Formed in 2009, the Archive Team (not to be confused with the archive.org Archive-It Team) is a rogue archivist collective dedicated to saving copies of rapidly dying or deleted websites for the sake of history and digital heritage. The group is 100% composed of volunteers and interested parties, and has expanded into a large amount of related projects for saving online and digital history.
This work of faction, part fact, part fiction written by politicians, academics, and researchers for their own entertainment and self discovery might be of interest to those who wish to wander beyond the confines of Jeffrey Archer's First Among Equals First Among Equalsinto the debateable "who says?" genre of Chris Mullin [ A Very British Coup ] [ A VERY BRITISH COUP ] BY Mullin, Chris ( AUTHOR ) Jan-14-2010 Paperback, and Nigel West Murder in the Commons (Parliamentary Whodunnits).
This cart load of 21 contributions, edited by Brack and Dale of between 12 and 23 pages, consists of 19 British political, and two international (US: Simon Burns, Soviet Union: Helen Szamuely) themes. Within the first category, two are more historical covering the two World Wars and the interwar periods; the rest focus on the post-war years with a bias towards the post swinging 1960s period: two on the Liberals in the 1950s (James Parry, and Michael McManus), four on the 1960s (John Barnes, Anne Perkins, Greg Rosen, and Robert Taylor), three the 1970s (Matthew Bailey & Philip Cowley, Mark Garnett, and Paul Richards), five the Thatcher years (Dianne Hayter, Sir Bernard Ingham, David Mills, Neil Stockley, and Robert Waller), and three post 1997 (Iain Dale, Mark Stuart, and Stuart Tnomson). Some are entertaining, analytically informative, and when move into the virtual counter-factional world merit at least 5 stars, a couple one star, with two unclassifiable - one is a thorough account of the importance of Lenin's journey to Moscow in 1917; the second a knowledgeable, discrete insider comment in support of Margaret Thatcher on what occurred during and after the Westland affair in 1986 and how it affected Heseltine and the Conservative Party, but neither leads the mind wander into alternative worlds.
Richard Grayson's revision would instantly kill off Dangerfield's admirable strange death of the Liberal Party thesis Strange Death of Liberal England, Nineteen Hundred and Ten Thru Nineteen Hundred and Fourteenprior to Britain's entry into the Great War, and Wilson's decline of the Party The Downfall of the Liberal party, 1914-1935. With plates, when showing had the Liberals remained united (plus if the Irish Nationals remained solid, and the Easter Rising was kept in mothballs until an eventual Civil War), the force of progress, rather than Labour, the Liberals would have survived longer. He shows Austen Chamberlain in 1922, a Lib-Lab coalition under Lloyd George, and Baldwin governments up to the depression; then followed by a Liberal Churchill leading a National Government until 1936 before the Liberals' collapse, his switch to the Tories (allowing for a second possible but unlikely appointment in 1940), and his Foreign secretary's departure to form a National Socialist Party. That is when Grayson passes the baton and opens another alternative history for John Charmley.
For him, a Lord Halifax rather than a Churchill Wartime coalition in 1940 (Lloyd George in, Ambassador Winston away in Washington), still allowed an armistice without Britain being invaded or becoming a Quisling state, and Eden's much earlier promotion to the Premiership in 1945, possibly taking a role similar to that in reality by France in 1944. One assumes a greater post-war carve up of the globe of the two world powers, a much reduced role for Britain.
Barnes' piece on Douglas-Home's victory in 1964 through the eyes of Premier Maudling kills off Wilson "White heat" revolution, the Profumo and Keeler scandal,puts Heath and Powell's alternative lives behind the leading contenders, to produce a positive change for a more accommodating Ian Smith in Rhodesia.
In contrast, Taylor's tale of the success of Barbara Castle's In Place of Strife, followed by the electoral success of the Party in 1970 by Rosen, not only could bring a Social Contract ten years before the one in 1978, great experiments in industrial democracy, greater unity, and corporativism in the state with transfers from among the Labour movement, to make Britain a credible lighthouse of progress in Europe for many years. Indeed, according to Richards, had Callaghan gone to the country in October 1978 rather than months later Labour not only would have won, but would have passed acceptable progressive devolution policies, and, helped by moneys from North Sea oil, would promoted new information technologies. Unexpectedly, by focusing on politics of consensus Labour might have been allowed to introduce sometime before 1992 a radical "right-to-buy" policy for council house tenants, a likely new range of clothes proposed in an alternative political reality by another Conservative administration or by "New Labour".
