'Liverpool beguiles, Liverpool bewilders. Swift's superb analysis gets to the scarred heart of this troubled, beautiful and spirited city' Paul Du Noyer

'[Swift] has a terrific eye for the telling detail . . . You should read this book' Guardian

'Fascinating, funny and full of great stories - just like the city itself' Alywn Turner

'Deftly blends a sweeping, multi-century history of the city's rising and fading fortunes with the cultural vignettes of Beatlemania and Merseybeat, the figure of the "scally" and Liverpool's "birds", and the emergence of football casual culture which began on Anfield and Goodison Park's terraces' New Statesman

Liverpool is a unique city within the United Kingdom; its dialect, hedonism, friendliness, rejection of 'Englishness' and, most pertinently, its politics, all make for a rich cultural landscape. Yet, many of the things that make Liverpool the city it is today were not always at the fore. Furthermore, the complexity of the city, and an investigation into all aspects of its past, has not been readily available - until now.

In Scouse Republic, David Swift expertly tracks the city's transformation from a humble village to a central component of the transatlantic slave trade and one of the most important ports in the world; from a stronghold of working-class Toryism to a bastion of left-wing politics, and analyses how the two manifest today. Swift interrogates the myths surrounding the city, offering a fully rounded perspective that considers both Liverpool's triumphs and tragedies, cleverly demonstrating how its remarkable evolution has added to the city's distinctive status. After all, in order to understand Liverpool, we need to understand its idiosyncrasies - all of which are key to comprehending modern Britain today, particularly in relation to racism, empire, deindustrialisation, immigration, popular culture and more.

Interspersed with personal anecdotes from Swift, who was born and bred in Liverpool, Scouse Republic is the untold history of one of the UK's most iconic cities. Brilliantly researched and deeply compelling, it illustrates that there is far more to Liverpool than meets the eye.

David Swift is a historian and writer based in London who specialises on the history and contemporary politics of the British Left, in particular in relation to race, class, gender and popular culture. He has researched and taught at several universities in the UK and abroad. His first book, A Left for Itself, was released by the radical publisher Zero Books in 2019.


Swift has written on the state of the Left for a variety of traditional and digital media including The Times, Independent, LabourList, Fabian Review, Progress Online, Spectator, Jewish Chronicle, UnHerd, and The Critic.