Promised You A Miracle

by Andy Beckett

A vivid, seminal portrait of early 1980s Britain: a period that changed Britain forever

The early 1980s in Britain were a time of hope, and of dread: of Cold War tension and imminent conflict, when crowds in the street could mean an ecstatic national celebration or an inner-city riot. Here, Andy Beckett recreates an often misunderstood moment of transition, with all its potential and uncertainty: the first precarious years of Margaret Thatcher's government. By the end of 1982, the country was changing, leaving the kinder, more sluggish postwar Britain decisively behind, and becoming the country we have lived in ever since: assertive, commercially driven, outward-looking, often harsher than its neighbours.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, British Literature, Music, Economics, Sociology

464 pages, Paperback

First published September 3, 2015

About the author

Andy Beckett was born in 1969. He studied modern history at Oxford University and journalism at the University of California in Berkeley. He is a feature writer at the Guardian, and also writes for the London Review of Books and the New York Times magazine. He lives in London.

Reviews

[Tom Ewing · Rating 5 out of 5]

Andy Beckett is a historian with journalistic training - a combination that makes him particularly well suited for writing contemporary history, where the wealth of material is so vast that selecting precisely the right story and telling it well is a crucial skill. Beckett does select the right stories - the best chapters here (and at its best, Promised You A Miracle is superb) take one or two eyewitnesses to early 80s history and let them speak. He interviews the great and not always good too - Tebbit is here, so is Dr David Owen, and Jeremy Isaacs, and less celebrated figures like Ken Livingstone's right-hand-woman Valerie Wise or hard-right economist Patrick Minford. But the book comes most alive when people front and centre in the Toxteth riots or the Greenham Common peace camp are talking.

Is there more to it than a collection of anecdotes? The thread of political history that winds through Promised You A Miracle is familiar: the early Thatcher era, where she managed to go from the least popular Prime Minister in British history to a landslide election victory. Beyond the formation of the SDP, Beckett doesn't spend much time on her opposition - he keeps the focus on Thatcher's monetarist experiment, its impact on a battered country, and the blunder-turned-triumph of her Falklands policy. His view - and it's one I broadly share - is that Thatcher was a lucky politician, gifted by jingoism and a split left the opportunity to cement her reforms. Which she seized. The rest is history, or rather is our present, where the consequences of Thatcher's policy are still unwinding themselves.

This is another of Beckett's arguments - rather than being a visionary, Thatcher was, like most politicians, a short-termist. Previous governments had spent time building up social housing and a stable and relatively equal society. Rather than liberating it, Thatcher cashed these hoarded chips in and found little to replace them.

But Promised You A Miracle is not simply oppositional. Beckett identifies something at work in Britain in the 70s and early 80s, some spirit of change and individual initiative. His point, subtly made and reinforced throughout, is that this spirit was to an extent apolitical: it inhabited actors on the left, the centre and the right alike, from the Greenham women's self-organisation, through the GLC Women's Committee accelerating social change through funding, to the forest of Enterprise Allowance Scheme businesses and independent TV producers.

Are such stories available in every decade? Possibly. But what Beckett is doing here is valuable - he is making the point that while Margaret Thatcher found herself ideologically aligned with this movement in society, she was its beneficiary rather than its godmother. And Thatcherism was quick to see some elements of individualism - the emergent identity politics of the GLC, for instance - as its foes. Thatcher laid claim to her entire era, and it has tended to be praised or damned with her. But in many ways she was an incompetent custodian. Promised You A Miracle starts the important business of decoupling the woman from her times.

