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ABSTRACT
This article examines the international journeys made during 1936–1943 by Sir Ernest Simon, the prominent Manchester reformer and businessman, to investigate urban planning in Moscow, Zurich, Stockholm, and across the United States. The research uses Simon’s own handwritten notes and other archival sources, together with subsequently published material where he drew lessons from these places for Britain. It is a detailed case study of ‘policy tourism’ and ‘cross-national learning’ by an individual important in the town planning movement who was also part of a wider demand for economic and social planning being influentially promoted at the time by cross-party ‘middle opinion’. The visits formed part of his personal search for a form of town planning that was both as effective as that in the Soviet Union but also democratic and consistent with British political values. Switzerland and Sweden were judged as successful democracies, able to plan their most important cities effectively without recourse to totalitarian methods. The United States he approached with suspicions of its tradition of pervasive city corruption. However, he returned heralding the Tennessee Valley Authority and New York City’s express highways and parks as the world’s most outstanding examples of democratic planning.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes on contributor
Stephen V. Ward is Professor of Planning History at Oxford Brookes University. He is a former President of the International Planning History Society and was for several years Editor of the international academic journal, Planning Perspectives. He has produced several books on twentieth-century planning, including his latest The Peaceful Path: Building Garden Cities and New Towns (University of Hertfordshire Press, 2016)
Notes
1 Simon, “Planning in Moscow and Manchester … ,” 5–11.
2 “Liberal Summer School: Moscow and Manchester – Is there a lesson democracy can learn from Communism? Sir Ernest Simon’s Reply,” Manchester Guardian, 2.8.1937.
3 Simon, “Town Planning – Moscow or Manchester?”
4 Marwick, “Middle Opinion … ”; Ritschel, The Politics of Planning.
5 Reviewed in Ward, “Planning diffusion … ”
6 Jones, “Simon, Ernest Emil Darwin … ”; Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester.
7 Rubenstein et al., Palgrave dictionary … , 916–17.
8 Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester.
9 Stevenson, 322–3.
10 Jones, “Simon, Shena Dorothy … .”
11 Simon et al., 1937; M11/11/2, Letters, Simon-Potter, 28.9.1936; Potter-Simon, 29.9.1936.
12 See Kotkin, “Modern Times”, for an overview of interwar Western interest in the USSR.
13 Ward, “Soviet Communism … ,” 501–3.
14 Stern, Western Intellectuals … , 86–131; David-Fox, Showcasing the great experiment … , 28–97.
15 Ward, 2015; ‘Introduction’ in Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, ix–xiii.
16 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, v–vi.
17 Ward, 2015; Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, xiii–xvii.
18 Papers of Lord Simon, Manchester Libraries: Information and Archives (hereafter M11/xx/xx) M11/15/11, 29.8.1936.
19 See Shimotomai, Moscow under Stalinist Rule … , especially 55–63.
20 Webb and Webb, Soviet Communism …
21 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, v–vi.
22 M11/15/11, 28–30.8.1936.
23 Ibid., 31.8.1936; 1.9.1936, 20.9.1936.
24 “Russians’ study of English methods,” Times, 21.9.1936.
25 M11/15/11, 1.9.1936; 14.9.1936; 16.9.1936.
26 Ibid., 4.9.1936; 5.9.1936; 23.9.1936; 25.9.1936.
27 Ibid., 4.9.1936; 7.9.1936; 8.9.1936; 20.9.1936; 22.9.1936.
28 Ibid., 2.9.1936; 6.9.1936; 12.9.1936.
29 Ibid., 11.9.1936; 14.9.1936; 16.9.1936.
30 Ibid., 13.9.1936; 15.9.1936; 19.9.1936.
31 Ibid., 2.9.1936; 5.9.1936.
32 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, v–vi.
33 M11/15/11, 14.9.1936.
34 Simon, Moscow in the Making, vi; M11/15/11, 4.9.1936; 5.9.1936.
35 Simon, Moscow in the Making, 224.
36 Ibid., 224–5.
37 Ibid., 147.
38 Ibid., 153.
39 M11/15/11, 21.
40 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, 212–13.
41 Ibid., 199–201; Shimotomai, Moscow under Stalinist Rule … , 7.
42 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, 203–6; 229–31.
43 Ibid., 183.
44 Editorial, Town and Country Planning, IV (14), 43–5; Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, 232–3.
45 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, 234.
46 Ibid., 137–42.
47 M11/15/11, 28.8.1936.
48 Shimotomai, Moscow under Stalinist Rule … , 92–3; Morrell, Britain Confronts the Stalin Revolution.
49 Neither were actually Mossoviet members, who survived the great purge largely unscathed. See Shimotomai, Moscow under Stalinist Rule, 144.
50 Simon et al., Moscow in the Making, 227.
51 Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester, 103–11.
