selfish as it sacrificed individuality in the name of the functioning of the democratic system in which confrontation only occurred between interest groups. This type of democracy was realised when the need for democratic governance overcame the democratic need to give everyone the capacity to choose and judge independently not only the rulers but also, and above all, the rulers’ choices.

The value of democracy lay not only in its ability to give voice to the will of people expressed through majority decisions, but also in the freedom to multiply and understand individual wills. Democracy was not only a political order, but also an attitude of the spirit. The problem with this type of democracy was its reduction to the circumscribed sphere of the functioning of political practice without taking into account the fact that democracy was not only the arena of institutionalised confrontation but the place where individualities learnt to know each other. A merely procedural democracy could turn into the worst of evils. As Jones stated:

The supreme problem of the State, it may be well to make clear, is not merely nor primarily to secure a particular form of government; but to learn what it ought to strive after under any form of government. We are inclined to assume that all will be well with the State provided its government be democratic; and we consider the democratic State to be that in which all its adult citizens have a share in ruling. But a State may be democratic in this sense, and still be corrupt and degenerate. [Jones, 1909, pp. 114–15]

What stands out from Jones’s words is the twofold nature of democracy, institutional and spiritual. Democracy, then, was not just a form of government, but the place of the spirit where man’s sovereignty lay (Jones, 1909, p. 128), because true liberty was granted by a form of government and a rule of conduct. This rule of conduct meant for Jones mutual understanding, and mutual understanding was only possible when there was complete and authentic knowledge.

Therefore, Jones argued for the creation of a second type of democracy. Reflecting on what was the Platonic idea of the philosopher kings, Jones stated: ‘We shall recognise that the philosopher-king in order to govern requires philosophic subjects, and that the citizen who can willingly obey the wise must himself be wise’ (Jones, 1910, p. 213). A wise democracy, in Jones’s idea, was a democracy where there reigned, in each individual, a sense of common ownership and responsibility for the management of power and its consequences. The role of the citizen in this kind of democracy was like that of ‘one who stands on the shore of a vast ocean, all in storm, witnessing a great argosy setting forth on a voyage of adventure and discovery to a land all unknown […]. Its captain has only dim prognostications of the direction in which he should sail […]. His authority over his crew is insecure, for the spirit of captaincy is in them all’ (Jones, 1919b, p. 174).

A truly democratic state must, therefore, have virtuous citizens responsible for the consequences of their choices. Responsibility for a certain decision could only be attributed when the decision was made with full awareness and thus knowledge of the facts. Democracy, then, was not so different from the Socratic sense of philosophy; i.e. a continuous arousing of inquiries (Jones, 1909, p. 158). Hence, citizens were to be educated, but not in the way the citizens of Germany were educated during the period that preceded the outbreak of the First World War where the ultimate aim of the national education system was to train men and women for the progress of the state (Jones, 1924, pp. 229–30).3 ‘I would educate them’, Jones argued, ‘into a fuller sense of the magnitude of their responsibility and the splendour of their chance’ (Jones, 1919b, p. 174).

Forming a League of Learning

Jones saw the problem of politics as revolving entirely around the issue of education. His belief in the need to educate citizens in the principles of citizenship was so strong that it turned Jones into a true prophet and missionary, whose task was to spread the word of idealism in the United Kingdom and throughout the English-speaking world. In 1908, Jones left for Australia to give a series of lectures at major universities on the continent (Boucher, 1990). In 1918, at the invitation of the National Defence Council, he was also appointed as a member of the British government mission to intensify collaboration between British and US educational institutions. In the United States, as a guest at Rice University, Jones outlined his plan for the creation of a League of Learning, with the aim of fostering intercultural exchange between students and professors of the respective universities. This would foster closer cooperation in the teaching of what he called ‘intelligent citizenship’, something that was based on the fundamental principle of mutual knowledge.

The reason behind the choice of the United States as a ‘pilgrimage destination’ was not only related to the same cultural background, but extended to political considerations. According to Jones, considering the development and end of the world conflict, the two countries shared the responsibility of securing world peace. This duty, for him, was not given by virtue of the successful outcome of the war, but as a relative consequence of owning a deeper sense of justice than that of the rest of the nations (Jones, 1919a, p. 190). Great Britain, as well as the United States, developed a higher sense of politics than the old states on the European continent. The essence of this political superiority arose, according to Jones, from the notion of fair play (Jones, 1919a, p. 291). Fairness, both in games and in political practice, was a fundamental principle in English-speaking countries. It was demonstrated by the willingness to give everyone the chance to participate fully, adhering to the rules and showing mutual respect, to properly develop their abilities. Translated into the political sphere, the principle of fairness coincided with the model of wise democracy outlined by Jones. In fact, as he stated:

If we have to guide and guard lower forms of civilization than our own, we will try in the future, as in the past, to govern for the sake of the governed. Whatever promise of growth their ruder civilization offers, we want to make the most of it. We desire to make the best use of all the good that lies in their simple customs, their quaint traditions, and their religion, rather than supplant them with those of our own which must remain alien to them. […] Good government alone is wise government, and wise government follows the example of the mother whose aim always is the good of her child. [Jones, 1919a, pp. 291–92]

It was necessary to educate populations and their respective citizens to take part in the rules of common life by following certain key principles of common life itself, namely fairness in following the shared rules. Fairness, in fact, was nothing other than the union of the principles of freedom and democracy. The reason for Jones’s visit to the Rice Institute was, he stated, ‘to guide the youth in the enterprise of freedom and fair play’ (Jones, 1919a, p. 293).