[Bevan Lewis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Many western democracies look to the 1980s as a pivot point in their history. Terms like revolution are tossed about in describing the disruptive and tumultuous social, political and economic transformations of this era. Such visible change draws historians like moths to a flame. In the UK, the period covered by this book (1980-1982) certainly sowed the seeds of significant transformations in Britain. Andy Beckett has little need to look too far beyond this timeframe, although he does follow some stories such as the Ken Livingston-led Greater London Council (GLC) through to their conclusion later in the decade.
Repeating the style of his previous book When The Lights Went Out Britain In The Seventies Beckett mixes historic research with reportage, visiting relevant individuals and locations from the period. Beckett's describes the book as "not intended to be a conventional, comprehensive history – twentieth-century Britain has plenty of those – nor a simple thumbs up or thumbs down for Thatcherism". The book manages to account for this controversial period without yeilding to the temptation to follow a partisan political viewpoint, or present one of the two 'accepted' narratives - either triumphalism or doom and gloom.
Part One, Yearnings looks at some signs of promise and positivity in the early 1980s - the Austin Metro ("A British Car. To Beat. The World"), Charles and Di's wedding and the 1981 test match victory over Australia. In Morbid Symptoms however, Beckett examines the darker side of the period. Monetarism is examined and contrasted with the problems and riots in Liverpool. Part Three, Stirrings offers an interesting look at some new movements which offered alternatives to the apparently failing monetarist experiment - the SDP, Ken Livingston's GLC and the Greenham Common anti nuclear protest. Part Four looks at signs of changes of mentality which could be argued to be the Thatcher era's lasting legacy - new attitudes of individual success, home ownership through the "right to buy" schemes and encouragement of individual enterprise. The account of the Falklands crisis - progressing from procrastination to decisive military action after the invasion - is compelling and obviously one of the keys to understanding the period. Part Five looks at the New World being built. The account of the development of the Docklands is illuminating as is the early years of Channel 4. The account of the Women's Unit at the GLC is interesting. In one sense it seems the 'last gasp' of radicalism and the left wing. However its also interesting that many of the values of equality (or 'political correctness' as some might describe them) have become mainstream now.
Beckett's overall argument is that "we are all Thatcherites now". Through examples such as the pop singers of the early 80s he shows how even those more left wing individuals who ostensibly opposed Thatcherism ended up buying into the paradigm of individuality and self-help. He also highlights in some respects how Thatcherism owed a debt to what went before. For example "Thatcherism liked to present itself as a rejection of the post-war, state-driven, more profligate way of doing things. But in housing, her administration was actually the post-war state’s beneficiary, selling off the assets that it had built up".
Overall this is a subtle and thoughtful look at a controversial era and its legacy.

[Graham Power · Rating 4 out of 5]

By the end of the 1970s there was a widespread perception that the British post-war consensus of full employment, a mixed economy and the Welfare State had reached a point of terminal crisis. Following the election of Margaret Thatcher as Prime Minister in May 1979 Britain was about to undergo a radical and lasting transformation. One of the many virtues of Andy Beckett’s book is that it provides a nuanced account of a polarised and polarising period in British history. Historical memory has a tendency to simplify but this survey of the early 1980s complicates received wisdom in surprising and illuminating ways.

Given the eventual triumph of Thatcherism it came as something of a shock to be reminded that, by the end of 1980, the Conservative government was deeply divided and the most unpopular since polling began. Against a backdrop of the highest levels of unemployment since the 1930s, inner city riots and - perhaps most embarrassing for an avowedly monetarist administration - spiralling inflation, even traditionally conservative newspapers were writing the political obituary of Thatcher as Prime Minister and Thatcherism as an ideology.

Beckett correctly identifies the Falklands War as the turning point in her political fortunes. The Argentinian invasion was widely anticipated and largely the result of incompetence by the Thatcher administration (‘one of the least surprising surprise attacks in modern military history’, as Beckett dryly puts it) but Britain’s eventual victory in the conflict unleashed a jingoistic wave of national pride which ensured Thatcher’s victory at the 1983 election.

He has an admirably unorthodox way of blurring the boundaries between Left and Right and dredging up often neglected and revealing facts. The 1980s regeneration of London Docklands, for example, was trumpeted as the triumph of free enterprise over the state, but Beckett points out that it was financed by Whitehall to the tune of £443 million, a figure far in excess of what had been spent on the area by previous governments.

The left-wing Greater London Council (GLC) was so detested by Margaret Thatcher that she eventually abolished the entire council (in the interests of preserving democracy against the threat of democratically elected politicians, presumably); nonetheless, with its emphasis on decentralisation and empowering people to change their own lives through voluntary associations, ‘red’ Ken Livingstone’s GLC carried a curious echo of Thatcherite rhetoric. In his own way Livingstone, the son of working class Tory voters, disliked the paternalism of the traditional British Labour movement as much as Margaret Thatcher did. The GLC was derided as the ‘loony left’ by the press, and not just the right wing press as Beckett points out, but it’s championing of gender equality, multiculturalism and LGBT rights was to have as enduring an influence on Britain as Thatcher’s espousal of market capitalism.

