"ENGLAND'S CRISIS."

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 11, 13 January 1934, Page 2 (Supplement)

"ENGLAND'S CRISIS."

A REVISED ESTIMATE. When it was first published in 1031, M. Andre Siegfried's "England's Crisis" was recognised as a very important book. This eminent Frenchman, who had been an observer of the English for years and travelled in her overseas Empire (his book on New Zealand is well known), and written one of the most penetrating studies of American civilisation, submitted the position of England in the world to a detailed examination. The. result was presented at a time when the world was beginning to. doubt England's ability to pull thrcAigh her troubles. He stressed her decline from her position of industrial supremacy irt.the nineteenth century, the faulty organisation of her manufacturing life, and the crushing burden of the "dole." It was very lucid, very readable, and to a considerable degree disturbing. Then- came the formation of the National Government, ' ' the abandonment of the gold standard, the rally of. the nation to the new regime. England was not a back number. She is to-day leading the world in industrial recovery. So. M. Siegfried has revised and enlarged his book. Jonathan Cape liuh issued it in a cheap - edition. In hie preface to this new edition M. Siegfried eaye the crisis is, if not over, at last under control, and the greatest danger lies behind, not ahead. "The Old Country ,(a familiar phraso tocolonials) survives and carries on, having proved once more to the world her capacity for defence and resistance. But has her recovery been great enough to guarantee for the {uturo. the same world supremacy that fihe enjoyed in the past?" He finds confirmed by recent events, his opinion, expressed,, in the original book, that the Empire and the spirit of England'have unlimited powers of adaptation and' life, bnt he cannot help thinking that the role that Eng-. land is destined to play in the twentieth century will be less brilliant than what she has known in the paet. (One-third of that century i<? over, .by the way.) The original study was a compliment to England, and it is an additional compliment that M. Siegfried should have so promptly revised his study of hor life and institutions. It is desirable that Britons, should study both the praise and ■ criticism written by this acute French observer.