Margaret Thatcher

Margaret Thatcher (1925-2013) was British Prime Minister and the first woman to hold this post.

Thatcher's government lasted eleven years, from 1979 to 1990, and was characterized by the implantation of neoliberalism in the United Kingdom.

Biography

Margaret Thatcher was born on October 13, 1925, in the city of Grantham, United Kingdom, to a middle-class family.

Her father was a merchant and Methodist pastor, in addition, he was a councilor and mayor of the city where he was born, instilling in his daughter a taste for politics.

She graduated in Chemistry from the University of Oxford where she also participated in the student movement at the Conservative Association. There, she was influenced by readings by Friedrich Hayek that advocated economic liberalism and condemned state intervention in the economy.

Later, she would be invited to join the Conservative Party lists and study law. After suffering a defeat in the 1955 elections she managed to be elected deputy in 1959.

From then on, she would integrate the conservative governments as Secretary of State of the Ministry of Pensions and Social Security and Minister of Education.

In 1979 she was nominated to be the Conservative Party candidate for the British government and would emerge victorious in the elections. She would be re-elected and would leave office only in 1990, when she would receive the title of baroness.

Margaret Thatcher married in 1951 and had two twin children. After leaving the government, she led a low-key life and wrote her memoirs. She passed away on April 8, 2013, in Westminster, UK.

Feminism

The British prime minister claimed that she did not like feminism and that she owed nothing of her political trajectory to this movement. When she was education minister, Thatcher even stated that she would not see a woman as British premier.

She was the first woman to hold a prominent position in politics, advocated for the liberalization of abortion and the decriminalization of homosexuality.

She did not give up being well dressed and makeup in order to stand out during meetings of representatives.

However, she still hasn't earned a place in the modern feminist pantheon because she comes from a right-wing party.

In fact, as much as the Labor Party fought for equality between men and women, it was the Conservative Party that launched a candidate to run in the elections and emerged victorious.

Government

Margaret Thatcher's government consisted of applying liberal measures to recover the British economy.

Thus, it launched an ambitious program of public privatization in which companies such as Bristish Airways were sold. , telephony, energy and transport.

She faced a 15-month strike in British coal mines and showed all her steadfastness by not negotiating with the miners.

Equally, she was intolerant of Irish nationalism and responded to the terrorist attacks by sending more soldiers to Ireland.

Ronald Reagan

Margaret Thatcher had in American President Ronald Reagan her best and most faithful ally.

President of the United States by the republican party from 1981 to 1989, coinciding with almost the entire term of Margaret Thatcher.

The vision of both was similar:to promote free enterprise, reduce the role of the State and fight socialism.

Reagan's support and non-intervention in the Falklands War was essential to the UK's victory during the war.

War of Falklands

Thatcher fought a war against Argentina over the Falklands in a conflict that lasted about two months. In Brazil, this incident is known as the Falklands War.

It was heavily criticized by the international community, as it was the first confrontation in centuries between an American and a European country. Equally, she was accused of using disproportionate force that caused the death of thousands of Argentine soldiers.

On the domestic front, however, the prime minister took advantage of the nationalist wave and guaranteed her re-election.

European Union

In the 1990s, when the European Union was becoming a reality, Thatcher made a historic speech in the House of Commons in 1990, rejecting the European Commission having more powers than national parliaments:

On the same occasion, she stated that the United Kingdom would not be part of a European monetary union. She claimed that the pound sterling had served the British people and the world satisfactorily and did not want to relinquish her control over the economy.

Socialism

Margaret Thatcher was deeply anti-socialist. She rejected that the state should occupy itself in areas where free enterprise should act and considered that a big state was the way to a totalitarian regime.

She dismantled English trade unions and helped Iron Curtain countries like Poland who wanted more freedom within the socialist regime.

When she was leader of the opposition in 1976, she made a speech against the USSR and for this reason the Soviets nicknamed her the "Iron Lady".

However, she recognized in Mikhail Gorbachev a leader open to new ideas and willing to negotiate with the West.

In this way, she supported his policies of Perestroika and Glasnot. But she was not enthusiastic about the nuclear weapons reduction policies carried out by the United States and the USSR.

Sentences

• “If you want them to say something, ask a man. If you want them to do something, ask a woman .”
• “For those who are waiting for that famous phrase so popular in the media, the change of opinion, I have only one thing to say:this lady is not one of upsets .” (In 1980, when pressed to adopt a consensus policy).
• “No one would remember the Good Samaritan if he had only good intentions. He had money too .”
• “The problem with communism is that one day other people's money runs out .”
• “It is worth knowing the enemy... among other things for the possibility that one day he will become a friend .”
• “Let me tell you what I believe:in man's right to work as he pleases, to spend what he earns, to own his property, and to have the state serve him and not his owner. This is the essence of a free country, and all other freedoms depend on these. .”

Curiosities

• Margaret Thatcher's life yielded a film starring actress Mery Streep, "The Iron Lady " by Phyllida Lloyd in 2011.
• Margaret Thatcher visited the Chilean general and dictator Augusto Pinochet while he was in England for medical treatment. The interview, filmed and broadcast on television, provoked controversy among human rights defenders.

Quiz of personalities who made history

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