active politics, devoting himself instead to charitable work. He was chairman of the Save the Children Fund, administered a number of educational trusts for the underprivileged and worked with groups for the relief of refugees.

Alden wrote a number of books on the subject of social reform, including The Unemployed - A Social Question, The Unemployable and Democratic England. Among other proposals, he was keen to see a rebalancing of England's population towards the land and away from the cities.