The Death of Consensus 100 Years of British Political Nightmares

<p><strong>From the Great Depression to the pandemic, a new history of British democracy, revealing how politics is transformed through fear. </strong></p> <p>Over Britain’s first century of mass democracy, politics has lurched from crisis to crisis. How does this history of political agony illuminate our current age of upheaval? </p> <p>To find out, journalist Phil Tinline takes us back to two past eras when the ruling consensus broke down, and the future filled with ominous possibilities – until, finally, a new settlement was born. How did the Great Depression’s spectres of fascism, bombing and mass unemployment force politicians to think the unthinkable, and pave the way to post-war Britain? How was Thatcher’s road to victory made possible by a decade of nightmares: of hyperinflation, military coups and communist dictatorship? And why, since the Crash in 2008, have new political threats and divisions forced us to change course once again? </p> <p>Tinline brings to life those times, past and present, when the great compromise holding democracy together has come apart; when the political class has been forced to make a choice of nightmares. This lively, original account of panic and chaos reveals how apparent catastrophes can clear the path to a new era. <em>The Death of Consensus</em> will make you see British democracy differently.</p>