As Beckett shows the Thatcherite ideology of the untrammelled free market economy with its holy grail of commercial success began to spread almost by osmosis influencing even those who did not regard themselves as right-wing. In pop music, at that time still a strong indicator of wider societal trends, the insurrectionary anarchy of punk gave way to a glamorous and tuneful form of pop with previously left field musicians proudly declaring their desire to be rich and famous. Groups comprised of working class boys from the recession hit North of England made videos in which they sang and danced their way around country houses dressed up like characters from Brideshead Revisited or Restoration fops.

A chapter on Channel 4 television, launched in 1982, brings into focus the complex and often contradictory nature of the cultural changes taking place. Proposals for a fourth television channel in Britain went back into the mists of time (well, the 1960s) but Channel 4 was finally established by the Conservatives in November 1980. Its perceived left-liberal programming agenda turned out to be not to Mrs Thatcher’s taste at all but the station gradually began to change the structure of British broadcasting in distinctly Thatcherite ways. It drew heavily on small independent production companies, previously largely unknown in British television, and displaced the duopoly of BBC and ITV in a way that Thatcher would have approved of (in 2023 independent production companies are key players in British TV with even the BBC now functioning as a publisher of programmes made by independents almost as much as an originator of them).

The independent production companies also began to erode traditional trade union practices and staffing levels. This was mainly for economic reasons rather than ideological ones but they were facilitated in this by the highly ideological trade union ‘reforms’ passed by the government. The story of Diverse Productions seems emblematic of the era: beginning as a subversively lefty sort of operation by the mid-eighties it was busy making a series in praise the free marketeers called The New Enlightenment (predictably, this was the only programme shown on Channel 4 that Margaret Thatcher is known to have enjoyed). The independents might have started off as pioneering buccaneers but the successful ones gradually transmuted into fully-fledged capitalist businesses.

This is a wide-ranging and highly readable book which combines a journalistic narrative drive with subtle historical analysis. Beckett captures the mood of change, as both Left and Right sought to escape the stasis of the post-war consensus, and provides a fresh perspective on events too readily reduced to cliche.

[Bookthesp1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having written a widely acclaimed one volume history of the 1970s Beckett turns his attention to the 1980s. Perhaps Beckett or his publishers have their eye on a multi volume approach since Beckett only covers the first two years of the 1980s. Thatchers victory in 1979 kick started the 80s a year early "a portentous moment, for those who pay attention to portents" as Margaret Drabble says at the beginning of her state of the nation 1980s novel The Radiant Way. Beckett doesn't quote this but Dominic Sandbrook probably would and this is a crowded market with one volume histories by Andy McSmith and the best for me- Rejoice Rejoice by Alwyn Hughes. Sandbrook is writing his own multi volume effort. So Beckett needs a hook to justify this micro approach and thus uses the title "Promised You a Miracle", a Simple Minds record and the context for those years according to Beckett, though its one he doesn't fully address even in the conclusion which is somewhat weak and half hearted as though he realizes its just a construct to make readers buy the book maybe- a familiar pop culture throwaway reference changed into some sort of political zeitgeist. I don't remember Thatcher promising miracles unless St Francis of Assisi was really "Dynamo" in disguise.
The book goes onto to describe in well hewn nicely written chapters some of these miracle workers- the Austin Metro designer,The SDP, Greenham Common protestors, Ken Livingstone's GLC, the development of docklands in London and Canary Wharf and a very good chapter on the Falklands War.
This latter event gave Thatcher the impetus to win the 1983 election on the back of a patriotic and (Rejoice Rejoice) perhaps miraculous piece of logistics. Before this war Thatcher's social experiments and economic vandalism (my words) had failed to kick start the economy. Her style was not yet imperious- indeed, she relied heavily on advisors and was often indecisive and reluctant to commit or follow through.
The book is well written though Becketts journalistic instincts see him a little too keen to describe clothing and house decor as a reflection of how his interviewees (David Owen et al) have changed over the years whilst retaining modicum amounts of their 80-s incarnations. Its a good book but the thematic chapters (even though, often linked or grouped) seem too standalone to provide a fully followed through argument. If Becketts miracle turns out to be a mirage it hardly seems to matter since in any decade there will be highs and lows, promises kept and broken.
Overall, he succeeds in giving a flavour of the period with some nicely written prose and links though not always slick or stylish. The book promised more than it could deliver and the conceit of the title was not fully explained or realized. At the end Beckett talks about the actual physical record of the same name in a sort of desperate attempt to tie the metamorphosis of Simple minds from minor Scottish rockers to Stadium fillers as a metaphor for a shiny, surface miracle that supposedly became the successful Thatcherism of post Falklands War society. Dominic Sandbrook has a more successful ( if equally flawed at times) argument about the genesis of 80s aspiration developing in the 1970s where hard faced union men became just like every one else- wanting stuff and holidays and social status- wanting to aspire.. Thatcherism may have been the right wing incarnation of this and Beckett is not the first to point out that early Thatcherism failed to deliver its later zeal and fire. It will be interesting to see whether Beckett does write further volumes on the 1980s. He should perhaps avoid weak metaphors (which try to emulate the hopes of anyone at the start of a new decade) and focus on a bigger picture. For now, a promising start but not a miracle.
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[Nat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great, hope he writes more of these. Not quite as good as the one about the 70s though.

