Thatcher's Legacy

At the time of Margaret Thatcher's fall, conventional wisdom held that Thatcherism was a leadership style that had departed with its author. In significant respects, Thatcher's economic reforms were incomplete, and she and her ideas had never enjoyed a popular majority. But subsequent events have made clear that 1979 was a new point of departure. Thatcher's legacy can be described as two revolutions. The first revolution was an assault on the size of the state sector, including the introduction of privatisation and lower taxes. The second was the centralisation of power in Whitehall; necessary for the achievement of the first, but ultimately in conflict with it. John Major and Tony Blair were strong proponents of both revolutions. Britain now requires a third revolution to decentralise, localise, and pluralise the state.