Time Period: 1976-1988
Why did the SDP fail?
Review of Patricia Lee Sykes, Losing from the Inside (2nd edn., Routledge, originally published 1989, republished 2018 as an e-book).
The twisting path
Review of Tudor Jones, The Uneven Path of British Liberalism: from Jo Grimond to Brexit (2nd edn., Manchester University Press, 2019).
The 1979 general election
Report of evening meeting, 3 February 2020 with David (Lord) Steel and Professor Sir John Curtice. Chair: Lord Wallace.
Robert Maclennan (Lord Maclennan of Rogart)
A look back at the life and career of the third leader of the SDP.
Anarchism and Liberalism 1880-1980
Some anarchists were successfully influential in liberal networks, starting with many New Liberal networks around the beginning of the 20th Century. My thesis focuses on this earlier period but I am interested in anarchist influences on liberalism throughout the twentieth century. If any readers can help with informing me of their own personal experiences of…
The 1979 General Election
The 1979 general election inaugurated the premiership of Margaret Thatcher and an eighteen-year period of Conservative government. It took place after the ‘winter of discontent’, marked by public sector strikes which destroyed the Labour government’s social contract. The results signalled the end of the post-World War II political consensus, based on an enhanced role for…
How the Liberal Party in Eastleigh grew in the 1970s
Review of Martin Kyrle, The Liberals in Hampshire – a Part(l)y History: Part 3 Eastleigh 1972–81: The thorn in the flesh bursts into flower (Sarsen Press, 2017).
Geoff Tordoff: an appreciation
A look back at the life and long political career in the Liberal Party and Liberal Democrats of Geoff Tordoff.
Tentative feelers: the Liberal Party’s response to the emergence of the Green Party
An examination of the early contacts between the Liberal Party and the emerging Green Party in the 1970s.
A lifetime in Liberalism: where do we go now?
The fourth Viv Bingham Lecture, as delivered by Tony Greaves.