Modules on the Conservative governments of Margaret Thatcher (1979-90) and John Major (1990-97) are among the most controversial and relevant on offer because they are the most recent. You have a chance to study issues which are still hotly debated and on which little consensus exists. Hence, you must be always on the lookout for political bias in your sources. You must also be sure to place these governments into historical context, looking at the period before 1979, studying the opposition parties, and relating politics to the general history of post-war Britain.

The vital first steps

The first thing is to divide the period into manageable subdivisions and gain a good knowledge of events:

a. Examine the general elections of 1979, 1983, 1987, 1992 and 1997. Search for the causes of the Conservatives’ four victories and single defeat. Initially, your list may be quite short, but add to it as your knowledge of the period grows. Analysis of each election result will also explain much about later years.

b. Develop a good knowledge of the key figures and, in particular, of the two prime ministers.

c. List the major policies of each government. Once you have constructed a chronological list (which will help you see connections between events) you should group them under convenient headings: political affairs (including Ireland), social and economic policies, industrial relations and foreign policies.

d. Finally, sum up the major differences between Britain in 1979 and in 1997. Overall, what had the Tories achieved? Had some sort of revolution occurred?

Fundamental issues

a. Why did the Conservatives come to power in 1979? Was victory the result of the failures of Callaghan’s Labour government?

b. How can we explain the relative failure of the opposition parties until the 1990s? You should be familiar with such figures as Foot, Kinnock, Benn and Steel, as well as with the ‘Gang of Four’ who formed the Social Democratic party in 1981.

c. How significant was the Falklands War of 1982 for Margaret Thatcher - in terms of her popularity, image and subsequent career?

d. What were the root causes of industrial unrest? How far, and by what means, did Thatcher ‘tame’ the trade unions? Pay particular attention to the miners’ strike of 1984-5.

e. What was ‘Thatcherism’? Identify the ‘ingredients’ commonly associated with it and ask whether it was an ideology, a political style, or just a media image.

f. Why did Thatcher fall in 1990? You will need to address such issues as the ‘poll tax’, her stance on Europe, and her relations with colleagues, including Nigel Lawson and Geoffrey Howe.

g. Why did ‘New Labour’ win the election of 1997? Assess the work of Blair and others in making Labour electable and the difficulties that beset John Major (who polled a disastrous 31 per cent of the total vote).

h. How politically significant were the media? (How valid, for instance, was the claim after the 1992 general election that ‘the Sun it woz wot won it’?)

High-grade issues

a. Who were the ideological founders of Thatcher’s Conservatism? You should know something of F.A. Hayek (author of The Road to Serfdom, 1944), as well as of Enoch Powell and Sir Keith Joseph.

b. Was Thatcher corrupted by power in the sense that she became more strident, more dogmatic, more intolerant of criticism and more bullying of her colleagues as her period in office lengthened?

c. Was she justified in ordering the sinking of the Belgrano?

d. Was she lucky in the choice of her enemies, including Arthur Scargill and General Galtieri?

e. Does the Westland affair of 1986 show that she was ‘just another slippery politician who would lie when cornered’ (John Campbell)?

f. Did she succeed in rolling back the frontiers of the ‘nanny state’?

g. What effect did the Thatcher years have on social cohesion in general and race relations in particular?

h. Have events since 1997, and the premiership of Tony Blair, caused any reassessment of the Thatcher-Major era?

Reading Suggestions. There is no single suitable textbook on this period - publishers take note. But there are a number of valuable studies, including Thatcher and Thatcherism by Eric Evans (Routledge, 2nd edition, 2004). There are also an enormous number of biographies, memoirs and political studies. Do not neglect the memories of older relatives, or the collections of newspapers they often have stored away. Video sources are also invaluable, especially The Downing Street Years, a TV biography of Margaret Thatcher. Abridged (HarperCollins) audio-books of the Thatcher and Major memoirs, read by the authors, tell us much about the personalities of the two prime ministers.