Research Catalog

Title

The myth of consensus : new views on British history, 1945-64 / edited by Harriet Jones and Michael Kandiah.

Publication

New York : St. Martin's Press; London : Macmillan : In association with the Institute of Contemporary Brithish History, 1996.

Items in the Library & Off-site

Holdings

Details

Additional Authors

• Jones, Harriet.
• Kandiah, Michael, 1962-

Description

xvii, 186 pages; 23 cm

Summary

• This groundbreaking collection of essays challenges the notion that early postwar Britain was characterised by a consensus between the major political parties arising out of the experiences of the wartime Coalition government. It brings together for the first time the views of the revisionist historians who have been working on newly released archival material over the past decade.
• What emerges is a new interpretation of early postwar Britain in which fundamental differences of approach characterised Labour and Conservative policies throughout the 1940s and 1950s on issues as varied as the economy, the welfare state, industrial relations and decolonisation. The Myth of Consensus dispels the idea of a golden age of postwar harmony and poses a challenge to orthodox interpretations of the period.
• It marks the beginning of a new generation of scholarly analysis and debate, and is essential reading for any student of contemporary British history.

Subject

• Consensus (Social sciences)
• Great Britain > History > George VI, 1936-1952
• Great Britain > History > Elizabeth II, 1952-

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

General Editor's Preface / Peter Catterall -- Introduction / Harriet Jones -- 1. A Bloodless Counter-Revolution: The Conservative Party and the Defense of Inequality, 1945-51 / Harriet Jones -- 2. Consensus Here, Consensus There ... but not Consensus Everywhere: The Labour Party, Equality and Social Policy in the 1950s / Nick Ellison -- 3. 'Not Reformed Capitalism, But ... Democratic Socialism': The Ideology of the Labour Leadership, 1945-51 / Martin Francis -- 4. Conservative Leaders, Strategy - and 'Consensus'? 1945-64 / Michael Kandiah -- 5. Consensus and Consumption: Rationing, Austerity and Controls after the War / Ina Zweiniger-Bargielowska -- 6. Butskellism, the Postwar Consensus and the Managed Economy / Neil Rollings -- 7. The Politics of the 'Social' and the 'Industrial' Wage, 1945-60 / Noel Whiteside -- 8. Industrial Organisation and Ownership, and a New Definition of the Postwar 'Consensus' / Helen Mercer -- 9. Decolonisation and Postwar Consensus / Nicholas Owen.

ISBN

• 0312161549
• 0333650735

LCCN

96020934

OCLC

• 34640825
• ocm34640825

Owning Institutions

Columbia University Libraries