Editing Thatcherism (section)

== Dispute over the term ==
It is often claimed that the word ''Thatcherism'' was coined by cultural theorist [[Stuart Hall (cultural theorist)|Stuart Hall]] in a 1979 ''[[Marxism Today]]'' article.<ref>{{cite magazine |first=Stuart |last=Hall |url=http://www.amielandmelburn.org.uk/collections/mt/pdf/79_01_hall.pdf |title=The Great Moving Right Show |journal=Marxism Today |date=January 1979 |access-date=3 November 2020}}</ref> However, this is not true as Tony Heath first used the term in an article he wrote that appeared in ''[[Tribune (magazine)|Tribune]]'' on 10 August 1973. Writing as ''Tribune''{{'}}s education correspondent, Heath wrote: "It will be argued that teachers are members of a profession which must not be influenced by political considerations. With the blight of Thatcherism spreading across the land that is a luxury that only the complacent can afford".<ref>{{cite magazine |last=Heath |first=Tony |magazine=Tribune |title=[Article] |date=10 August 1973}}{{Title missing|date=March 2023}}</ref>{{sfn|Procter|2004|p=98}} Although the term had been widely used before then,{{sfn|Vinen|2009|p=4}} not all social critics have accepted the term as valid, with the [[High Tory]] journalist [[T. E. Utley]] believing "There is no such thing as Thatcherism".<ref>{{cite news |first=T. E. |last=Utley |title=Monstrous invention |work=The Spectator |date=9 August 1986}}</ref>

Utley contended that the term was a creation of Thatcher's enemies who wished to damage her by claiming that she had an inflexible devotion to a particular set of principles and also by some of her friends who had little sympathy for what he called "the English political tradition" because it facilitated "compromise and consensus". Utley argued that a free and competitive economy, rather than being an innovation of Thatcherism, was one "more or less permanent ingredient in modern Conservative philosophy":
<blockquote>It was on that principle that Churchill fought the 1945 election, having just read Hayek's ''Road to Serfdom''. [...] What brought the Tories to 13 years of political supremacy in [[1951 United Kingdom general election|1951]] was the slogan 'Set the people free'. [...] There is absolutely nothing new about the doctrinal front that she presents on these matters. [...] As for 'privatisation', Mr. Powell proposed it in [...] 1968. As for 'property-owning democracy', I believe it was [[Anthony Eden]] who coined the phrase.{{sfn|Utley|1989|pp=76–77}}</blockquote>

In foreign policy, Utley claimed Thatcher's desire to restore British greatness did not mean "primarily a power devoted to the preservation of its own interests" but that she belonged "to that militant Whig branch of English Conservatism...her view of foreign policy has a high moral content". In practical terms, he claimed this expressed itself in her preoccupation with "the freedom of Afghanistan rather than the security of Ulster".{{sfn|Utley|1989|pp=77–78}}

Such leftist critics as [[Anthony Giddens]] claim that Thatcherism was purely an ideology and argue that her policies marked a change which was dictated more by political interests than economic reasons:
{{blockquote|Rather than by any specific logic of capitalism, the reversal was brought about by voluntary reductions in social expenditures, higher taxes on low incomes and the lowering of taxes on higher incomes. This is the reason why in Great Britain in the mid 1980s the members of the top decile possessed more than a half of all the wealth.{{sfn|Giddens|1993|p=233}} To justify this by means of economic "objectivities" would be an ideology. What is at play here are interests and power.{{sfn|Drago|Leskosek|2003|p=37}}}}

The Conservative historian of [[Peterhouse]], [[Maurice Cowling]], also questioned the uniqueness of "Thatcherism". Cowling claimed that Thatcher used "radical variations on that patriotic conjunction of freedom, authority, inequality, individualism and average decency and respectability, which had been the Conservative Party's theme since at least 1886". Cowling further contended that the "Conservative Party under Mrs Thatcher has used a radical rhetoric to give intellectual respectability to what the Conservative Party has always wanted".{{sfn|Cowling|1990|pages=xxvii–xxviii}}

Historians Emily Robinson, Camilla Schofield, Florence Sutcliffe-Braithwaite and Natalie Thomlinson have argued that by the 1970s, Britons were keen on defining and claiming their individual rights, identities and perspectives. They demanded greater personal autonomy and self-determination and less outside control. They angrily complained that the establishment was withholding it. They argue that this shift in concerns had helped cause Thatcherism and was incorporated into its appeal.{{sfn|Robinson|Schofield|Sutcliffe-Braithwaite|Thomlinson|2017|pp=268–304}}