[William Connelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

Having read Beckett’s ‘When The Lights Went Out’, I was interested in his take on the 1980’s. It’s an interesting question of how much did people shape Thatcherism and how much did Thatcherism shape them. It’s a symbiotic relationship. Much of the short term thinking, like much of the last 40 years, leaves a lot to be desired.

[Jonathan Norton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although they were popular at the time, the 80s now look dated compared to later decades. Many features are redundant and embarrassing, and the people who were alive then haven't aged well. Altogether it just proves once again that if you remember the 80s then you weren't born later on.

[Pinko Palest · Rating 5 out of 5]

an eclectic selection of aspects of the early 80s. The Falklands War features prominently, as is only to be expected: for the author, this is the sole reason Thatcher and thatcherism survived. There is a fair deal on economic thinking, although there is much less on detailed economic policy. There is not much on the Cold War, but a good deal on Greenham Common. There is nothing on football and hooliganism, but a wealth of detail about cricket. There is almost nothing on New Romanticism but a whole chapter on ABC. The SDP is covered in some detail, Ken Livingstone at the GLC is given several chapters, as well as the rise of the Labour Left, while there is nothing on Northern Ireland and the hunger strikes. The author concludes that Thatcherism was more or less avoidable, and that though it did express certain changes in the zeitgeist, these were also expressed in very different ways. All in all, a joy to read

[Akin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Extremely well-researched and written, but despite (or because of) this, it comes across as a set of vignettes united by place and time, rather than the cohesive account of the birth of New Britain that it proposes. FWIW (and obviously, one acknowledges the author's hard work, research and judgement) one suspects that extending the narrative until, say 1987, would have given the narrative more convincing form - taking in the abolition of the GLC and its legacy, Death in Gibraltar and Thatcher's military swagger, the City and the Big Bang, Thatcher v Heseltine over Westmoreland...

Also, i rather think that a bit more cultural analysis, beyond pop music, might have strengthened the context somewhat. But these caveats aside, an enjoyable and informative consideration of the early eighties and Year Zero of the new Britain.

[Simon Woodrup · Rating 5 out of 5]

Andy Beckett wrote an excellent book. A thorough but very readable review of the early Thatcher years in Britain.
If you want to know more about the last gasp of British auto manufacturing, the jingoistic Falklands war, what led to the Toxteth riots in Liverpool, the Greenham Common women and the anti-nuclear protests and what it was to live on America's "unsinkable aircraft carrier" aka the British Isles, the fighting and sometimes silly and self-destructive (but heartfelt) squabbles on the Left, the burgeoning women's movement and the re-birth (death?) of London as it was then you'll love this book.
I can't say it better than Hilary Mantel (of course I can't!)....it is "Bracingly anti-nostolgic",
and given the current shift to the right in US/Anglo/European politics it is very timely.

[Jeff Howells · Rating 5 out of 5]

It makes me feel old at the thought that for some time now the 80s have been studied as history. Hot on the heels of watching Dominic Sandbrook's TV documentary series I've read this book, which looks at the years 1980-82. Even though it's a short period Beckett covers a lot. Just a sample of the things covered are: the Austin Metro, the creation of the SDP, the '81 riots (Toxteth rather than Brixton this time), Ken Livingston & the GLC, Greenham Common, the Docklands regeneration and the Falklands War. Given this history is still relatively recent, Beckett peppers the book with interviews with people who were there, and it's this that stops it becoming a nostalgia fest. It's a really strong addition to the post war British History genre...lets hope there is more to come.

