ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 discusses the changes that took place in agriculture and land tenure during the First World War and interwar period, looking at patterns of landownership and the spread of owner-occupation. It accounts for the decline in political importance of the land question after 1918 and explains the withdrawal of the landed aristocracy from politics following the sale of their estates during the period 1909 to 1927. The chapter also assesses the domestic impact of the First World War, which influenced public opinion on the use of land in the national interest. It describes the continuing economic decline of agriculture during the interwar period and the way it resulted in less adverse public attention being directed towards landowners as a class, especially after the withdrawal of wartime agricultural protection in 1921, regarded by many farmers as ‘The Great Betrayal’. Finally, it describes the way land reform attracted less public controversy as a political issue after 1918, particularly as more farmers became owner-occupiers on an increasing scale and describes the spread of owner-occupation in rural and urban areas.
