The Guild State, Its Principles and Possibilities (Signed copy)

First edition, second printing. Hardback, bound in black cloth with red printed titling. 19 × 12.5cm, 153pp + ads. This copy has been inscribed by the author "To R McNair Wilson from the author; with many thanks for a most illuminating evening, March 3, 1936". Robert McNair Wilson was a surgeon, writer (he wrote detective fiction under the name Anthony Wynne), journalist and Liberal Party politician. The medieval guild is deconstructed into political theory and social commentary in this contemporary look at one of the most important social institutions of the Middle Ages. Essential principles and values underlying the guild system are discussed with a view toward applying them to current societal ills such as unemployment, absentee corporate ownership, and employee disenfranchisement. The system, adapted to the needs and circumstances of the 21st century, is discussed as a serious economic alternative to the alleged disasters of capitalism and socialism; indeed, this book proposes it to be the only useful system because of its revolutionary and successful past. Condition: A good reading copy, but there is some patchy fading to the covers and a fair amount of underlining (presumably by McNair Wilson) throughout. Otherwise, the books remains in strong readable condition.…