What really happened in Britain in the 1970s
In 1973 there was a military coup against a democratically elected left-wing Government in Chile.
It was a bloody and vicious affair (on the part of the army and its US backers)but is probably not the preferred instrument of the ruling order for regime change or perhaps more accurately regime changes.
Sometimes they are people who have to go or be moved to keep the ‘markets’ happy. It happened to Tony Benn in 1975 and to Varoufakis in Greece in 2015, although he chose to leave the Government rather than accept a lesser role.
But more often it’s about policy changes.
What it meant for the UK in 1976 is largely a matter of historical record and memoirs now.
The 1974 oil crisis had caused serious problems for the UK economy and the Labour Government which was elected twice in that year on a platform well to the left of where Labour currently is (but still on the basis of managing the system and reforming it where possible) faced economic problems.
Towards the end of 1976 the Prime Minister Jim Callaghan claimed that the country had only £2 billion left and that measures from printing money to increased unemployment and cuts in benefits would be required unless action was taken.
Benn records in his Diaries that Michael Foot spoke against £2bn cuts in spending, increased unemployment and cuts in benefits on the basis that these were unsustainable and would split both the trade unions and the Labour Party.
The choice remained between a left-wing strategy of no cuts and economic investment championed by Tony Benn and others and a loan from the IMF.
The choice does seem familiar.
Tony Benn argued that the situation was similar to 1931 when Labour split over austerity measures. Callaghan disagreed.
Benn’s alternative strategy which involved import controls, reduction in armed forces commitment in Cyprus and Germany and withdrawal from what was then the EEC was part of an alternative left strategy.
It might be queried how effective at least parts of it would have been.
Denis Healey’s policy of monetarism certainly was effective. Its main effect was to usher in the Thatcherite era of neo-liberal economics which New Labour in key parts (but not quite all) kept to.
The Labour left made their point but did not resign. It can be argued that to have done so would simply have given an earlier start to Thatcherism.
The real alternative of mobilising protest from below in workplaces and communities was not centrally addressed- although obviously there were anti-cuts protests and campaigns.
Even so the events of 1976 are a reminder of the origins of austerity politics and the opposition to them. The search for a successful strategy to counter them continues. Perhaps the 2019 Labour Manifesto in part constructed by people who do remember the actual 1970s may do something.
Not name calling but serious politics are required to beat those who would make ordinary people pay for their crisis.
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