[Neil · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very absorbing study of a pivotal period both in modern British history and my own life. Full of interesting snippets and telling anecdotes with which Beckett adroitly recreates a vanished time and place. Nostalgic without being maudlin, by detailing the genesis of ideas and trends which are now firmly embedded in society Beckett reminds us of LP Hartley's famous dictum that "The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there". A really excellent read.

[John W · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tremendous. I hope he carries on through the rest of this vital decade of British history.

[Bill Tyne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I choose to read Beckett's account of Britain 1980 - 82 as a companion to Dominic Sandbrook's "Who Dares Wins" which covers roughly the same period (Britain 1979 - 1982). Sandbrook is generally considered to be of the center-right politically and so Beckett a left wing Guardian journalist would be the perfect foil to add balance to Sandbrooks Thatcherite leanings. Reading both histories was very revealing - not just in what the books themselves had to say about the period but also in the biases of both authors.

Overall there is far more depth in Sandbrook's tome (hardly suprising as it is more than twice the length of Becketts work) and generally speaking Sandbrook is less partisan, however Beckett covers the founding of Channel Four and the Greenham Common Peace Camp in far more depth than Sandbrook, as well as presenting a simple, concise explanation of the different measures of money supply which Sandbrook appears to assume we all know.

Beckett is more naive, less searching in much of his analysis - all to often he goes with the simplistic left wing dogmas rather than presenting a fuller, more complex and messy picture of reality - this is clear when he discusses Economics, the Falklands and the IRA (he fails to give due weight to serious negative the impact the increase in the value of the pound due to North Sea Oil on the manufacturing export market in the UK; Oil was just as much a headache as it was a gift for the Tories. He is damning of the British presence in Northern Ireland and fails to understand why politicians (Labour and Tory) refused to call it a war or recognise members of the IRA as political prisoners - he provides no background as to why the troops went into Northern Ireland and glosses the sucessive bombings that had occurred in London upto Livingstone inviting Gerry Adams over for talks at the GLC. When he does consider the Falklands he views it as a jingoistic exercise in militarism and fails to recognise the disaterous impact it would have had if we had failed to defend the right of the Falklanders to self determination. While he recognises that there were problems relating to the Argentinian junta, he is keen to emphasis the small number of people that would be involved if we handed the Islands over to the Argentinians - this surely mirrors his attitude to Northern Ireland, where the majority of the population should forget their desire to belong to the UK and go be part of a larger Ireland - forgetting of course that at the time the Republic asked the UK government to keep Northern Ireland as they didn't want the potential civil war that would result if they pulled out the troops and handed control over to Dublin).

On the positive side he recognises much of the positive impact of a range of GLC programs, which were lambasted at the time but now appear absolutely sensible and mainstream. Beckett is also quick to recognise this period as the point when the forces behind the pre-existing divide between London and the rest of the UK began to accelerate and the slight cracks became a chasm. Beckett is also stronger on the analysis of how the culture and the mindset of society shifted, taking a more individualistic bent and pushing against the accepted mores of the seventies.

The premise of the book is that it shows why this period made Britain the society it is today, presumably changing from how we had lived and conducted things in the past. Just what those changes were, and how they came about between 1980 and 1982 is never really made explicit, though there are hints. The move to consumerism and the shift from heavy industry are eluded to as is the increase in individualism with a shift on the left away from supporting large scale class initiatives to trying to garner support from multiple small scale disparate groups.

Ultimately both these books provide a similar picture of the decline of the old left with a change in the approach to resolving the economic problems of the country (no more postwar consensus). Both of them highlight the collapse of heavy industry and the spiralling of unemployment, though Beckett is more inclined to see this as deliberate policy while Sandbrook sees the Tories as less in control of events than that with constant disagreements about how harsh policy should be and an underlying panic when they realised just how bad unemployment was getting. The differences between Sandbrook and Beckett are a question of degree. Both recognise the rise of music and media trends (New Romantics and Independent Production Companies) as being indicative of the new agressive individualistic, self-determining, neo-liberal outlook that filtered throughout society. These attitudes found their way into both left and right and, for better or for worse, we are still stuck with them today!

[Rick Burin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a hugely entertaining work of popular social history: a succession of loosely-connected long reads about all aspects of Britain in 1980-82, when the country rediscovered its sense of pride and direction – but at what cost? Kicking off with a typically telling allegory about an overpriced chair, Beckett is perceptive, witty and allergic to received wisdom as he chronicles phenomena ranging from monetarism to the Mini Metro, taking in the Falklands War (the astonishing central set-piece of the book), the Greater London Council’s women’s committee , and the creation of Canary Wharf, alongside passages on the arts, Greenham Common, and the prospect of nuclear Armageddon, a section that comprehensively that will explode any lingering feelings of nostalgia.

