Author Description

A study of the making of mining communities and their collective responses to strikes. The author begins by discussing the idea of community, looking at the ways in which sociologists and historians have constructed models of mining communities. He argues that community, perhaps more than other terms in social science, needs to be understood historically, taking into account both small-scale changes in local institutions and social structure and the ideas that people have of the places in which they have lived and worked. Although he points to the relevance of these issues to the 1984-85 dispute, Dr Gilbert's main concern is with the very different histories of community development in South Wales and in Nottinghamshire and the influence of these histories on collective action in the two areas. He examines how the mining settlements of Ynysybwl in South Wales and Hucknall in Nottinghamshire reacted to the nine-month lockout of 1926 - in that dispute many Nottinghamshire miners returned to work early while their Welsh counterparts remained on strike to the end. Dr Gilbert focuses on the changing balance of local power and explores the changing ideas of community held by the inhabitants of the two settlements.