Sam Aaronovitch (26 December 1919 – 30 May 1998) was a British economist, academic, working class intellectual and senior member of the

Communist Party of Great Britain The Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) was the largest communist organisation in Britain and was founded in 1920 through a merger of several smaller Marxist groups. Many miners joined the CPGB in the 1926 general strike. In 1930, the CPGB ...

Biography

Aaronovitch was born in the East End of London to

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

immigrants and his early years were devoted to activity as a Communist Party militant and then a party full timer. In 1945 he was the election agent for one of only two Communist candidates ever elected to the

London County Council The London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today ...

. Near the age of 50, he entered academia as an economist after studying at

Balliol College, Oxford Balliol College () is a constituent college of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1263 by nobleman John I de Balliol, it has a claim to be the oldest college in Oxford and the English-speaking world. With a governing body of a master and aro ...

for a D.Phil. (without any previous academic qualifications) from 1967 to 1971. He once explained his difficulties in filling in applications for university posts: "Education: St George's-in-the-East Secondary,

Stepney Stepney is an area in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in the East End of London. Stepney is no longer officially defined, and is usually used to refer to a relatively small area. However, for much of its history the place name was applied to ...

1930–34; Balliol College,

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

1967–71." He became head of the economics department at South Bank Polytechnic and published a stream of books and articles on topics such as industrial pricing, insurance, monopoly, the impact of the

City A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

on the London economy, and macroeconomic policy. Although he remained a Communist Party member and a firm

Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...

, he was a critic of party orthodoxy. Working with a team of militant

trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

officials and young intellectuals, Aaronovitch helped develop the

Alternative Economic Strategy The Alternative Economic Strategy (AES) is the name of an economic programme proposed by Tony Benn, a dissident member of the British Labour Party, during the 1970s and 1980s. The Secretary of State for Industry in the Labour government, Tony Be ...

for the Labour movement only to see it derailed by the 1979 election victory of

Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013), was a British stateswoman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of th ...

. He published a series of books on British

political economy Political or comparative economy is a branch of political science and economics studying economic systems (e.g. Marketplace, markets and national economies) and their governance by political systems (e.g. law, institutions, and government). Wi ...

helping popularize the subject and as a speaker was able to combine and integrate industrial and academic viewpoints. Aaronovitch aligned himself with the modernizing Eurocommunist movement in the 1980s and was a frequent contributor to '' Marxism Today''. In 1981, he published ''The Road from Thatcherism'' in an attempt to articulate the need for a broad alliance against

Thatcherism Thatcherism is a form of British conservative ideology named after Conservative Party (UK), Conservative Party leader Margaret Thatcher that relates to not just her political platform and particular policies but also her personal character a ...

. In 1982, he established and ran the Local Economic Policy Unit and published the journal ''

Local Economy Local purchasing is a preference to buy locally produced goods and services rather than those produced farther away. It is very often abbreviated as a positive goal, "buy local" or "buy locally', that parallels the phrase " think globally, act lo ...

''. The Sam Aaronovitch Memorial Prize is awarded each year. Falling ill, he retired from South Bank University in 1997. He was married three times, to Bertha, Kirstine, and Lavender. He was survived by five children, among them the

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

scriptwriter and fantasy novelist

Ben Aaronovitch Ben Dylan Aaronovitch (born 22 February 1964) is an English author and screenwriter. He is the author of the series of novels '' Rivers of London''. He also wrote two ''Doctor Who'' serials in the late 1980s and spin-off novels from ''Doctor Who ...

, journalist David Aaronovitch and actor Owen Aaronovitch. A family memoir by David Aaronovitch, ''Party Animals: My Family and Other Communists'', was published in January 2016.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aaronovitch, Sam 1919 births 1998 deaths People from Stepney Alumni of Balliol College, Oxford Academics of London South Bank University English economists 20th-century English Jews Jewish socialists Communist Party of Great Britain members 20th-century British economists