In the manner of Slate’s celebrated podcast, Slow Burn, the author finds fascinating new ways into the more well-trodden stories, while digging out some completely new ones – post-apocalyptic homes under Wiltshire! – and offering a left-leaning but even-handed perspective that refuses to just indict Thatcher and her idea of Britain, as much as frankly that’s what we all want. Though Beckett is a skilful and pacey narrator whose probing interviews and exhaustive location visits immeasurably enhance the material, his meta ‘New Journalism’ style can get a little formulaic – breaking into contemporary descriptions of his subjects: their faces, clothes and environs – and there are occasionally laborious descriptions of visual media that slow his flow. You can also argue, I think, that his focus is at times too much on London: though the capital was the principal battleground of a white-hot ideological war, the five years that have passed since the book’s publication show that you underestimate the rest of the country – and the impact of Thatcherism upon it – at your peril.

This sort of long-form journalism is a curious way to treat the subject – vivid sketches of the period, from which we are sometimes left to extrapolate the connections and conclusions – but just about every chapter is gripping and in some way revelatory.

[Keith Hamilton · Rating 4 out of 5]

A worthy successor to his previous book 'When the lights went out', a social history of the turbulent 1970s, this book focuses on the three years 1980 to 1982, and shows how pivotal these years were to the making of modern Britain.

The book succeeds in its aim because it focuses on the people who were involved in the key events and their personal stories, rather than an over reliance on dry statistics, facts and figures.

Whilst some of the events may be very familiar (that Royal Wedding, the Falklands war, the birth of Thatcherism, Ken Livingstone and his 'loony left' council, the Greenham Common protests ,the increasing dominance of London , its new financial institutions and the glass and concrete towers of Canary Wharf, the birth of the radical broadcaster Channel 4, the birth of the SDP), the author has insightful things to say, and paints a vivid and entertaining picture of life in the early 1980s.

If you want to understand what made this country the way it is now, and how some of the hopes and promises of the 1980s have been dashed, reading this book is a very good place to start.

[Thomas Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Andy Beckett's book on the 1970s is one of the best history books I've read. It encapsulated so much of what went on in that decade and explained the significance of those events in a very interesting and insightful manner, and I was expecting to get the same level of insight in this book about 1980-1982. While this book was an enjoyable read and touched on many important political and historic events from the early eighties, I felt that this book lacked the critique and analysis that his book on the 70s had. At times this book drags a little, with its descriptions sometimes becoming convoluted, thus making the book less readable. Although there are a few flaws to the book, I still thoroughly enjoyed reading it and learnt a great deal about a very important and influencial period of modern British history. I look forward to the next book that Beckett writes.

[Simon Jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

The early nineteen eighties was when the modern UK - for better or for worse - was created. And Andy Beckett's book documents this tumultuous period deftly and very entertainingly. The births of Thatcherism and the SDP, the rise of Ken Livingstone at the GLC, the start of the transformation of London's Docklands, and numerous other fascinating subjects are analysed and explained in detail.

The strength of 'Promised You A Miracle', which was published in 2015, is the fact that the author tracked down and interviewed a lot of the protagonists from the era. John Nott, Geoffrey Howe, Ken Livingstone and many more - people in their seventies and eighties when the author met them - are able to look back on events they lived through and add personal recollections. It brings the history to life.

A hugely enjoyable, informative and readable book.

[Paul Jack · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a brilliantly well written account of 3 key years at the start of the 80s that were a pivotal turning point in post-war British history. There is so much here to learn from and enjoy. Andy Beckett has an easy to read style that informs, never dumbs-down and it feels as if he was at the heart of so many events and developments (when in fact he was a schoolboy at the time). favourite bits for me were the chapters on the Greenham Women, the fear of nuclear armageddon and its paranoia, the GLC/ken Livingstone and the genesis of London's docklands renewal. I couldnt put it down and am waiting with baited breath for a follow up!

[Andrew Galloway · Rating 4 out of 5]

Extensively well researched, Andy Beckett's exposition of the rapid cultural changes that took place in Britain in the early 1980's is a must read for anyone wishing to more fully understand why Britain is the way it is today in the early twenty-first century. Although some of the chapters read like extended Guardian articles, overall the content is very well researched, comprehensive and accessible.
The chapters on the Falklands 'Crisis' are particularly enlightening.

