Unit name | Politics and Society in Contemporary Britain (Level I Lecture Response) |
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Unit code | HIST25007 |
Credit points | 20 |
Level of study | I/5 |
Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12) |
Unit director | Professor. Pemberton |
Open unit status | Not open |
Pre-requisites |
None |
Co-requisites |
None |
School/department | Department of History (Historical Studies) |
Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
The changes that took place in postwar Britain were enormous: the development of an affluent consumer society with ‘shopping’ the main leisure activity; a new youth-oriented culture; the transformation of women’s lives as they moved out of the home and into the workplace; the development of a multicultural society; and an increasingly middle class and individualised electorate less identified by their background with a particular political party and more likely to ask politicians ‘what can you do for me and my family’. Politicians had to come to terms with all this. In turn, however, the evolution of postwar politics had a huge impact on British society, not least because governments took upon themselves an unprecedented degree of responsibility for the economic and social wellbeing of British citizens. This unit explores these important interrelationships between social, cultural, and economic change, and the evolving politics of postwar Britain.
Aims:
1 x 3000 word essay (50%) and 1 x 2 hour exam (50%)
Addison, P., The Road to 1945 (1994)
Addison, P., No turning back: the peacetime revolutions of post-war Britain (2010).
Addison, P. & Jones, H. (eds.), Companion to contemporary Britain, 1939-2000 (2005)
Bogdanor, V. (ed.), From New Jerusalem to New Labour (2009)
Carnevali, F. Twentieth-century Britain (2007)
Clarke, P., Hope and glory: Britain, 1900-1990 (1996)
Dutton, D., British politics since 1945: the rise, fall and rebirth of consensus (1997)
Marwick, A., British society since 1945 (2003)
Morgan, K. O., The people's peace: British history, 1945-1990 (Oxford, 1990)
Rosen, A., The transformation of British life, 1950-2000: a social history (2003).