- Samuel George Hobson
Samuel George Hobson, often known as S. G. Hobson (
4 February 1870 -4 January 1940 ), was a major theorist ofguild socialism .Born in
Bessbrook ,County Armagh , Hobson was given aQuaker education inSaffron Walden and thenSidcot ,Somerset . Moving toCardiff , he became an activesocialist , joining first theFabian Society and then becoming a founder member of theIndependent Labour Party (ILP). He began writing for the ILP newspaper, "Labour Leader ", and in 1900 was elected to the Fabian Society's executive.Hobson stood for the ILP in the
1895 UK general election at Bristol East, becoming a member of theBristol Socialist Society for some years. In the 1906, he stood as an "independent Labour" candidate in Rochdale. By this point, he was keen to go beyond the Labour Party's Parliamentary activity and create an actual socialist society.From 1906, Hobson developed a theory of a socialism based on
guild s, a form of workers'self-management inspired by Mediaeval forms of organisation. He left the Fabians in 1910 and soon began writing forAlfred Richard Orage 's magazine, "The New Age ". He coined the term "guild socialism", and in 1914, his writing for the publication was compiled as "National Guilds: an Inquiry into the Wage System and a Way Out". He helped found theNational Guilds League , but following disagreements withG. D. H. Cole over strategy, and "The New Age"'s move to supportingsocial credit , he ceased theoretical work.Throughout this period, Hobson had been involved in various profitable activities, managing a banana
plantation and editing an investment journal. Eventually, he attempted to organise a builders' guild, but this was not a success.Hobson wrote a memoir entitled "Pilgrim to the Left - Memoirs of a Modern Revolutionist" which was published by Longmans, Green & Co. in 1938.
References
*
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.