[Anna Schilke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beckett's thesis is simple: the years between 1980 and 1982 were instrumental (perhaps even the largest contributing factor) to creating the modern UK. He didn't manage to convince me that this was true. However, I learned an awful lot about the eighties, from pop stars to formation of Canary Wharf to the beginnings of the Social Democrats. His sense of humor was an added bonus. The small print of the book was not.

[James Tidd · Rating 4 out of 5]

From its beginning explaining the advert that was helping to launch the Mini Metro via the Iranian Embassy siege, the inner city riots of Brixton, Toxteth etc and the Falklands campaign which saved the Prime Minister. The book explores what is probably Britain's most important three years in its recent modern history.

[Laura Naldrett · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting account of a tumultuous period. I found some chapters more engaging than others and felt it tailed off in some areas without conclusions. Easy to see similar themes in play now showing the cyclical nature of UK society. A good stop gap whilst waiting for the Dominic Sandbrook monster volume covering the same period to come out in paperback.

[Ipswichblade · Rating 4 out of 5]

Decent book about the early 80s. I like the way the author concentrated on some specifics rather than a scatter gun approach. The chapter on how the Docklands grew was very interesting and Andy Beckett had clearly done some quality research speaking to people who were involved at the time.

[Joe O'Donnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

The years of 1980 to 1982, when Britain under Margaret Thatcher become a laboratory for radical free market ideas and economic shock treatment, are key to understanding the Britain of today. That is the contention of “Promised You A Miracle”, Andy Beckett’s analysis of the political, economic and cultural landscapes of Britain in the early years of Thatcherism.

Despite the claims made by right-wingers over the last 30 years, “Promised You A Miracle” shows that the triumph of Thatcherism was far from inevitable. By the early 1980s, as unemployment soared to over 3 million in the U.K., the Thatcher government was split to the point of paralysis about the correct economic path to take. The country was experiencing the most prolonged economic crisis since the Great depression, the inner cities had erupted in violence, and even the inflation the Tories had promised to tame was sky-rocketing.

One of the great insights of “Promised You A Miracle” is just how lucky Thatcher got. The delivery of North Sea oil (devised under the previous Labour government) got the Tories out of an economic hole. And Thatcher was hugely fortunate that, in April 1982, Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands (a territory that, as Beckett recounts, the U.K. Government only months previously was prepared to negotiate away their sovereign claim to the islands). Both of these events rescued a Thatcherite project that might otherwise have been heading for electoral defeat and a place as a mere footnote in British political history.

There are large chunks of this book - like the Healy-Benn battle where left and right flanks of Labour party feuded themselves into irrelevance - that appear to have contemporary parallels. Beckett’s analysis of the policies of Ken Livingstone’s Greater London Council shows how it paved the way for the metropolitan identity politics of the 2000s. In Beckett’s forensic retelling of the Toxteth riots that exploded during the summer of 1981, readers will find resonance with the London riots of 2011 and the Black Lives Matter movement. And the subtitle of the book (“Why 1980-2 made modern Britain”) can be seen most obviously in the Thatcherite ‘Right-to-buy’ scheme, that sold off huge swathes of council housing, thus greatly depleting the U.K.’s social housing stock and leading directly to housing and homelessness crises of today. Tellingly, in the light of the U.K’s recent military disasters, Beckett sees "the ease with which modern Britain goes to war as largely a legacy of the early 1980s".

If “Promised You A Miracle” was merely a recitation of the political and economic changes of the early 80s, it would still be a fine book. But, Beckett also focuses on the popular culture of the time - ABC, TV adaptation of "Brideshead Revisited", The Face magazine, the creation of Channel 4 – and how they came to reflect the prevailing political and economic trends.

If I had one criticism of “Promised You A Miracle”, it is that it pays scant attention to the 1981 Hunger Strikes – events that through Sinn Fein’s electoral strategy and the resulting Peace Process really *did* change the U.K. (or at the very least the part of the U.K. in Northern Ireland).

Notwithstanding this quibble, I could easily have read another 300 pages of this absorbing social history. It is one of the great strengths of “Promised You A Miracle” that, even for someone like me who consider themselves to be on the left, it leaves you with a sense of how the energy and ideas of Thatcherism could have seemed seductive in early 80s Britain. Highly recommended.

