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251. From Economic Convergence to Convergence in Affluence? Income Growth, Household Expenditure and the Rise of Mass Consumption in Britain and West Germany, 1950-1974

Author:
Peter Kramper
Publication Date:
10-2000
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
The “Golden Age” of post-war European economic growth has witnessed extraordinary changes not only in the economic, but also in the social and cultural outlook of Western European societies. Eric Hobsbawm's statement that “[h]istorians of the twentieth century in the third millennium will probably see the century's major impact on history as the one made by and in this astonishing period” is perhaps a little bit too enthusiastic; but it shows that the “Great Boom” has come to be regarded as a key period on the road to the present-day Western world. It has transformed the countries of the West and has at the same time made them more similar to each other. No matter what European societies were in 1950 by 1973, they were all, in Galbraith's famous.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Britain and Europe

252. The Persian Gulf

Author:
Shahram Chubin
Publication Date:
07-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
In the past fifty years five US President's from Truman to Clinton have directly or indirectly, affirmed US interests in the Middle East. The 'doctrines' in the case of Carter (1979) and Reagan (1981) specifically addressed the security of the Persian Gulf. The same period has seen the withdrawal of imperial powers. Three decades ago Britain managed the security of the Persian Gulf. Two decades ago France had the largest naval force in the Indian Ocean. The contraction of these commitments was encouraged by the US, which was unwilling to be associated with colonialism and its evils. Yet since Britain's withdrawal from the Gulf which occasioned the Nixon doctrine, the US has been grappling with how best to assure security. Reliance on regional states ("twin pillars") was upset by the Iranian revolution. In the 1980's the long Iran-Iraq war underscored the need for a Western role, but neither its shape nor its duration were clear. Local forces were reluctant to envisage any thing beyond an "over the horizon presence."
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Britain, United States, Iraq, Europe, Iran, Middle East, and France

253. The Myth of Meritocracy? An Inquiry into the Social Origins of Britain's Business Leaders Since 1850

Author:
Tom Nicholas
Publication Date:
01-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
Recent sociological analysis of the extent to which modern British society has become more meritocratic raises important conceptual issues for the recurrent economic history debate concerning the social mobility of Britain's business leaders. The majority view in this debate is that high social status backgrounds have predominated in the profiles of businessmen throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. François Crouzet's The First Industrialists reveals that Britain's industrial pioneers were drawn largely from the middle-and upper-classes, and that the image of the self-made man as the mainstay of the Industrial Revolution is a myth. Stanworth and Giddens identify a prevalence of 'elite self-recruitment' among deceased company chairmen active in large corporations and banks between 1900 and 1970. Scott's work on the upper classes distinguishes a 'core' business stratum characterised by kinship and privilege. Bringing together a range of research on the social origins of businessmen in the twentieth century, Jeremy asserts that 'it was rare for sons of the semi-skilled and unskilled to rise to national leadership in Britain'. The typical twentieth century business leader is upper-or upper middle-class by social origin, rising through the public schools and Oxbridge into the higher echelons of the business community.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Britain and United Kingdom

254. Forever in the Shadow of Churchill?: Britain and the Memory of World War Two at the End of the Twentieth Century

Author:
Nile Gardiner
Publication Date:
01-1997
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Security Studies at Yale University
Abstract:
This paper examines recent debates in Britain surrounding the memory of the Second World War. Part one is an examination of the controversy sparked by the publication in 1993 of John Charmley's Churchill: The End of Glory, and Alan Clark's article in The Times, “A Reputation Ripe for Revision?”
Topic:
Foreign Policy
Political Geography:
Britain, United Kingdom, and Europe

255. Numbering British Contention, 1758-1834

Author:
Thomas Chronopoulos
Publication Date:
12-1995
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Studies of Social Change
Abstract:
In the period between 1758 and 1834 repertoires of contention in Britain changed from parochial, particular, and bifurcated to cosmopolitan, modular, and autonomous. In other words, eighteenth century actions "that included a good deal of ceremonial, street theater, deployment of strong visual symbols, and destruction of symbolically charged objects" through the course of time lost their relative predominance and instead "demonstrations, strikes, rallies, public meetings, and similar forms of public interaction came to prevail during the nineteenth century." These new routines for the eighteenth century contentious events are the ones that ordinary people in the United States and Western Europe still to this date principally employ to make claims. This conclusion merges from a systematic study of more than 8,000 contentious gatherings, in Southern England (1758-1820) and Great Britain as a whole (1828-1834).
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Economics, and Politics
Political Geography:
Britain, United States, United Kingdom, Europe, and England