Noble, William
(2024)
Popular Declinism and Racial Politics in the Age of Consensus: The Midlands, c. 1958-81.
PhD thesis, University of Nottingham.
Abstract
This thesis uses four local case studies to examine the links between popular declinism and discourses of ‘race’ and immigration in the Midlands in the period c. 1958-81: Nottingham c. 1958 (around the time of the ‘race riots’), Smethwick c. 1959-64 (charting the growth of political racism in the town culminating in Peter Griffiths’ 1964 general election victory), Wolverhampton c. 1967-74 (the local background and reactions to local MP Enoch Powell’s ‘rivers of blood’ speech), and Leicester c. 1972-81 (examining reactions to the arrival of Ugandan Asian evacuees in 1972 and the rise and fall of the National Front’s popularity). Local press sources are heavily utilised, along with correspondence, the national press, film materials from the Media Archive for Central England, and contemporary popular and academic publications.
The thesis presents six main arguments. First, it contends that a key means of understanding racism and anti-immigration sentiment during this period (and indeed today) is through the lens of popular declinism. Second, and relatedly, it asserts that racism interacted with popular declinism to transform ‘race’ into what many perceived as the primary source of social problems in post-war Britain. Third, it illustrates the pivotal role that popular, vernacular accounts of recent history, particularly the Second World War, played in shaping racist popular declinist discourses. Fourth, it substantiates the Midlands’ importance in shaping these discourses. Fifth, it demonstrates the essential role played by racialised notions of ‘ordinariness’, ‘respectability’, ‘civilisation’, and other concepts in these discourses, as well as in ideas regarding ‘deservedness’ vis-à-vis entitlement to the benefits of the welfare state. Sixth, and finally, the thesis suggests that this racist popular declinism was of great significance to the gradual erosion of popular support for the welfare settlement in the 1960s and 1970s.
The extensive literature on declinism has mainly focused on economics and on Britain’s diminishing status as a global power. How declinism operated at a popular level, including how it was intertwined with racism and anti-immigration politics, has been largely overlooked in previous scholarship. This thesis begins to redress this oversight, and in so doing argues for the value of local and regional studies to provide insight into the development of political discourses at the level of everyday life in a period of dramatic change. Declinism continues to influence debates on ‘race’ and immigration today, with this thesis therefore addressing questions with important ramifications for contemporary society.
| Item Type: |
Thesis (University of Nottingham only)
(PhD)
|
| Supervisors: |
Blackburn, Dead
Peplow, Simon
Schaffer, Gavin |
| Keywords: |
East Midlands, Nottingham, Smethwick, Wolverhampton, Leicester, twentieth century history, racism, anti-immigration, racial politics |
| Subjects: |
D History - General and Old World > DA Great Britain
H Social sciences > HT Communities. Classes. Races |
| Faculties/Schools: |
UK Campuses > Faculty of Arts > School of History |
| Item ID: |
78757 |
| Depositing User: |
Noble, William
|
| Date Deposited: |
10 Dec 2024 04:40 |
| Last Modified: |
10 Dec 2024 04:40 |
| URI: |
https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/78757 |
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