David Rubinstein (7 August 1932 – 19 August 2019) was an American-born British social historian and political activist.

Biography

Rubinstein was born of Jewish parentage in

Cleveland Heights, Ohio Cleveland Heights is a city in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, United States. The population was 45,312 at the 2020 census. One of Cleveland's historic streetcar suburbs, it was founded as a village in 1903 and a city in 1921. History The area that is ...

, US. His father Beryl Rubinstein was a musician. To escape

McCarthyism McCarthyism is a political practice defined by the political repression and persecution of left-wing individuals and a Fear mongering, campaign spreading fear of communist and Soviet influence on American institutions and of Soviet espionage i ...

and as inspired by a trip he took around Europe, Rubinstein moved to England in 1952 to pursue a

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), established in 1895, is a public research university in London, England, and a member institution of the University of London. The school specialises in the social sciences. Founded ...

, where his doctoral thesis was o
The decline of the Liberal Party 1880-1900
After graduating, Rubinstein joined the Labour Party, became a naturalised British citizen in 1964, and began teaching social history the

University of Hull The University of Hull is a public research university in Kingston upon Hull, a city in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It was founded in 1927 as University College Hull. The main university campus is located in Hull and is home to the Hu ...

the following year. He also joined

The Ramblers The Ramblers' Association, branded simply as the Ramblers, is Great Britain's walking charity. The Ramblers is also a membership organisation with around 100,000 members and a network of volunteers who maintain and protect the path network. T ...

and was a campaigner for Palestinian rights and better transport. In 1956, Rubinstein married Shirley Livingstone, with whom he had three children. They later divorced, and Rubenstein remarried writer and researcher Ann Holt in 1974. Rubinstein and Holt later became members of the

Religious Society of Friends Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...

. After leaving Hull in 1988, Rubinstein, a Francophile, taught at French universities in

Tours Tours ( ; ) is the largest city in the region of Centre-Val de Loire, France. It is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Departments of France, department of Indre-et-Loire. The Communes of France, commune of Tours had 136,463 inhabita ...

, Angers, and

Boulogne Boulogne-sur-Mer (; ; ; or ''Bononia''), often called just Boulogne (, ), is a coastal city in Hauts-de-France, Northern France. It is a Subprefectures in France, sub-prefecture of the Departments of France, department of Pas-de-Calais. Boul ...

. Back in England, he worked in local government in

Tower Hamlets The London Borough of Tower Hamlets is a borough in London, England. Situated on the north bank of the River Thames and immediately east of the City of London, the borough spans much of the traditional East End of London and includes much of ...

and

Maidstone Maidstone is the largest Town status in the United Kingdom, town in Kent, England, of which it is the county town. Maidstone is historically important and lies east-south-east of London. The River Medway runs through the centre of the town, l ...

as a council and Labour Party adviser. Rubenstein and Holt retired to

York York is a cathedral city in North Yorkshire, England, with Roman Britain, Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers River Ouse, Yorkshire, Ouse and River Foss, Foss. It has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a Yor ...

in 1997, where he was an honorary fellow of the

University of York The University of York (abbreviated as or ''York'' for Post-nominal letters, post-nominals) is a public Collegiate university, collegiate research university in York, England. Established in 1963, the university has expanded to more than thir ...

. He continued to write about Quakers, York, and the history of the Labour Party. He traveled frequently and refused to own a car, relying solely on public transport and protesting rural service cuts. He specialized in the 19th and 20th centuries and wrote approximately 20 books. He died in 2019.

Publications

A selection of Rubinstein's work: * 1969: ''The Evolution of the Comprehensive School, 1926-1966'' (Authored with Brian Simon. London: Routledge) * 1969: ''Leisure Transport and the Countryside'' (Authored with Colin Speakman. London: Fabian Society) * 1969: ''School Attendance in London, 1870-1904: A Social History'' (New York: A.M. Kelley) * 1970: ''Education for Democracy'' (Edited with Colin Stoneman. New York: Penguin) * 1972: ''Psychotherapy of Schizophrenia'' (Authored with Yrjo O. Alanen) * 1972: ''The Wold's Way'' * 1973: ''People for the People: Radical Ideas & Personalities in British Social History'' (London: Ithaca Press) * 1974: ''Victorian Homes'' (North Pomfret, VT: David & Charles) * 1980: ''Education and Equality'' * 1981: ''Marx and Wittgenstein: Social Praxis and Social Explanation'' * 1986: ''Before the Suffragettes: Women's Emancipation in the 1890s'' (Brighton, Sussex, UK: Harvester) * 1991: ''A Different World for Women: The Life of

Millicent Garrett Fawcett Dame Millicent Garrett Fawcett (; 11 June 1847 – 5 August 1929) was an English political activist and writer. She campaigned for Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, women's suffrage by Law reform, legal change and in 1897–1919 led Brita ...

'' (New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf) * 1999: ''But He'll Remember: An Autobiography.'' William Sessions LimitedReviewed in Freeman, Mark (2004) Clio-biography, Cultural and Social History, Volume 1, Number 3, 1 September 2004 , pp. 333-340(8) * 1999: ''York Friends and the Great War'' (York, UK: Borthwick Institute of Historical Research) * 2000: ''Culture, Structure and Agency: Toward a Truly Multidimensional Sociology'' * 2005: ''The Labour Party and British Society, 1880–2005'' (Brighton, UK: Sussex Academic Press) * 2006: ''An Inquiry into the Philosophical Foundations of the Human Sciences'' (Authored with Alfred Claassen. San Francisco State University Series in Philosophy) * 2009: ''The Backhouse Quaker Family of York Nurserymen: Including James Backhouse, 1794-1869, Botanist and Quaker Missionary'' * 2009: ''The Nature of the World: The Yorkshire Philosophical Society, 1822-2000'' (York, UK: Quacks)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rubinstein, David 1932 births 2019 deaths 20th-century American historians 21st-century American historians 20th-century British historians 21st-century British historians Academics of the University of Hull Academic staff of the University of Angers Academic staff of the University of Lille Nord de France Academic staff of the University of Tours Alumni of the London School of Economics American emigrants to England American expatriates in France American male non-fiction writers American social historians American Quakers British expatriates in France British people of American-Jewish descent British Quakers British social historians Converts to Quakerism from Judaism Historians from Ohio Jewish British activists for Palestinian solidarity British activists for Palestinian solidarity Jewish British writers Labour Party (UK) people Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom Ohio socialists People from Cleveland Heights, Ohio Public transport activists