The Politics of the Future in Britain 1958 to 2004

1958 年至 2004 年英国未来的政治

• 批准号: 2584859
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2021 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2584859
• 关键词: Politics; Future; Britain; 1958; 2004

The primary objective of this research is to investigate British people's perceptions of the future between 1958 and 2004. Ranging from the bleak to the bright, the preposterous to the probable, what do these 'futures past' tell us about the popular politics of post-war Britain? Since 1945, political parties have dealt in competing visions of Britain's future: the socially-democratic 1945 Labour Manifesto, 'Let Us Face The Future'; Macmillan's vision of an 'affluent' Britain in the late-1950s; the technocratic revival of Harold Wilson's 'White Heat'; Enoch Powell's prophesised 'Rivers of blood'; Margaret Thatcher's attempts to 'roll back the tide of Socialism'; and Blair's vision of a 'Third Way'. But how far did 'ordinary' Britons buy in to these visions? Or, alternatively, did they develop their own vernacular visions? Thanks to the ever-growing study of public memory, historians have demonstrated that post-war Britons were incapable of agreeing on their past and its meaning; this research will explore how - through the lenses of race, class, gender and nation - Britain looked to its future.Historians have a tendency to teleology, to view the past in light of subsequent events. A historical investigation that focuses on imagined futures avoids this pitfall by recreating the uncertainty and contingency of the past. To date, there have been relatively few histories of modern Britain's 'futures past': just three journal articles (by Ortolano, Crowcroft, and Kowol) have explored perceptions of the future among Conservative Party leaders and urban planners. Rob Waters' Historical Research Lecture in October 2019 demonstrated the utility of a 'futures past' perspective in his analysis of Black political cultures in the 1970s. As of yet, however, no historian has adopted a future-focused perspective for a sustained cultural and political history of post-war Britain.

这项研究的主要目的是调查1958年至2004年期间英国人对未来的看法。从黯淡到光明，从荒谬到可能，这些“过去的未来”告诉我们战后英国的流行政治是什么？自1945年以来，各政党对英国未来的看法相互矛盾：1945年工党社会民主宣言《让我们面对未来》;麦克米伦对20世纪50年代末“富裕”英国的看法;哈罗德·威尔逊的“白色热”的技术官僚复兴;以诺·鲍威尔预言的“血流成河”;玛格丽特·撒切尔试图“击退社会主义浪潮”;以及布莱尔的“第三条道路”但“普通”英国人在多大程度上接受了这些愿景？或者，他们是否发展了自己的本土视野？由于对公共记忆的研究日益增多，历史学家已经证明，战后的英国人无法就他们的过去及其意义达成一致;这项研究将探讨英国如何--通过种族、阶级、性别和民族的视角--展望未来。历史学家倾向于目的论，即根据随后发生的事件来看待过去。关注想象中的未来的历史研究通过重现过去的不确定性和偶然性来避免这一陷阱。到目前为止，关于现代英国“未来的过去”的历史相对较少：只有三篇期刊文章（Ortolano，Crowcroft和Kowol）探讨了保守党领导人和城市规划者对未来的看法。罗布沃茨的历史研究讲座在2019年10月展示了他在20世纪70年代黑人政治文化的分析“未来过去”的角度的效用。然而，到目前为止，还没有一位历史学家采用以未来为中心的视角来研究战后英国持续的文化和政治史。