Description:
Margaret Thatcher was the longest-serving Prime Minister of the twentieth century, the first female leader of a major political party, and the first female Prime Minister. This is a study of how her reputation in both the domestic and international sphere was constructed by Thatcher and others over the course of her career.
Margaret Thatcher was the longest-serving Prime Minister of the twentieth century, the first female leader of a major political party and the first female Prime Minister. These simple facts would in themselves have guaranteed her an elevated place in the pantheon of British political history. However, further claims have been advanced about her: she presided over a sea change in the governance of the British economy; she cured 'the British disease' of disruptive industrial relations; she created a culture of greed. Her style of leadership attracted extremes of adoration and loathing that reached far beyond the usual parameters of party division. This is not a biography of Margaret Thatcher. It is a study of how her reputation in both the domestic and international sphere was constructed by Thatcher and others over the course of her career. Notably, this is the first scholarly treatment to make full use of the "Thatcher Archive", and as a result has comprehensively reassessed and re-evaluated her place in the British political pantheon.