The plan for the realisation of the League of Learning was set out in detail by Jones. It differentiated according to the range of people involved such as university students, undergraduates and master’s students, doctoral students, and professors. This League of Learning represented a kind of ideal model for the unification of peoples under the banner of knowledge, almost as a complementary project to the creation of the League of Nations. For Jones, the League of Learning was far more valuable than mere formal obligations and treaties that bound the actions of politicians. True power originated in knowledge and great ideas operated like physical forces in the natural world. There could be no more powerful league than a league of thinkers, as knowledge was a property whose possession could not be claimed (Jones, 1919a, p. 268). It belonged to all indiscriminately; it was a reciprocal possession that, unlike material possession, did not limit one’s knowledge at the expense of the others, but expanded and enriched both. Knowledge, especially that concerning the humanities, both nourished and united peoples. Sensible and rational life, the union of two elements that had no finite boundaries like those of the objects studied by the natural sciences, could only be studied through the principle of relations. It was therefore particularly important to promote the growth of the network of relationships and the expansion of knowledge between cultures (Jones, 1924, p. 227).

For this reason, it was crucial to stimulate the growth of the system of personal relationships and the expansion of knowledge among peoples. The humanities were branches of philosophical thought and could not grow separately from it (p. 227). To educate individuals, it was necessary to always consider the principle of unity and completeness. However, this principle was constantly violated by reducing citizenship to confined actions with temporary and fleeting obligations and privileges, such as voting, jury duty, or engagement in social or charitable work (p. 228). When speaking of citizenship, as well as education, one was not to think of anything other than a fragment of existence. Within one’s own family, in the performance of one’s work or religious duties, and in times of peace, the state remained a backdrop in everyone’s life. Similarly, education was considered by many to end with the beginning of ‘real life’ (p. 229), i.e. the practical, day-to-day activities, challenges, and interactions that individuals faced outside of idealised or theoretical environments. Furthermore, this fragment of existence dedicated to education was a privilege, largely reserved for young people from families with the economic means for further studies. For the poor, Jones argued, there was no other option but to begin working life. This was not solely linked to economic factors because, as Jones’s own experience taught, no one could deny the educational value of an honest vocation (p. 242). However, the conditions of modern industry had irreversibly made this impossible.

The immense industrial complexes were no longer educational institutions, and the relationship between employees and employers was not even remotely comparable to that established in the reality of small workshops. There were no more petty and foolish moral relations, Jones asserted, than those created between workers and businessmen (p. 242). Citizen education in the age of modern industrial societies was a disastrous failure, if evaluated in terms of individual character development, social well-being, and security. It did not ensure happiness and did not promote virtue because it was not oriented towards the good of the citizens, but solely towards that of the state. The education advocated by Jones consisted of vocational training (p. 247); that is, education that awakened the students’ potential and prepared them for an honourable life. Therefore, the state was required to compel its citizens to be free. There was a supreme truth, Jones affirmed, that the world had to learn: ‘That which occupies the mind enters into the conduct, just as that which is near the heart invades the intelligence; and what enters into conduct fashions fate’ (p. 261). Unfortunately, modern education had been reduced to a tool in the hands of industry and technology. The British government itself had commissioned evaluations of sciences based on the criterion of goods production and how to maximise their distribution. Education had lost sight of humanity and had focused on money.

Nevertheless, a timid attempt to awaken the consciousness of citizens was possible. Jones placed his hopes in the creation, through collaboration between English and Welsh universities and their respective classes of workers, of the Workers Educational Association (WEA) (Williams, 2023). The latter’s purpose, according to William Temple, promoter and first president of the Association from 1908 to 1924, was to create the sacrament of passion for knowledge and brotherhood and to recognise education as an ally for social emancipation, without utilitarian purposes (Iremonger, 1948, pp. 80–81; see also Craig, 1963, pp. 140–41). The aim of the Association was the same as that of the great social reformers, namely to make the genuine value of human life accessible to all citizens. This was described by the Joint Committee with British universities as the purpose of the Association:

