undertaken while holding a full-time post at the LSE, and producing a stream of publications. Such a relentless pace surely affected his health, poor from childhood. It also raises the question of what sort of life he had outside work. The central point is, again, that Titmuss should be seen, and saw himself, as a public figure, and it is in that light that the bulk of this volume is constructed.
To make my own position clear, I firmly believe that historical insights can constructively inform contemporary policy debates.41 Understanding a major figure in post-war Social Policy can, and should, help illustrate how we might better contribute to the kind of discussions taking place in the first decades of the twenty-first century, many of the issues with which Titmuss grappled still being with us. This is not to say that the solutions he offered to the problems of his own times were necessarily ‘right’, or can be unthinkingly transferred into a much-changed world. Nonetheless, asking the appropriate questions, and attempting to evaluate Titmuss’s analyses, can illuminate both change and continuity in welfare policy formation and practice, and the nature of the social problems which such policies seek to address.
The remainder of the volume is divided into six parts. The first, ‘Early Life and Career to the End of 1941’, embraces Titmuss’s origins, limited formal education, and marriage to Kay. His employment in commercial insurance, political commitments, research into population and population health, and relationship to ‘progressive opinion’ in the 1930s and early 1940s are then discussed. The second part, ‘From Problems of Social Policy to the London School of Economics’, covers the period from 1941 to 1950, and begins with a major shift in his career, his engagement to write Problems of Social Policy. This did not, however, keep Titmuss from other activities, scholarly and otherwise. For instance, he continued his involvement with the Eugenics Society, begun before the war. He was also developing a significant media presence, both through publications and on the radio. Part II ends with Titmuss’s LSE appointment, and his inaugural lecture wherein he outlined his plans for ‘Social Administration’. Titmuss’s only child, Ann, had been born in 1944, and his new career was to impact not only on Titmuss himself, but also on Kay and their daughter.
In Part III, we examine Titmuss’s ‘First Decade at the LSE’. In this period he gave a number of public addresses articulating some of his key preoccupations. His growing fame, and influence, led to work for official bodies such the Guillebaud Committee, which examined the finances of the NHS. He also became increasingly involved with the Labour Party, particularly its attempts to reformulate its pensions policy. Titmuss was, as his inaugural lecture had intimated, keen to build up research in the Department of Social Administration. But there were problems in the 1950s over the training of social workers, an unhappy episode in Titmuss’s career. More positively, his already impressive publication record was further enhanced by two important works, Essays on ‘The Welfare State’ and The Irresponsible Society.
Part IV, ‘Power and Influence: Titmuss 1960 to 1973’, is the longest, dealing as it does with Titmuss at the height of his powers. We start off with his role in tributes to an individual whom he greatly admired, the historian and ethical socialist R.H. Tawney. Titmuss also took an interest in mental health, one reason why he was invited by the Labour government to join the Royal Commission on Medical Education. He was in demand abroad as well, and his work in Mauritius, Tanzania, and Israel is duly examined. Back home he had a significant input to the reform of Scottish social work, and this complemented his engagement with the Seebohm Committee, set up in 1965 to report on local authority social services. A further contribution to public life came through membership of the Finer Committee, concerned with the problems facing one-parent families. Nor did he stop publishing and writing. Part IV also embraces Titmuss’s engagement with the United States. Sometimes seen as an archetypal Englishman (he loved gardening and cricket), Titmuss’s interest in welfare systems outside Britain has been somewhat overlooked. In recognition of his public service, Titmuss was made CBE, at Prime Minister Harold Wilson’s nomination, in the 1966 New Year’s Honours List.42
Like its predecessor, Part V, ‘Troubles’, deals with Titmuss in the 1960s and early 1970s, but here the emphasis is on issues which caused him considerable upset. Titmuss’s tenure at the Supplementary Benefits Commission was marked by his loyalty to that body, its policies, and its staff, all of which he defended against what he saw as unwarranted criticism, often from people he considered friends. Challenging, too, was the issue of race relations. Titmuss had a track record of opposing hostility to immigrants, and discrimination, and his support for the Labour government was put under strain by certain of its policies. Titmuss was also an opponent of the Vietnam War, and, closer to home, of Britain’s attempts to join what was then called the Common Market. But of even greater concern was, first, his longstanding dispute with the IEA over the role of the market in healthcare provision. This was extremely stressful, although it had a positive outcome in that it spurred Titmuss to produce what turned out to be his last major work, The Gift Relationship. Second, even closer to home Titmuss was a major participant in the so-called ‘Troubles’ which beset the LSE in the late 1960s. He resisted what he saw as bullying, and ill-informed, behaviour by staff and student protestors. Titmuss’s always fragile health took a turn for the worse in the early 1970s, and Part V concludes with his death, and its aftermath. Finally, in Part VI, an attempt is made to assess Titmuss’s life and work.
Notes
1R.M. Titmuss, ‘Social Administration in a Changing Society’, British Journal of Sociology, 2, 3, 1951, p 189. Reprinted in Essays on ‘The Welfare State’.
2R.M. Titmuss, Poverty and Population, London, Macmillan, 1938.
3R.M. Titmuss, ‘Role of the Family Doctor Today in the Context of Britain’s Social Services’, The Lancet, I, 1965, p 1.
4Most social policy academics see their subject as a ‘field’ rather than a ‘discipline’. I am grateful to, especially, the late Professor David Donnison (interviewed by the author 4 December 2015 and 11 February 2016), for clarifying this point.
5Oakley, Man and Wife, p 202.
6T.H. Marshall, Social Policy, London, Hutchinson, 1965, p 7.
7J.E. Meade, ‘Poverty in the Welfare State’, Oxford Economic Papers, 24, 1972, pp 289–326.
8G. Howe, ‘The Fabian Threat to Freedom’, The Daily Telegraph, 4 January 1967, p 14.
9R. Miliband, ‘The Sickness of Labourism’, New Left Review, 1, 1, Jan/Feb 1960, pp 5–9. I owe the point about Miliband’s attitude to Titmuss’s Department to Professor Jose Harris.
10A. Seldon, ‘Ideas Are Not Enough’, in D. Marquand and A. Seldon (eds), The Ideas That Shaped Post-War Britain, London, Fontana, 1996, p 268.
11D. Donnison, ‘The Academic Contribution to Social Reform’, Social Policy and Administration, 34, 1, 2000, pp 34, 37.
12S.
