Thatcher (17 page)

History:
USA and China open diplomatic relations. European Monetary System becomes operational. Iran is declared an Islamic Republic by Ayatollah Khomeini. Carter and Brezhnev sign the SALT II treaty limiting nuclear weapons. Iranian students seize the US embassy in Tehran and demand the return of the Shah for trial.

Culture:
Judy Chicago, The Dinner Party. Alban Berg, Lulu. The Clash, London Calling. Boomtown Rats, I don't like Mondays. Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. Peter Schaffer, Amadeus. Martin Sherman, Bent. Films: Alien. Mad Max. Manhattan. Monty Python's Life of Brian. TV: Antiques Roadshow. Life on Earth. Minder. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

 

Year:
1980

Premiership:
Steel strike begins (ends 3 April). Cabinet agrees European budget proposal; short-term settlement. Iran-Iraq war begins. Reagan elected US President

History:
US ban trade with Iran, break off relations and expel Iranian diplomats. EC imposes trade sanctions against Iran.. OPEC increases crude oil prices by 10 per cent.

Culture:
Richard Rorty, Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature. Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose. Joseph Brodsky, A Part of Speech. Mark Medoff, Children of a Lesser God. Elliot Carter, Night Fantasies. Philip Glass, Satyagraha (opera). Cindy Sherman, Untitled No. 66. Tony Cragg, Plastic Pallette I. Films: Airplane!. Raging Bull. Tess.

 

Year:
1981

Premiership:
NCB announces pit closures (abandoned 18 February). Second Republican hunger strike begins in Northern Ireland (ends 3 October). Budget: counter-Keynesian – increases taxes at bottom of depression. Social Democratic Party (SDP) formed (‘Alliance' of SDP & Liberals, 16 June). Crosby by-election: Shirley Williams wins Conservative seat for SDP

History:
Greece becomes tenth member of the EC. François Mitterrand becomes first socialist president of France. Gunman seriously wounds Pope John Paul II in an assassination attempt. Israel formally annexes the Golan Heights, occupied in 1967. President Reagan introduces economic sanctions against the USSR.

Culture:
Alisdair MacIntyre, After Virtue. Bucks Fizz win the Eurovision Song Contest for the United Kingdom. Films: Mommie Dearest. The Postman Always Rings Twice. On Golden Pond. TV: Only Fools and Horses. Brideshead Revisited.

 

Year:
1982

Premiership:
Argentina invades Falklands. UN SCR 502 demands Argentine withdrawal; British Task Force sails. South Georgia recaptured Argentine cruiser General Belgrano sunk. HMS Sheffield hit by Argentine Exocet missile. British Forces land at San Carlos Bay June: Argentine forces on the Falklands surrender.

History:
Spain agrees to end blockade of Gibraltar. Military coup in Guatemala. Military coup in Bangladesh. Israeli Prime Minister Begin announces that Israel will assert sovereignty over occupied West Bank. Israeli armed forces invade Lebanon. USA announces new Middle East peace proposals, which are rejected by Israel. Sikhs besiege Indian Parliament in New Delhi. President Brezhnev dies. Bombs destroy Israeli HQ in Lebanon.

Culture:
Jenny Holzer, Times Square. Luciano Berio, La vera Storia. Dire Straits, Love over Gold. Michael Jackson, Thriller. Isabel Allende, The House of Spirits. Primo Levi, If Not Now, When?. Julian Mitchell, Another Country. Tadeusz Cantor, The Dead Class. Richard Rorty, The Consequences of Pragmatism. Films: ET. Ghandi. An Officer and a Gentleman. TV: Countdown. The Young Ones. Brookside. Boys from the Blackstuff.

 

Year:
1983

Premiership:
Reagan announces ‘Star Wars' (Strategic Defence Initiative); Thatcher supports. General election: Conservative Government formed. (144 majority) US invasion of Grenada.

History:
IBM produces first PC with in-built hard disk. HIV virus isolated.

Culture:
Karl Popper, Realism and the Aim of Science. J M Coetzee, The Life and Times of Michael K. Alice Walker, The Colour Purple. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Oliver Messiaen, Saint Francois d'Assise (opera). Michael Jackson, Beat It. Billie Jean. David Bowie, Let's Dance. Eurythmics, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This). Niki de Saint Phalle/Jean Tingeley, Fountain. (Pompidou) Cindy Sherman, Untitled No. 131. Films: The Dresser. Zelig. TV: The Jewel in the Crown Breakfast television begins in the UK.

 

Year:
1984

Premiership:
Brunei becomes independent. Iraq commences bombing Iran. Ronald Reagan (Republican) wins US Presidential election.

