Professor Donald Cameron Watt (1928-2014)

By Dr Robert Boyce|

Donald Cameron Watt, who died on Thursday 30 October 2014 in his 87th year, was a member of the Department of International History for 39 years until his retirement in 1993. Born in 1928, the son of a master at Rugby School, he attended Rugby before obtaining a place at Oriel College Oxford in 1948. His interest in international history had been stimulated by his time in National Service which posted him to Austria as a member of the British occupation forces. Upon graduation in 1951 he put his linguistic skills and historical knowledge to effective use as assistant editor of the documents on German foreign policy, 1918-1945, based in the Foreign Office. After three years with this project he joined the LSE in 1954 as Assistant Lecturer, then Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader and in 1972 Professor of International History. In 1981 he succeeded James Joll as the Stevenson Professor of International History. In 1990 he was elected a Fellow of the British Academy as well as the Royal Society of Arts.

Donald Cameron Watt’s first historical publication was a review of Lewis Namier’s Diplomatic Prelude and two subsequent volumes of occasional pieces on war origins, which appeared in the Cambridge Journal in 1954. Already confident of his views, Donald anticipated later revisionist work by challenging Namier’s negative treatment of British statesmanship in the 1930s which, he argued, faced greater constraints than Namier was prepared to acknowledge. Two years later Donald published Britain and the Suez Canal within weeks of the crisis itself, and followed this some months later with an edited volume of Documents on the Suez Crisis. Subsequently he edited the Royal Institute of International Affairs’ annual Survey of International Affairs (1961 to 1971), Documents on International Affairs (1961, 1966), the American Studies in Europe newsletter (1962-65), with James Mayall the annual Current British Foreign Policy (1970-73), and with Kenneth Bourne Studies in International History (1967) and the multi-volume British Documents on Foreign Affairs (1985-97) which comprised the entire 150-year-long Confidential Print series of documents from the archives of the Foreign and Colonial Office. In 1969 he published a new edition of Hitler’s Mein Kampf with a detailed introduction; a second edition appeared in 1992.

Donald’s publications mainly took the form of journal articles, essays, lectures and reviews which appeared in both academic journals and the popular press. Several collections were published as books including Personalities and Policies: Studies in the formulation of British foreign policy in the twentieth century (1965), lectures at Trinity College Cambridge: Too Serious a Business: European armed forces and the approach of the Second World War (1975) and the Lees Knowles lectures at Oxford: Succeeding John Bull: America in Britain’s Place (1984). But he also wrote the first part of a two-volume History of the World in the Twentieth Century (1967) and How War Came: The Immediate Origins of the Second World War (1989), a 736-page narrative account of events on the eve of the war in Europe largely drawn from his earlier work, which was awarded the Wolfson History Prize.

Besides administrative responsibilities in the Department and the School, Donald contributed to the historical profession in a remarkable number of ways. He was a longstanding member of the editorial board of Political Quarterly, Marine Policy, International History Review, Intelligence and National Security, and Review of International Studies. He created and for several years taught a professional course on the international politics of maritime relations. He actively contributed to the new field of historical studies in intelligence, counter-intelligence and national security. In the 1960s he actively supported efforts to alter the fifty-year rule governing the release of official British documents, which led to the current thirty-year rule in 1967. In 1967 he became secretary, and between 1970 and 1977 chairman, of the Association of Contemporary Historians. In 1978 he was appointed Official Historian in the Cabinet Office Historical Section. He chaired the Greenwich Forum between 1974 and 1984, was secretary-treasurer of the International Commission for the History of International Relations from 1982 to 1995, and board member of the Institute of Contemporary British History (now based in King’s College London) from 1987 to 2001. Besides being an indefatigable lecturer, Donald also supervised a very large number of PhD students, many of whom entered the history profession and remained his friends throughout their careers. His research students formed the nucleus of the seminar on twentieth-century international history, which was held at the LSE and served the whole of the University during the twenty-five years that he chaired it.

