Robert Travers, professor of history at Cornell University specializing in modern British history, comments on the death of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
He says:
“Margaret Thatcher was a hugely successful and admired leader in Britain and the world, but opinion in Britain remains deeply divided about the legacy of her policies. She was the first, and so far only, woman prime minister in British history. She had extraordinary abilities as a political performer on the national and world stage, and succeeded in projecting an image as a strong leader, a politician of conviction who stood for freedom and individual rights against the power of the state. “As a strong defender of free-market capitalism, Thatcher drew political strength from her alliance with Ronald Reagan, and from the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union. In her domestic policies, she tried to promote individual personal responsibility by rolling back the power of the state to intervene in people’s lives. Her critics blamed her policies for undermining the welfare state, and for creating greater social inequality. “The arguments over her policies in the 1980’s – whether government should seek to protect the poorest and to regulate the power of big business – still continue today, making Thatcher’s legacy as contested as her policies.”
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