History:
IBM produces first PC with in-built hard disk. HIV virus isolated.

Culture:
Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being. Martin Amis, Money. Tom Clancy, The Hunt for Red October. New edition of James Joyce, Ulysses correcting 5,000 errors. Band Aid raises £8 million for Ethiopian famine relief with Do they know it's Christmas? Michael Jackson wins eight Grammys. Turner's Seascape, Folkstone is auctioned for $10 million. Films: Amadeus. Paris, Texas. TV: The Bill. The Living Planet. Spitting Image.

 

Year:
1985

Premiership:
NUM votes to end coal strike. Anglo-Irish Agreement signed at Hillsborough: consultative role for Republic. Luxembourg European Council; Single European Act agreed.

History:
Mikhail Gorbachev is named First Secretary of Soviet Communist Party. Shi'ite gunmen hijack TWA aeroplane demanding release of prisoners held in Israel. Explosion sinks Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior, killing one. First elections held for Hong Kong's legislative council. Palestinian guerrillas hijack an Italian cruise liner. Major famine in Ethiopia.

Culture:
Habermas, The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity. Julian Barnes, Flaubert's Parrot. Patrick Süsskind, Perfume. Ted Hughes appointed Poet Laureate. Saatchi Collection opens in London. Christo wraps the Pont Neuf, Paris. USA for Africa record We are the World. Live Aid rock concert raises more than $60 million for famine relief. Films: After Hours. Back to the Future. TV: Eastenders. The War Game.

 

Year:
1986

Premiership:
Westland: Heseltine walks out of cabinet; replaced at Defence by George Younger. Brittan resigns, Channon replaces him at DTI Westland: emergency debate, ending the crisis US air raids on Libya, mainly from British bases; Thatcher attacked for allowing them Anglo-US Summit at Camp David: Thatcher and Reagan issue arms control statement.

History:
Portugal and Spain enter European Community. Jacques Chirac is elected Prime Minister of France. Major accident at Chernobyl nuclear power station near Kiev announced. The seven major Western economic powers hold a summit meeting in Tokyo. Rt Rev Desmond Tutu enthroned as first black Archbishop of Cape Town, SA. Reykjavik (Reagan-Gorbachev) Summit; talk of abolishing nuclear weapons

Culture:
Kingsley Amis, The Old Devils. Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove. Musée D'Orsay, Paris is opened. Lucien Freud, Painter and Model. A Lloyd Webber, The Phantom of the Opera. Paul Simon, Graceland. TV: The Singing Detective. Casualty. Neighbours begins on UK television.

 

Year:
1987

Premiership:
‘Louvre Accord' to halt decline in $; Lawson secretly begins shadowing DM. Thatcher visits USSR (ended 1 April). General Election: Conservative Government formed (101 majority). ‘Black Monday': Dow Jones falls 23 per cent

History:
Iran launches missile attack on Baghdad; Later truce is agreed. US President Reagan accepts full responsibility for Iran-Contra scandal.. US destroyers and commandos attack Iranian oil installations in Gulf. US-USSR Summit in Washington. Reagan and Gorbachev agree to eliminate intermediate nuclear forces. World population reaches 5 billion.

Culture:
Jacques Derrida, Of Spirit, Derrida and the Question. Tom Wolfe, Bonfire of the Vanities. Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale. Nigel Osborne, The Electrification of the Soviet Union. Judith Weir, A Night at the Chinese Opera. Richard Deacon, The Back of My Hand. Films: Fatal Attraction. The Last Emperor. TV: All Creatures Great and Small. Inspector Morse.

 

Year:
1988

Premiership:
Sterling ‘uncapped' on Thatcher's insistence and rises above 3DM. Budget: highest rate of income tax cut to 40 per cent. Interest rates cut to 7.5 per cent (lowest 1979–90); Thatcher publicly supports Lawson.

History:
Gorbachev announces Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan from May New York Stock Exchange registers third largest one-day fall in history. President Mitterand wins French presidential election. Peace agreement between Somalia and Ethiopia ends 11 years of conflict. Iraq and Iran announce ceasefire. Gorbachev is elected President of the USSR by Supreme Soviet. George Bush wins US presidential election.

Culture:
Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time. Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses. Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Love in the Time of Cholera. Thomas Harris, The Silence of the Lambs. Gyoergy Ligeti, Concerto for Piano and Orchestra. Witold Lutoslawski, Piano Conerto. Anish Kapoor, Mother as Void. Jasper Johns' False Start sold for $17 million. Films: The Last Temptation of Christ. Rain Man. TV: Red Dwarf.

