ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a sense of continuity is established by recognition of the influence in the twentieth century of experiments from an earlier period. It deals with a consideration of pacifist colonies during the Second World War. The land has consistently exercised a powerful influence on Utopian thought and communal action. The Norman Conquest in the eleventh century led to the confiscation of holdings and the emergence of a class of peasants who laboured for a large landowner or for tenant farmers. Industrialization from the end of the eighteenth century led to a new spate of 'back to the land' activity, born of the evocative contrast of grim towns and an imagined joyful countryside, and a heightened sense of loss resulting from an accelerated exodus of labour from the land. Driven by a half-forgotten Utopian dream of resettling the land, the Association made no claim to be anything more than a well-ordered scheme to alleviate unemployment.
