ABSTRACT
Was there a decline after 1870 in the British economy? Did growth slow down, and prosperity come to a halt? So many reputable historians have proclaimed that with the ‘great depression’ (1873–96) England entered an era of sloth and stagnation, even of retreat, that the claim has almost been promoted to a dogma. After the zenith of the mid-century the Victorian star is said to have followed a downward course towards the ‘Edwardian twilight’ before sinking into the troubled waters of the two World Wars. According to this thesis, which has become classic, the serious difficulties that beset the nation condemned it to a general decline in efficiency. In short, the late-Victorian climacteric marked the fateful turning-point between the crushing superiority of the nineteenth century and the slow foundering of the twentieth century.
