United Kingdom

All of this made Britain’s decision, after fierce political discussion, not to join the planned EEC, established by the Treaty of Rome on March 25, 1957, an event of signal importance. It meant that although economic conditions in Britain did indeed improve in the last years of the 1950s and through 1960—Prime Minister Harold Macmillan could remark with only slight irony that the British people had never “had it so good”—Britain nevertheless did not share in the astonishing growth in European production and trade led by the “economic miracle” in West Germany. By the mid-1960s there were signs that British prosperity was declining. Increases in productivity were disappearing, and labour unrest was marked. Prime Minister Macmillan quickly realized that it had been a mistake not to join the EEC, and in July 1961 he initiated negotiations to do so. By this time, however, the French government was headed by Charles de Gaulle, and he chose to veto Britain’s entry. Britain did not join the EEC until 1973.

In the aftermath of increasing difficulties for industry and increasing labour conflict, the Thatcher governments after 1979 set about a far-reaching restructuring of the economy, one based less on economic than on political and moral factors. Thatcher set out to end socialism in Britain. Her most dramatic acts consisted of a continuing series of statutes to denationalize nearly every industry that Labour had brought under government control in the previous 40 years as well as some industries, such as telecommunications, that had been in state hands for a century or more. But perhaps her most important achievement, helped by high unemployment in the old heavy industries, was in winning the contest for power with the trade unions. Instead of attempting to put all legislation in one massive bill, as Heath had done, Thatcher proceeded step by step, making secondary strikes and boycotts illegal, providing for fines, as well as allocation of union funds, for the violation of law, and taking measures for ending the closed shop. Finally, in 1984–85, she won a struggle with the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), who staged a nationwide strike to prevent the closure of 20 coal mines that the government claimed were unproductive. The walkout, which lasted nearly a year and was accompanied by continuing violence, soon became emblematic of the struggle for power between the Conservative government and the trade unions. After the defeat of the miners, that struggle was essentially over; Thatcher’s victory was aided by divisions within the ranks of the miners themselves, exacerbated by the divisive leadership of the militant NUM leader Arthur Scargill, and by the Conservative government’s use of the police as a national constabulary, one not afraid to employ violence. The miners returned to work without a single concession. In all these efforts, Thatcher was helped by a revival of world prosperity and lessening inflation, by the profits from industries sold to investors, and by the enormous sums realized from the sale abroad of North Sea oil. From 1974 the unexpected windfall of the discovery of large oil reserves under the North Sea, together with the increase in oil prices that year, transformed Britain into a considerable player in the field of oil production (production soared from 87,000 tons in 1974 to 75,000,000 tons five years later). The political use of oil revenues was seen by some as characteristic of the failure of successive British governments to put them to good economic and social use.

The restructuring of the economy away from the manual and industrial sectors, which was a consequence of the rapid decline of manufacturing industry in Britain in the 1990s, also meant the decline of the old, manual working class and the coming of what has been called “postindustrial” or “postmodern” society. Within industry itself, “post-Fordist” (flexible, technologically innovative, and demand-driven) production and new forms of industrial management restructured the labour force in ways that broke up traditional hierarchies and outlooks. Not least among these changes has been the expansion of work, chiefly part-time, for women. There has been a corresponding rise of new, nonmanual employment, primarily in the service sector. In the early phases of these changes, there was much underemployment and unemployment.