Postwar consensus

The post-war consensus is a historian's model of political cooperation in post-war British political history, from the end of World War II in 1945 to the late 1970s and its repudiation by Conservative Margaret Thatcher. Majorities in both parties agreed upon it. The consensus tolerated or encouraged nationalisation, strong labour unions, heavy regulation, high taxes, and a generous welfare state. The concept states that there was a widespread consensus that covered support for coherent package of policies that were developed in the 1930s and promised during the Second World War, focused on a mixed economy, Keynesianism, and a broad welfare state. In recent years the timing of the interpretation has been debated by historians, asking whether it had weakened and collapsed before Thatcherism arrived in 1979. There has also been debate as to whether a "postwar consensus" ever really existed.

The historian's model of the post-war consensus was most fully developed by Paul Addison. The basic argument is that in the 1930s Liberal intellectuals led by John Maynard Keynes and William Beveridge developed a series of plans that became especially attractive as the wartime government promised a much better post-war Britain and saw the need to engage every sector of society. The coalition government during the war, headed by Churchill and Attlee, signed off on a series of white papers that promised Britain a much improved welfare state after the war. The promises included the national health service, and expansion of education, housing, and a number of welfare programs. It included the nationalisation of weak industries.

In education, the major legislation was the Education Act of 1944, written by Conservative Rab Butler, a moderate. It expanded and modernised the educational system and became part of the consensus. The Labour Party did not challenge the system of elite public schools--they became part of the consensus. It also called for building many new universities to dramatically broaden educational base of society. Conservatives did not challenge the socialised medicine of the National Health Service; indeed, they boasted they could do better job of running it.

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