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm roughly the same age as Andy Beckett so his books have a real resonance for me, covering the years in which I grew up. I enjoyed his previous book When The Lights Went Out Britain In The Seventies which covered all of the stuff that was happening whilst I was watching 'Starsky & Hutch' and 'The Two Ronnies', and so I looked forward to reading this one. It didn't disappoint.

Unlike many a dry history, Andy Beckett writes himself into the story and tells you a little bit about what was going on in his own life when these events were happening, and what they meant for him and his family. He visits the places and meets the people involved (often more honest and wistful, 30yrs later) and the result is a very human and at times elegiac version of history that is highly enjoyable.

The chapters on the Cold War and the Falklands War stuck out for me, but the most fascinating aspect of all was his debunking of the mythology that has built up around Margaret Thatcher. The history books barely ever mention this, but her government really sucked for the first 3 years of it's existence. All the numbers were awful (particularly unemployment), Maggie was never entirely sure of herself or her mission, half the cabinet ("the wets") hated her and wanted her out, and the miners DEFEATED her in 1981. Hello? Where does that little morsel ever get mentioned in the history books?
Most damning of all, shocked and in stasis after the invasion of the Falkland Islands in 1982 (there had been numerous warnings) it basically took the First Sea Lord, Admiral Leach, to burst into a private meeting, take the situation by the scruff of the neck and propose a naval task force, which recaptured the islands a mere two months later. Thus on an outporing of patriotic cheerleading, Mrs Thatcher secured an election victory in 1983 and the stage was set for the 'greed is good' decade.

Oh, and meanwhile the Labour Party was splitting itself apart. Plus ça change....

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

If journalism is the first draft of history, then Andy Beckett's description of Britain in the early 1980s is history version 1.5. Using a range of memoirs, contemporary accounts and personal interviews with man of the key individuals from the era, he offers a idiosyncratic description of the period that is leavened with his own memories of his life in Britain during that time. HIs argument is a somewhat contrarian one: that these years were not just the beginnings of a lurch rightward as has often been relieved, but a time of dynamic change in many other respects. In Beckett's view people like "Red Ken" Livingston and the Greenham Common protestors were in every respect as much an embodiment of the transformation taking place as was Margaret Thatcher, and with a legacy nearly as important to making Britain the country it is today. His analysis is provocative, as is his highlighting of how much of this change was built upon the achievements of the previous decades rather than reflecting a rejection of them. For anyone interested in learning ore about the history of Britain during this era this is an excellent book to read, one that hopefully Beckett will build upon with a successor volume that describes further how the decade unfolded from this provocative start.

[Kieran · Rating 5 out of 5]

The early 1980s were to the UK what the late 1960s were to the USA, or the late 80s and early 90s were in Russia. A mix of economic upheaval, political conflict and social transformation combined to threaten to tear British society apart.

Andy Beckett chronicles this time of turbulence brilliantly, visiting obvious subjects, such as the Falklands War, the Toxteth riots, and the Thatcher government, as well as less obvious areas, like the transformation of the London Docklands, the launch of Channel 4, and the life of the Austin Metro.

Like in 'When the Lights Went Out,' his previous book, Andy Beckett's great strength is his writing style. You feel sucked in to this world which, as someone born in 1990, is at once very familiar and yet somehow completely alien. Even knowing a lot of it already, and how it ended, didn't ruin it at all.

[Ugh · Rating 4 out of 5]

How Britain changed in the late 70s and early 80s, and what remains of those changes.

Part history; part journalism of the surviving key players.

Seemingly fair-minded: the Tories are painted as neither entirely villainous nor entirely heroic; Labour as neither entirely competent nor entirely virtuous.

It's an excellent look at some of the most momentous aspects of the early 80s, with not a few surprising details and authorial gems.

It's also strangely discrete, however, with little if any flow from one chapter to the next and little overriding narrative; if not for that, it'd be a solid five stars.

But it's well, well worth a read - especially if, like me, you were born in the 80s but know little about their politics.

[Derek Baldwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Took me a while to plough through this, no reflection on the book which is interesting and very readable. Reading a history of a time I remember so well, with one major caveat, feels odd. Few surprises, no revelations, maybe I hadn't remembered what ABC were called before they were called ABC, but that's about it. (I've forgotten already, by the way) The caveat is that though this all seemed so very familiar I wasn't actually living in the UK at this time....