TITLE:
The Legacy of Margaret Thatcher—A Critical Assessment
AUTHORS:
Paul Stepney
KEYWORDS:
Thatcherism; Individualism; Neoliberalism; Privatization; Nationalism
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.2 No.1,
January
13,
2014
ABSTRACT: The recent death of Margaret Thatcher sparked some very strong and
divided opinions throughout Europe, United States and across the
globe. Her death made headline news, such was her notoriety as a person who not only sought to change history
but was instrumental in reshaping it especially during the 1980s and 1990s. Although Thatcher may have passed away, the
ideas underpinning Thatcherism are alive and well, and importantly, continue to exert a decisive
influence on the wider political and economic landscape. The heart of Thatcher legacy is a fundamental contradiction
neatly exposed by the current global economic crisis. Thatcherism, with its
belief in the efficacy of the market and determination to roll back the
frontiers of the state, ought to have been thoroughly discredited given that
deregulation of the financial markets has led to many of today’s problems. However, despite the financial crisis requiring massive
government bailouts on an unprecedented scale, neoliberal thinking in the best
Thatcherite traditions continues unabated. This is the paradox of Thatcherism.
Now several months after her funeral is an appropriate time to make a rational
assessment of her legacy, noting her achievements alongside the bitter controversy
about the highly individualistic and divided society she helped to create.