No Such Thing as Society: A History of Britain in the 1980s [Paperback]

Review.

No such thing as society. Andy McSmith

This book, from Independent writer Andy McSmith, is designed to be a portrait of Britain (or to be more honest, England) in the 1980's. It is questionable whether it can be called a history as such, as, firstly, too many actors on the national stage at that time are still with us, and, secondly, as we are only now moving year by year to the release of official papers under the 30 year rule.

But as a portrait of a period still fresh in the mind of many, it is a useful volume. If, like me, you accept the theory of 'long wave' economic cycles driven by technological change, it shows how the 1980's, at home and across the globe, was a decade marked by the ebbing of the old economy and the growth of the new replacement.

In the UK such change was inevitable, but the pace of that change was still largely determined by human and institutional agencies. In the UK that mean only one person, one who stalks every chapter of this book, Margaret Thatcher. Like Lloyd George before she came into political life as a provincial outsider and walked largely alone. Like Lloyd George she too became a dynamic force for changem if not for the general good.

She remade the UK in a new image. She rode the surf of technological change with firm, but limited conviction. The very shape of the country has altered as a result, McSmith omits, oddly, the one appearance that above all, typified this - the iconic 'walk on the wasteland' where, handbagged and in unsuitable shoes, she strode over the ruins of a collapsed heavy engineering works that only a decade before was one of the largest suppliers of steel and iron making plant in the world. Today, on that site, we no longer see buildings that house manufacturing, but a rather featureless office park housing the back office functions of the finance industry. Such change was and is typical of our new landscape.

Andy McSmith takes us on a canter through this changing social and economic landscape and is good at pointing out vignettes of the time that have come back to haunt us today. He gives us potted histories of the three crucial episodes that marked Margaret Thatcher's decade - the Falklands War, the defeat of the Miners and the Poll Tax - and this acts as a useful primer for the coming years when (hopefully) state papers covering these episodes emerge. How useful these will be is doubtful; as I suspect the security services will have a heavy vetting role in the first two. Questions will continue to haunt us about the degree of importance to which the defence chiefs gave the fog shrouded islands islands in the South Atlantic, and given that even after nearly two centuries we still know little about how the secret state infiltrated the Chartists and the infant Left, what chance of knowing how they dealt with the NUM in that most spook ridden strike of 1984-85 ?

McSmith, as a journalist is also strong and readable on the little incidents of life which shone across the decades. He cites the long forgotten Beaconsfield by election which in a safe Conservative seat, and fought at the height of the jingoism and crude populism of the Falklands War, was surely of little import. Correct, except for one thing. The Labour candidate, a certain Mr A C L Blair, certainly absorbed the feelings of the electorate at that time. Whether this was a factor that was later played out in Basra and Fallujah is a moot point.

Indeed, what is fascinating is the way that this book illustrates how far away our present dilemmas and fears are from the 1980's. In the Index, in the space where we would expect to find 'Islam', we find merely a blank space between the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation and Israel (and the sole entry for that country relates to a Special AKA single on the aftermath of the Lebanon incursion).

As said this is both a useful primer for the heavier and more specialised histories which will emerge in the coming decade, and also a good read for anyone under the age of 25 who wants to learn more about what formed the world they will be inheriting.

I have one factual correction to make however. Andy McSmith, in his fascinating instancing of the birth of 'Only Fools and Horses' says that the series invented two brand new slang terms; 'plonker' and 'wally'. Wrong. As a young teenager living not so far from Peckham, I can remember both terms which originate from a part of the male body - a Wally, by the way, being a short cucumber which was a staple part of the London kosher diet.

David Walsh

"It's hard to see how this account could be bettered", says Andrew Marr on the cover of the `No Such Thing as Society'. Well, no, Andrew, I'm afraid it's not. Here are three ways in which it could have been improved.

First, and most seriously, his selection of material is totally lacking in discrimination. The first job of the historian is to select from the multitude of events those of genuine importance; McSmith seems more interested in trying to squeeze in as much of what happened as possible. Often the things that fall out are the more significant but less eye-catching. So, for example, the index references Westwood (Vivienne) but not Westland (Helicopters). Judging by the space allocated to each topic, anyone with no knowledge of the decade would assume that The Young Ones was as important as the miners' strike; the New Romantics as important as the Brixton Riots; and Live Aid probably more important than all of them. Perhaps a dedicated postmodernist would want to claim exactly that, but McSmith doesn't come across as a postmodernist, so I assume he was just being unselective.

Secondly, when he does cover a topic he summarises what happened well enough, but doesn't really offer much explanation of why it happened in the way it did. So, for example, to really understand the way that the Labour Party imploded in the first half of the decade, you need to go quite a long way back into the 1970s, and understand its changing relationship with the unions and other trends on the radical left. McSmith touches on this, but the 70s is a bit outside his remit. So you need to know a bit already about some of the topics covered before you can really get the best from this work.

Finally, there's not a great deal of new research on show. Rather than conducting new interviews with some of the important protagonists, he seems to have been happy to put it together from secondary sources and newspapers. This contrasts badly with Andy Beckett who, in `When the Lights Went Out', his masterly account of the 1970s, talked to a large number of people, from the likes of Edward Heath and Peter Walker through to individual shop stewards. The result is that Beckett's book has a life and an immediacy that McSmith's lacks.

So, why four stars? Because I think you have to take this book for what it is. This is not really a history, it's a series of journalistic essays on aspects of 80s politics and culture. And viewed that way it's really very good. McSmith worked as a journalist, among other things, during the decade; he made contacts and picked up a lot of gossip and he treats us to some of it here (some of the best bits of which, incidentally, are hidden away in the footnotes). His work has all the virtues of the best journalism - it's well written, snappy, gossipy, admirably clear and concise. You might not come away with a detailed understanding of all the trends and developments that took place during this complex decade, but if you know nothing you will get a good overview very quickly. And if, like me, you lived through it first time around, you will be reminded of a few things you've forgotten and have a few holes filled. As long as you don't expect more from it, it's highly recommended.

For anyone old enough to have an adult memory of the 1980s, this book is a marvel, reminding us what an extraordinary decade we all lived through. Half forgotten memories are given fresh life as you turn the pages - and turn them you will, given the fast pace, the lovely writing and the way the material is organised. And then there is the stuff that passed you by - the details you missed at the time,or which have come to light since. Margaret Thatcher lambasting her home secretary over incompetence in the search for the Yorkshire Ripper and having to be dissuaded from racing up to Yorkshire to take personal charge of the investigation... as the author points out, this was in Hugo Young's biography of the Iron Lady, but how many readers will either come upon the anecdote for the first time, or have forgotten it?
Politics, pop, crime, counter-culture, economics, the miners' strike - this wonderful pocket history covers it all in one effortless read.
And for those too young to remember the 1980s, what an enviable way to learn. Entertaining, informative - Andy Marr is right, it is hard to think how this could be improved upon.