Margaret Thatcher, thirty years ago the era of the iron lady 'godmother' of Brexit ended
Exactly thirty years ago, the last term of the government of Margaret Thatcher ended, the "iron lady" who ruled the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990. Leader of the Conservative party since 1975, Margaret Roberts, married Thatcher, remains a controversial figure for the history of Great Britain. In fact, many of his choices continue to be discussed: to give some examples, the Falklands war of 1982, going through the tug-of-war with the miners' union in the mid-1980s, up to his very tough approach to then European Economic Community in the early 1990s. One of the main reasons why perhaps the “Thatcher phenomenon” is still so much discussed today may be related to the effects that “Thatcherism” still has on our society.
Miss Thatcher brought about economic, social and political changes that in part were already underway: as the historian Dominic Sandbrook (who specializes in contemporary post-world war history) states, in an interview for the BBC, "Britain was clearly a very different country in 1990 than in 1979. It was more open, ambitious, cosmopolitan and more progressive, but also much more aggressive, individualistic and unequal ”.
Many of its supporters have given it the credit for revitalizing the financial sector, giving a new international impetus to the City (and beyond) and have positively assessed the privatization of various public-based activities, and the inclusion of the concept of "competition Even within sectors that have remained public. On the contrary, his opponents underline the side effects of his policies, such as cuts in public spending, the weakening of the welfare state, the process of de-industrialization of the Center and North of the country, which have led to an increase in the rate of unemployment in Great Britain (peaking at nearly 3 million unemployed in 1983) and a highly unequal economic configuration of the country. Indeed, as the South grew and the UK repositioned itself as a global player, the country's Center and North entered recession.
Many Thatcherian policies and ideas are still alive in Britain, but the most curious and paradoxical thing that the British have inherited from that historical period is perhaps what is most threatening the revitalized financial sector: British Euroscepticism. The official biographer of the Iron Lady Charles Moore explains in an interview with The Economist that it is difficult to speculate on Miss Thatcher’s position towards the Brexit referendum (and in my opinion, it would also be incorrect to try to give an answer).
However, Moore himself says that Thatcher's choices in foreign policy certainly inspired a new generation of Eurosceptics. This does not mean that the United Kingdom was previously a pro-European country: from the birth of the Czech Republic (European Coal and Steel Community) up to the 1980s, the British attitude has always been interested but suspicious.
Miss Thatcher was well aware of the economic advantages that came from being part of the single market, which she had no intention of abandoning, but has always opposed the transfer of some parts of national sovereignty to the Community. In a famous excerpt during a session at the House of Commons, where she reported the results of the 1990 European Council in Rome, the iron lady told her colleagues: "The President of the Commission, Mr. Delors, said at a conference print the other day, which would like to transform the European Parliament into the democratic arm of the Community, the Commission into its executive power and the Council of Ministers into its Senate. No! No! No!".
The echo of those "No" has never stopped and has not gone unheard. Since then, Euroscepticism has grown in the country, especially among the young people of those years, who have become the ruling class today. But before explaining how this was possible, it must be remembered that the debate on Europe in Great Britain has been set up, since the Thatcher era, in the following way: to be in favor of the free exchange of goods and capital, and the advantages that it it entails, without however ceding further sovereignty to Europe. This position has always reassured the City; How many times have we heard, before the 2016 referendum, that the scenario of the Leave victory was very unlikely, since the British "didn't want to leave"? This security did not take into account the votes of those de-industrialized, impoverished and, dare I say, forgotten areas of the center and north of the country: the same ones that clashed with Thatcher's policies in the 1980s.
Some populist parties have been remembered from these areas, such as UKIP under the leadership of Nigel Farage, who, exploiting the sentiment of anti-politics, has constructed an anti-establishment narrative against Europe; albeit by only about two percentage points, Leave triumphed in the 2016 Brexit referendum. In fact, if you look at the results of the time, there is a clear difference between the votes in the capital (and around) and votes in the midlands and in the north of the country (excluding Scotland). Boris Johnson himself, in December 2019, managed to get the votes of the former "Labor strongholds" of the North, probably precisely because of that motto, Get the Brexit Done.
Certainly there are other contributing causes that led to Brexit as well, and there is much more to say than Margaret Thatcher. However, it cannot be ruled out that Thatcher's policy has reinforced, especially in the conservative sphere, an anti-European sentiment which may have further favored the process of the United Kingdom’s exit from the EU. It is interesting to note a connection created between a certain anti-Europeanism of the British Conservative Party of Thatcherian matrix with the anti-establishment anti-Europeanism of precisely those areas that the policy of the Iron Lady sacrificed to pursue its own economic policy. And Brexit, which is the result of that welding, could significantly contribute to making Britain a minor player on the international stage in the coming decades.
