Making Thatchers Britain

Cambridge University Press, 8/2/2012
EAN 9781107683372, ISBN10: 1107683378

Paperback, 368 pages, 22.8 x 15.2 x 2.3 cm
Language: English

Margaret Thatcher was one of the most controversial figures of modern times. Her governments inspired hatred and veneration in equal measure and her legacy remains fiercely contested. Yet assessments of the Thatcher era are often divorced from any larger historical perspective. This book draws together leading historians to locate Thatcher and Thatcherism within the political, social, cultural and economic history of modern Britain. It explores the social and economic crises of the 1970s; Britain's relationships with Europe, the Commonwealth and the United States; and the different experiences of Thatcherism in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The book assesses the impact of the Thatcher era on class and gender and situates Thatcherism within the Cold War, the end of Empire and the rise of an Anglo-American 'New Right'. Drawing on the latest available sources, it opens a wide-ranging debate about the Thatcher era and its place in modern British history.

Introduction
varieties of Thatcherism Ben Jackson and Robert Saunders
Part I. Making Thatcherism
1. 'Crisis? What crisis?'
Thatcherism and the seventies Robert Saunders
2. The think-tank archipelago
Thatcherism and neo-liberalism Ben Jackson
3. Thatcher, monetarism and the politics of inflation Jim Tomlinson
4. Thatcherism, morality and religion Matthew Grimley
5. 'A nation or no nation?'
Enoch Powell and Thatcherism Camilla Schofield
Part II. Thatcher's Britain
6. Thatcher and the women's vote Laura Beers
7. Margaret Thatcher and the decline of class politics Jon Lawrence and Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite
8. Defiant dominoes
working miners and the 1984–5 strike David Howell
9. Thatcherism, unionism and nationalism
a comparative study of Scotland and Wales Richard Finlay
10. 'Just another country?'
the Irish question in the Thatcher years Marc Mulholland
Part III. Thatcherism and the Wider World
11. Thatcherism and the Cold War Richard Vinen
12. Europe and America Andrew Gamble
13. Decolonisation and imperial aftershocks
the Thatcher years Stephen Howe
Appendices Prepared by Peter Sloman
Further reading.