Donald’s constant theme as lecturer, reviewer, supervisor and convenor was the importance of keeping international history properly international. For him this meant two things. First, the historian of international relations must consider not only a country’s formal diplomatic activity – its diplomatic history - but also the process of policy-making and ‘deep’ factors influencing it such as politics, demography, cultural traditions, economics, intelligence and military resources. Second, the historian must go beyond the narrow vantage-point of a single national actor by considering all the powers involved in an international event. Donald did not always heed his own injunctions, and significantly his last major project was the preparation of an official history of the British Ministry of Defence. He remained nonetheless a stimulating lecturer whose manifest enthusiasm for modern international history reached a wide audience and inspired several generations of students.

Donald donated his extensive collection of books and academic journals to Brunel University library where they are freely available to readers. He also donated eleven volumes of press cuttings and other printed material gathered between 1956 and 1959 to St. Antony’s College Oxford.

• Editor, Survey of Intl Affairs, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1969, 1977
• Editor, Documents on Intl Affairs (1961, 1966)
• Ed. w Kenneth Bourne, Studies in International History (1967)
• A history of the World in the Twentieth Century, Part I (1967)
• Ed. Contemporary History in Europe (1969)
• Ed. Hitler’s Mein Kampf (1969), 2nd ed. (1992)
• Ed. with James Mayall, Current British Foreign Policy (1970, 1971, 1972, 1973)
• Editor, Survey of International Affairs, RIIA, 1962-71;
• Rockefeller Reseach Fellow in Social Sciences, Institute of Advanced Studies, Washington, 1960-61
• Sec 1967, chmn 1970-77, Assoc of Contemporary Historians
• Member of the board, Institute of Contemp Br Hy, 1987-2001
• Chm, Greenwich Forum, 1974-84
• Sec-Treasurer, Intl Commn for the Hy of IR, 1982-95 (hon vp 1995-)
• Member ed bd, Political Quarterly, 1969-2000; Marine Policy 1978-94, IH Review, 1984-94; Intelligence and National Security, 1986- ; Rev of Intl Studies, 1989-95;
• General ed. British Docs on Fn Affairs, 1985-97;
• Editor, American Studies in Europe newsletter, 1962-65
• FRSA 1990Fn Member, Polish Acad. Of Arts and Sciences, Krakow, 1993

• Britain and the Suez Canal (1956)
• Ed. Docs on the Suez Crisis (1957)
• Britain Looks to Germany (1965)
• Personalities and Policies (1965)
• Editor, Survey of Intl Affairs, 1961, 1962, 1963, 1969, 1977
• Editor, Documents on Intl Affairs (1961, 1966)
• Ed. w Kenneth Bourne, Studies in International History (1967)
• A history of the World in the Twentieth Century, Part I (1967)
• Ed. Contemporary History in Europe (1969)
• Ed. Hitler’s Mein Kampf (1969), 2nd ed. (1992)
• Ed. with James Mayall, Current British Foreign Policy (1970, 1971, 1972, 1973)
• Succeeding John Bull (1984)
• How War Came (1989)
• Ed. with Guido Di Tella, Argentina between the Great Powers (1990)

Cameron Watt, Professor Donald (b.1928)

Born 17 May 1928. Educated at Rugby School and Oriel College, Oxford (BA 1951). Asst Editor, documents on German Foreign Policy, 1918-1945, in the Foreign Office, 1951-1954; Asst Lecturer, Lecturer, Senior Lecturer in International History, London School of Economics, 1954-1966; Reader in International History in University of London, 1966; Titular Professor of International History, 1972-1981; Official Historian, Cabinet Office Historical Section, 1978-; Stevenson Professor of International History in the University of London, 1981-1993; Fellow of the British Academy, 1990; Professor Emeritus, 1993-; associated with numerous scholarly journals and secretary/chairman of committees on International History and International Relations. Married 1st, 1951, Marianne Grau (d.1962): 1 son, 2nd, 1962, Felicia Stanley (d.1997): 1 stepdaughter.