Britain 1945-1964 Flashcards
Who won the 1945 election? Who were they up against ?
Clement Atlee - Labour
against…
Winston Churchill (lost)
Who won the 1951 election?
Churchill (Conservatives)
Who took over from Churchill as prime minister in 1955?
Anthony Eden
Who took over from Eden as Prime minister in 1957?
Harold Macmillan
What are the core principles of the Conservative party in this period?
-Privatisation
-Laissez-faire
-Allow for competitive capitalism
-no heavy taxes
-People shouldn’t depend on the government.
What are the core principles of the Labour party in this period?
-Nationalism
-More government intervention through redistribution and taxation
-welfare state
What were Labour’s strengths in the 1945 election?
-Leaders gained a good reputation during wartime as their ministerial record reaffirmed their loyalty to the electorate
- Aligned with the zeitgeist of reform and reconstruction
- Labour were not in power during the great depression, so couldn’t be blamed.
What were the conservative weaknesses in the 1945 election?
-There was poor conservative electioneering because they were overconfident that they would win.
-Churchill didn’t maintain his popularity as a domestic politician + The Gestapo blunder where Churchill mentioned the need for a secret police force lost his popularity.
-At the end of WW1 conservatives promised a ‘land fit for heroes’ and instead received a Spanish flue epidemic and a depression.
What were economic factors that helped Labour win the 1945 election?
-There was a widespread desire for economic reconstruction because the country was in 400 million debt.
- Laissez-faire economics were disappearing because of this debt.
What were economic factors that helped Labour win the 1945 election?
-There was a widespread desire for economic reconstruction because the country was in 400 million debt.
- Laissez-faire economics were disappearing because of this debt.
What were the social factors that helped Labour win the 1945 election?
-There was a widespread desire for social reconstruction.
-War propaganda and conscription led to people leaning more toward left-wing ideas of equal society as a more egalitarian spirit emerged in society.
-The Beveridge report of 1942 was taken on by Labour and not by the conservatives.
What was the foreign policy/ international context surrounding the Labour 1945 victory?
-WW2 had entered people’s homes in a way WW1 hadn’t, and after 6 long years, people were tired and felt more like a society that should support each other.
-People wanted the land fit for heroes they had been promised at the end of WW1.
-There were higher expectations for government involvement after their large amount of involvement in WW2.
What were the five giants of the Beveridge report? What were they ended by?
- Want ——> ended by national insurance
- Disease ——> ended by comprehensive health service
- Ignorance ——> ended by an effective education system
- Squalor ——> ended by slum clearance and rehousing
- Idleness ——> ended by full employment
What were Labour’s weaknesses which allowed the Conservatives to win the 1951 election?
- Attlee’s government had been worn down by six years of heavy economic and financial difficulties.
-Labour couldn’t shake their image of a party of rationing and taxation.
-The small majority + labour divisions (over economics, welfare and foreign policy) led to 18 months of ineffective governing.
What were conservative strengths which allowed them to win the 1951 election?
-The conservatives had reformed its finances and constituency organization and were much better positioned to fight for seats and votes than in 1945, thanks to Lord Woolton.
-The 1950 election saw an influx of bright young conservative MPs eager to battle against a tiring argument.
-Churchill is the personality behind the conservatives and he was re-elected in 1951.
What were economic factors in the Conservative victory in the 1951 election?
-The Labour governments nationalisation of iron and steel provided an easy target for opposition attacks.
What were social factors in the Conservative victory in the 1951 election?
-people tired of Labour’s austerity.
-prescription charges were reintroduced to fund the Korean war, making the people unhappy and dividing the party.
What was the foreign policy/international context surrounding Conservative victory in the 1951 election?
-Britain’s entry into the Korean War in 1950 made Labour’s left wing unhappy; it argued that the labour government was sheepishly following the USA into a Cold War engagement, due to our dependency on US money.
What is ‘Butskellism’?
‘Butskellism’ is a merge of (progressive conservative) Rab Butler and (Labour) Hugh Gaitskell, regarded as a key figure on the Labour right. This suggested that the left and right wings of the two parties met in the middle to form a consensus on matters such as finance, the economy, and the welfare state.
What were the causes of The Suez Crisis?
- Colonel Nassar, Egypt’s President, nationalised the Suez Canal to raise finance for the Aswan dam on the Nile, meaning Britain would have to pay to bring in imports, despite owning 40% of it.
- Eden had French support because they resented Egypt’s support of Arab nationalists in French Algeria.
- Eden believed the USA would give at least moral backing to the concept of the Anglo-French freeing the canal, which they did by joining the Canal users association.
Why did the Suez Crisis go so wrong for Britain?
- The Americans (Eisenhower) condemned Eden’s actions, as they thought in the cold war context it was encouraging the soviets to take the initiative.
Why did the Suez Crisis go so wrong for Britain?
-The Americans (Eisenhower) condemned Eden’s actions, as they thought within the cold war context it was encouraging the soviets to take the initiative.
- There was a lack of international support, with the UN also condemning Britain.
-Britain faced the verge of economical collapse due to large withdrawals of deposits from its international investors.
How did Britain shift blame for the Suez Crisis?
-By using Eden as somewhat of a human shield; he resigned shortly after the Crisis due to poor health, although the likely more prominent reason was the Crisis.
What evidence is there that the Suez Crisis did short-term damage (1957-59) to Britain?
- The Suez Crisis sparked Britain’s first-ever anti-war protests.
-Britain earned international condemnation from the UN and US, leading to Eden’s registration due to ‘ill health’ in January 1957.
What evidence is there that the Suez Crisis did no short-term damage (1957-59) to Britain?
-The relative socio-economic prosperity of the 1950s meant that many within society had ‘never had it so good. They were therefore willing to overlook this foreign policy blunder, hence their re-election in 1959.
-Eden acted as a human shield and was replaced by the popular Harold ‘SuperMac’ Macmillan, who proved a strong leader. The conservatives even increases their majority from 60 to 100 seats in 1959.
What evidence is there that the Suez Crisis did long-term damage (1957-59) to Britain?
- Suez began a process in which many within society became distrustful of the Tory’s ‘government by clique’.
-Britain was in a weaker position in international affairs to due the condemnation from America and the EU.
