Bring Home the Revolution

In Bring Home the Revolution award-winning journalist and broadcaster Jonathan Freedland casts his vote for transforming the UK into a republic. The crux of this entertaining and highly readable argument is that it's time Britain was more like America--in its political culture anyway. The pioneers who founded the American ideal not only exported a British revolution, he says, they exported Britain's rightful destiny: a democratic, radical, egalitarian political style. As Washington correspondent dor the Guardian until 1997, the author witnessed a diverse cross-section of US society; armed with more facts, figures and statistics than a government white paper, he covers many notable aspects of American life--from the ladies of Lesbianville to the Montana militiamen; from the spectacle of OJ Simpson's trial to the infamous McDonald's "hot coffee" lawsuit; from their written constitution, their self-made millionaires, their classlessness and their unshakeable belief that the "land of the free" is also the greatest country on earth. Freedland concludes with a 10-point plan to revolutionise Britain, including popular sovereignty (power must flow from the bottom up); the need for a written constitution, local power and a classless society, and ends with a call to create a new British identity. --Carey Green