52 Hulme, “Putting the City Back into Citizenship”, discusses this more fully in the Manchester context.
53 Simon et al., Constructive Democracy.
54 Beveridge, “Planning under Democracy” in Ibid., 125–43.
55 M11/17/6.
56 Bryce, Modern Democracies, I, 327–454.
57 M11/11/2, Letters Gollancz-Simon, 9.2.1939; Simon-Gollancz, 11.2.1939.
58 Simon, The Smaller Democracies.
59 M11/17/4, Scandinavian Speech, 12.11.1938; Simon, “Town Planning in Stockholm.”
60 M11/11/2, Letters Gollancz-Simon, 20.2.1939; Simon-Gollancz, 1.1.1939.
61 Childs, Sweden: The Middle Way; Simon, The Smaller Democracies, 52.
62 Musial, Tracing Roots of the Scandinavian Model …
63 Simon, “Town Planning in Stockholm,” 81; Simon, The Smaller Democracies, 89–90.
64 M11/15/13, generally.
65 M11/15/14; M11/15/9; M11/15/12, generally.
66 M11/15/13, 19.
67 Ibid., 2.
68 Simon, The Smaller Democracies, 33–9, 89–114.
69 Simon, “Town Planning in Stockholm,” 82–4.
70 Simon, The Smaller Democracies, 35, 91.
71 Ibid., 35–7, 95.
72 Ibid., 94, 97.
73 M11/10/1, USA local government …
74 Bryce, Modern Democracies, II, 97–140.
75 M11/10/1, USA local government …
76 White, The City Manager.
77 M11/10/1; White, The City Manager.
78 Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester, 114–18.
79 M11/11/2, Letters, Simon-Cripps, 4.3.1941; Simon-Maisky, 5.3.1941; Maisky-Simon, 7.3.1941; Cripps-Simon, 24.3.1941; Simon-Cholerton, 22.4.1941.
80 M11/11/2, Letter Simon-Attlee, 19.3.1941.
81 M11/16/15, Broadcast, 22.2.1942; Simon, The Rebuilding of Britain.
82 Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester, 118.
83 M11/15/15, 1.
84 Simon, Rebuilding Britain.
85 M11/15/15, 1; 3.
86 Ibid., 11.
87 Ibid., 12.
88 Ibid., 2 (19.10.1942).
89 Ibid., 2 (20.10.1942).
90 Ibid., 38 (10.11.1942); 5; 36 (3.11.1942).
91 Huxley, “TVA, a great American experiment,” Times, 22 & 22.5.1935; PEP, “The Tennessee Valley Authority”
92 M11/15/15, 9–10 (29.11.1942; 30.11.1942).
93 Simon, The Tennessee Valley Authority; Huxley, TVA: Adventure in Planning; Lilienthal, TVA: Democracy on the March.
94 Simon, The Tennessee Valley Authority, 1; Ekbladh, “Mr TVA.”
95 M11/15/15, 10; 76 (10.12.1942).
96 M11/10/1, Express Highways in the United States (19.12.1942).
97 Simon, The Tennessee Valley Authority, 63.
98 M11/15/15, 76 (10.12.1942).
99 Simon, The Tennessee Valley Authority, 62.
100 M11/15/15, passim.
101 M11/10/1, War, housing and post-war planning, 8.
102 M11/15/15, 11.
103 M11/15/15, 9, 13.
104 M11/15/15, 9; 10; 50.
105 Simon, Rebuilding Britain, 151–2.
106 M11/15/15, 50 (18.10.1942).
107 M11/15/15, 12.
108 Simon, The Tennessee Valley Authority; M11/11/2, Simon, Address to Landscape Architects, 8.11.1943.
109 M11/11/2, Simon, Rebuilding Britain.
110 M11/11/2, Letters, Simon-Gollancz, 1.5.1943; 24.3.1944; Gollancz-Simon, 5.5.1944.
111 M11/11/2, Letter Gollancz-Simon, 9.10.1944, Horsman-Simon, 25.10.1944; Simon-Gollancz, 3.4.1945; Gollancz-Simon, 5.4.1945.
112 Simon, Rebuilding Britain, 127–62.
113 Ibid., 171, 172–8.
114 Simon, Rebuilding Britain, 194–211, especially 203–7.
115 M11/11/2, Letter Horsman-Green, 7.7.1945.
116 Ibid., Letter Simon-Gollancz, 3.4.1945.
117 Ibid., Letter Girard-Simon, 23.5.1945; Ministère de la Réconstruction … , Étude no. 51A.
118 Simon, Rebuilding Britain, 15–66; M11/11/2, Letter Williams-Ellis–Simon, 5.10.1944; 9.10.1944; Simon–Williams-Ellis, 10.10.1944.
119 M11/11/2, Letter Simon-Gollancz, 17.6.1944; Gollancz-Simon, 21.6.1944; Simon-Gollancz, 24.8.1944.
120 Simon, Rebuilding Britain, 227–9.
121 Ibid., 231–2.
122 Ibid., 233.
123 Stocks, Ernest Simon of Manchester, 124–39.