| Abstract: | Margaret Thatcher was seen as one of the most dominant post-war Prime Ministers and yet she was forced to resign in November 1990. Most extant explanations of her fall concentrate on relatively short-term factors such as the resignation of Sir Geoffrey Howe, the Community Charge and issues surrounding the European Community. This article argues that these accounts fail to explain Mrs Thatcher's fall because they do not place her resignation within the context of prime ministerial power. The article suggests that traditional notions of prime ministerial power are flawed because they are essentiallystatic and over-simplistic. The article develops an alternative model of prime ministerial power based on the notion of power dependence. The model is then used to demonstrate that Mrs Thatcher's fall was due to her failure to recognize her dependence on cabinet colleagues. |