 

Year:
1989

Premiership:
NHS White Paper published (Working for Patients). Thatcher clashes with Howe and Lawson on ERM line at Madrid Council (met again 25 June). Thatcher sets conditions for ERM entry (‘Madrid conditions'); reject Social Chapter. Lawson resigns as Chancellor of the Exchequer; Major replaces him.

History:
Ayatollah Khomeini issues fatwa against Salman Rushdie for ‘blasphemy' in The Satanic Verses. Tiananmen Square massacre in Beijing. Gorbachev and Kohl sign Bonn Document affirming the right of European sates to determine their own political systems. Mass demonstration in Leipzig demands political reform in East Germany. East Germany announces opening of borders with West Germany. Berlin Wall is demolished. Czechoslovakia: end of Communist rule (Havel President 29 December) Romania: dictator Ceausescu overthrown (killed 25 December) US troops invade Panama to overthrow General Noriega's regime.

Culture:
Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day. Anne Tyler, Breathing Lessons. Wendy Wasserstein, The Heidi Chronicles. William Nicholson, Shadowlands. I M Pei, Pyramid outside the Louvre, Paris. John Cage, Europera III/IV A Lloyd Webber, Aspects of Love. Films: Batman. When Harry met Sally. Dead Poets' Society.

 

Year:
1990

Premiership:
Trafalgar Square riot against Community Charge (‘Poll Tax'). Strangeways prison siege (ends 25 April); disturbances in other gaols. Ridley resigns over comments on Germany. Iraq invades Kuwait; Thatcher with Bush in Aspen. UK announces commitment of forces to the Gulf. Britain joins ERM; interest rates cut by 1 per cent to 14 per cent. Howe resigns. Howe's resignation speech bitterly critical of Thatcher. Heseltine stands for Conservative leadership Conservative leadership election first ballot (Thatcher 204: Heseltine 152). Thatcher announces Decision not to contest second ballot. 28 November: Thatcher resigns. After 11 years and 209 days in office, she is the longest-serving Prime Minister of the 20th century.

History:
General Noriega surrenders to US authorities. President de Klerk ends 30–year ban on ANC. Nelson Mandela is released after 27 years in prison in South Africa. In East Germany, first free elections since 1933. ‘Alliance for Germany' wins 48 per cent of vote. Boris Yeltsin elected President of Russian Federation, defeating Gorbachev's candidate. East and West Germany sign reunification treaty. GDR ceases to exist.

Culture:
Karl Popper, A World of Propensities. Martin Amis, London Fields. Patricia Cornwell, Post Mortem. Ian McEwan, The Innocent. Derek Wolcott, Remembrance. Brian Ferneyhough, String Quartet No. 4. Gyoergy Ligeti, Concerto for Violin and Orchestra. Jeff Koons, Jeff and Ilona. Damian Hirst, My Way. Films: Goodfellas. Cinema Paradiso. Wild at Heart. TV: Have I Got News For You. One Foot in the Grave. The Trials of Life.

There has been a huge growth of writing about Margaret Thatcher, Thatcherism and Monetarism. I have reduced this list to those books and authors who have contributed to my own understanding of the person and the subject.

 

Books by the Thatchers

Thatcher, Carol,
Below the Parapet: Biography of Denis Thatcher
(Harper Collins, London: 1997).

——,
Diary of an election: With Margaret Thatcher on the campaign trail
(Sidgewick and Jackson, London: 1983).

Thatcher, Margaret,
The Downing Street Years
. (HarperCollins, London: 1993).

——,
The Path to Power
(HarperCollins, London: 1995).

——,
Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World
(HarperCollins, London: 2003).

 

Biographies, authorised or otherwise

Abse, L,
Margaret, daughter of Beatrice : a politician's psychobiography of Margaret Thatcher
(Jonathan Cape, London: 1989).

Campbell, J,
Margaret Thatcher Vol.1. The Grocer's Daughter
(Jonathan Cape, London: 2000).

——,
Margaret Thatcher Vol. 2. The Iron Lady
(Jonathan Cape, London: 2003).

Cosgrave, P,
Margaret Thatcher : Prime Minister
(Arrow Books, London: 1978).

Murray, P,
Margaret Thatcher
(W H Allen, London: 1980).

Young, H,
‘One of Us': a biography of Margaret Thatcher
(Macmillan, London: 1989).

 

Books about Thatcherism

Different aspects of Thatcherism have attracted different analyses: it is possible to find writing on almost any aspect of the Thatcher governments or policies or actions. This list is indicative reading including general commentaries as well as specific critiques.

Andrews, K, and J Jacobs,
Punishing the poor: poverty under Thatcher
(Macmillan, London: 1990).