A History of the Conservative Party
2 total works
An authoritative study of the Conservative party in the war and in the period of postwar reconstruction through to the Suez crisis. In these, the Churchill and Eden years, the same men who had held cabinet office before 1939 led the party through to postwar recovery in 1951. Only in 1957, after Suez, did they hand over to the next generation. John Ramsden argues that Macmillan's was the first truly 'post-war' cabinet not dominated by the presence or memory of Churchill. The book explores local conservatism, and its relations with the centre, as well as the national party, to present a collective biography of the Conservatives in the years which saw the end of Britain as an international superpower.
This is the final volume in the series: the definitive account of the political party that has governed Britain for most of the century. John Ramsden traces the political developments and leadership battles (and the wider fortunes of the Party in the country at large) from Macmillan's accession to premiership in 1957, to the surprise election victory of Margaret Thatcher in 1979, taking in the Douglas Home and Heath years in full.