Riots in Thatcher's Britain

Easington Colliery 1984. Photo by Keith Pattison
Dr Peter Hayes has published a chapter entitled 'Riots in Thatcher's Britain' in Crowd Actions in Britain and France from the Middle Ages to the Modern World (Palgrave Macmillan, 2015). He takes a fresh look at three violent confrontations during Margaret Thatcher's period as Prime Minister: the inner city riots, the Miners' Strike and The Poll Tax Riot.  The chapter suggests that Thatcher's response to the inner city riots was not one of mere condemnation as she recognised that racist policing and unemployment were contributory factors. It explains how the decision not to hold a strike ballot caused some of the violence in the Miners' Strike, and contributed to its failure. Finally it considers how the Poll Tax Riot reflected the broader unpopularity of the tax.  This was not only because the poll tax was seen as being unfair but also because local governments had deliberately set the new charge at a high rate.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Blake, Albion and the French Revolution

Image
Blake's Albion An essay by Dr David Fallon has been published in Home and Nation in British Literature from the English to the French Revolutions , a Cambridge University Press collection edited by A.D. Cousins and Geoffrey Payne. In 'Homelands: Blake, Albion, and the French Revolution', David shows the significance in Blake's writing of the Enlightenment discourse of national manners and the emerging notions of nationalism and the militarised nation-state that arose during the British wars with revolutionary France. Blake's poetry reveals a complex relationship to nationalism as he attempts to articulate a form of distinctly British patriotism without endorsing the 'official' martial British nationalism of the time. He argues that Blake, like a number of radical contemporaries, regarded the violence of the French Revolution and the aggressive response of Britain arising from deeply engrained national cultures.
Read more

One big happy family?

Image
Kim Willis (TESOL) has co-written an article which appears in the English Language Research (ELR) Journal . Kim and her co-author Dr Ahmad Nazari (London Metropolitan University) explore perceptions of the development of group dynamics amongst a cohort of MA TESOL students. Ahmad Nazari and Kim Willis 2014. 'One Big Happy Family? An Investigation into Students' Perceptions of Group Dynamics on an MA TESOL Program' . ELR Journal . Issue 1: 105-128.
Read more

The New North East

Image
On Monday 13th July 2015 the Department of Culture will be hosting a one-day symposium focused on our region entitled ‘ The New North East ’. This interdisciplinary gathering - which takes place in the Prospect Building, St Peter's Campus - will bring together scholars and practitioners working in the field of ‘cultural studies’ (broadly understood to include history, literature, linguistics, visual arts and media studies). It is hoped that the forum will allow participants to share developments in their disciplines, especially those which have opened up new avenues of research and/or shed new light on more traditional objects of enquiry in the study of North East England and North East Englishness. We hope the exciting range of talks will attract interest from academics, students and members of the public from across the region. The confirmed speakers are: Professor John Tomaney (Bartlett School of Planning, University College London) Dr Adam Mearns (School of Englis...
Read more