ABSTRACT

This chapter discusses some sets of changes, since the beginning of what Margaret Thatcher originally called the 'New Elizabethan Era' in 1952. It focuses on the changes in the family especially in men and women's roles with respect to familial relationships, employment, childcare, children's upbringing and education. The chapter provides changing political ideologies and social movements, especially moves away from consensus politics to New Right and particularly Thatcherite critiques of the welfare state and social movements such as feminism. The New Labour government have recognised the problems of the rapid growth of lone parenthood, especially amongst women with young children. With the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that there were two contradictory tendencies within Thatcherism as a political ideology and as it affected government policies. Her belief in liberal or laissez-faire conservatism, or the importance of limited government in the context of the free market, is what could lead her and her own personal life in that direction.