Abstract
The Great War of 1914–18 ended with the defeat of the main external enemy, Germany. Amidst the general feeling of relief, there was also a belief amongst different classes and sections of British society that a new Britain should be built. This agreement amongst people and groups who disagreed about other matters is usually called by historians a consensus. In this case the consensus, or general agreement, was that the internal enemies in pre-war British society — such factors as class discrimination and privilege, poverty, unemployment, slums, epidemic disease — should also be defeated. It was widely thought that the fundamentally divided, class-ridden and socially unjust society that had existed up until 1914. was no longer acceptable or relevant. The nation had come together in a wartime consensus, and many people believed that unity must be sustained, partly for the benefit of the country as a whole as it faced the post-war world, and in part as a reward to the deprived sections of society who had made great sacrifices in order to contribute to and support the military effort.
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Chapter 1 Idealism and Reality
G. D. H. Cole and Raymond Postgate, The Common People, 1746–1946 (London: Methuen, 1966) p. 544.
Charles Loch Mowatt, Britain between the Wars 1918–1940 (London: Methuen, 1966) p. 1.
Sir William Beveridge, Social Insurance and Allied Services (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1942) Cmd 6404, p.6.
Pauline Gregg, A Social and Economic History of Britain, 1746–1965 (London: Harrap, 1965) p. 449.
Kevin Jefferys, The Attlee Government, 1945–1951 (London: Longman, 1992) p. 59.
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David Dutton, British Politics since 1945 (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991) p. 39.
Arthur Marwick, British Society since 1945 (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1982) pp. 17–18.
Man Sked and Chris Cook, Post-War Britain (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1993) p. 103.
Kenneth Morgan, The People’s Peace: British History, 1945–1989 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990) p. 181.
John Solomos, Race and Racism in Contemporary Britain (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1989) p. 48.
John Osborne, Look Back in Anger (London: Faber and Faber, 1986) p. 9. All subsequent references are to this edition.
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© 1995 Brian Spittles
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Spittles, B. (1995). Idealism and Reality: the 1918–60 Background. In: Britain since 1960. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-24271-9_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-24271-9_2
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