Its work consists in stimulating the demand for Higher Education among workpeople, in co-operating with Universities and other Education authorities, to supply their needs, and in acting as a Bureau of Intelligence upon all matters which affect the education of workpeople. By organizing Higher Education upon a democratic basis under the direct control of workpeople themselves, and at the same time placing at their disposal the best academic advice, it has succeeded in bringing together two elements which are indispensable to the success of any movement for the Higher Education of the working class. [Anonymous, 1908, p. 10]

The WEA thus represented a great opportunity to teach the working class that industrial training was only a secondary tool useful for learning the values of a liberal education. Obviously, the Association could not fulfil this role autonomously but was to be assisted by the experience of university institutions. Universities, especially the oldest and most prestigious English universities, were to be reformed for this purpose, so that their ethos would encourage their students to go on to serve the British Empire in accordance with the values of freedom, individuality, justice, and goodness. These students would not only come from the educated elite, but would also include those who had never had direct experience with what Jones called the power of ideas (Jones, 1916–17).

The ideas Jones spoke of were those contained in the ‘immortal’ works of literature (Jones, 1924, p. 77), in the depth of philosophical reasoning, and in the wisdom of history. Teachings that focused solely on the technical realm could not open up the horizons of citizenship to men, because they lacked that spiritual component that was the prerogative of the humanities. However, in this educational endeavour, attention directed towards industrialists and businessmen could not be marginalised. They too were victims of ignorance and prejudice, and their liberal education was by no means superior to that of the working class. However, their ignorance regarding the principles of democracy and liberalism caused much more considerable damage, which reverberated throughout the entire community. The responsibility to anticipate and meet the needs of the country was enormous, which was why the commitment to their education was not to be overlooked. This represented a commitment to reform the values that guided individuals in modern societies, who were individuals at the mercy of a world too bound to the immanent aspect of matter. Such reform was to be the responsibility of the state and social reformers.

The state and social reformers would then exercise functions once exclusive to the church and its ministers. Their quest was for works that fostered rather than frustrated a scientific and non-dogmatic inquiry into spiritual matters, and for those works that moderated the antagonisms between the world of labour and the objectives of capital. To achieve these ends, social reformers should not look to the church, but rather to the universities. Thus, the state, even in its secular guise, was to promote a message of brotherhood and respect for the value of human life, which was no longer tied to a metaphysical dimension but became an immanent principle for the earthly survival of humanity. The message of religion was liberated from dogmatism, and its principles were democratically tested in the face of circumstances.

Some Concluding Remarks

The subject of education and thus knowledge was a fundamental aspect of Jones’s thought – not on an epistemological level but in the sense of knowledge of the facts concerning the spheres of politics and society. Even outside the academic context, all of his efforts sought to improve the social condition of citizens, by inviting them to become more aware of their role in society and in the world. His insights hinted at the existence of a space full of pitfalls and dangers that separated man from politics. This space could also become very treacherous since greater responsibility of the citizen called upon to make decisions concerning public life may be subject to greater forms of manipulation. For Jones, knowledge was an elemental force that even preceded freedom, because without knowledge man was unable even to know the actual degree of freedom he possessed. One had first to know and recognise freedom in order to exercise it. Otherwise, it could be nothing more than a caprice of the will. The more knowledge was free and freely granted to all – in all its forms and without any kind of restriction – the more power was forced to reveal its true face and, therefore, had to be challenged. It was precisely within the gaps in knowledge that power infiltrated, changed its form, and moved among citizens unnoticed, masked by conformity and habit.

Knowledge, however, was also a dangerous weapon, as Jones’s criticism of political parties demonstrated. In fact, the appropriation of knowledge and the belief by those who possess it that they held truths that were unknown to the majority make knowledge itself a form of power – or rather, an instrument of power. This power could sustain itself, as it was directly supported by those upon whom it was exercised. For this reason, a democracy that was truly considered as such had to firstly direct all its efforts towards fighting ignorance, and make education as broad and free as possible. This was Jones’s aim. It was also the proper purpose of any social reformer who did not shape society to his own liking, but provided it with the tools it needed to decide for itself and collectively on the form into which it would be transformed.

A democracy, as Jones pointed out, was thus not only an institutional system whose survival was guaranteed by a stable relationship between checks and balances. First and foremost, it was a spiritual community. Indeed, democracy did not perish merely because of an upheaval in the political order that changed its structure towards a more autocratic one. Democracy, as a living organism that came to the end of its existence, could also perish from ‘natural causes’. Its perishing was only hastened by the influence of external circumstances – in this case, the change in the political order – since it would have inevitably occurred by the disease caused by the ignorance of the population.

History proved (and continues to prove) that it was more fruitful to create a union of thinkers and thoughts than a political union held together by treaties and interests. This wish lay behind Jones’s call for the creation of a League of Learning. Its creation would have been a useful tool alongside the League of Nations. While the latter would have ensured stability and broadened the network of international relations, the former would have gone deeper into their nature and prevented them from being linked only to material interests. Unfortunately, Jones’s hopes continue to be disappointed. If this does not change, neither democracy nor relations between democratic countries can last.