It did not signify that internal dangers would be erased from unhappy trades unions, or that one NUM miner from Barnsley, Scargill, would not find a place in history, but it might have avoided the post Gaitskell inter-party factionalism up to Militant, as well as the split and the formation of the SDP in 1981, though a different "Gang of Four" might still have left Labour making some noise though not obtaining the same popular effect. Hayter takes one through the bizarre state should Benn had beaten Healey for Deputy Leader, with light appearing at the end of the tunnel for Labour, and not solely for the benefit of the Tories under Thatcher.
If instead John Smith had lived beyond May 1994, no one disputes that the Labour Party would not have become Blair's New Labour. It is possible Labour would have won in 1997, but would not have achieved the same landslide. For Stuart, Smith would never have introduced a couch-type cabinet, nor policies decided by informal groups or spin doctors of the Campbell-Mandleson kin. It is likely, he contends, conflicts would mount as he liked to have an hands-on say in finance much to the discomfort of a Chancellor Brown. The question, unmentioned, is the role of Blair himself, and how long the government could survive. If there was no landslide, and Michael Portillo had retaken his seat at Enfield, in 1997, it is possible, as Dale suggests, that in the wake of the foot and mouth debacle he could have henceforth gone around the country, not as a TV presenter, complete with his Bradshaw guide, but come out as PM in 2001, as a replacement either for Smith or a weakened Blair administration. In a word: a miracle!
Had Bailey & Cowley's tale of Heath's resignation in 1974 occurred the Thatcher years might never have been witnessed. Richards thinks she would have gone immediately after the election making her life a small party footnote, since even Charles Moore has noted in his biography she was very unpopular until her famous victory in May 1979. However, a government led by a Whitelaw would still have passed most of the economic legislation passed by Thatcher during her early years, described as "Thatcherism without Thatcher", an iron fist in a velvet glove rather than a boxing glove, with a more collegial, cooperative leadership. Should a war with the Argentine have been necessary these two authors feel former Major Whitelaw would definitely have sent the task force to the South Atlantic, so dampening the belief that the cabinet was full of Wets, that only "Hilda" was the new Churchill, with the bulldog breed to say no and was up for a fight.
Of the what would have beens during the Thatcher years Waller denies the possibility of the Alliance becoming the second party, and Her Majesty's official Opposition due to first-past-the post electoral system. If it had become stronger and more organized afterwards, and had Scargill balloted the NUM in 1984, so obtaining the legitimacy required as Mills writes, it is possible the Alliance would have held the balance of power called in an earlier election in 1986; but it would have still required a new electoral system even mentioned in Thomson's chapter on the negotiations with the LibDems for a possible Blair coalition in 1997 to change the state of the parties.
The question is did these ideas talked about during the 1990s with Roy Jenkins, Paddy Ashdown et al, and these stories written in 2003 have a small say in 2011 to make the Conservative leadership so negative during the referendum about both of the LibDems and the AV system? All contributors imagine a new PR system is bound to break up the old and create new parties, perhaps thinking of the extreme case of Italy. And why not Germany? When the system was changed in The Final Cut by Dobbs The Final Cutit brought no change, with the Conservatives returning to power, stronger, and Francis Urquhart laughing beyond the grave. So it doesn't depend on the country, but as in business the moment, what the leaders are offering and if the people are listening for the goodies on offer during the change. Urquhart left us with his final memorable message: "You might say that. I can not possibly comment".
Across the Atlantic pond, in the US, Burns informs us should Oswald have missed JF Kennedy in Dallas in 1963, the Vietnam crusade, Nixon and Watergate would have moved down a different route, permitting a long Kennedy epoch, (leading possibly to an appeal for similar Bush / Clinton family run administrations into the 21st century), as well as a speedier end to the Cold War. Believable? In his dreams.
In 1963, the week prior to the events in Dallas, the BBC called on Verity Lambert to produce a part historical / science fictional children's programme, Dr Who, intended to inform and entertain, and though in a different format, it is still a big hit. If Prime Minister Portillo stays the course for half that time, then Duncan Brack & Iain Dale should get more than the thumbs up. Watch out Marr, you've got good rivals after around. You, too, have got something to learn.
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Prime Minister Portillo: and Other Things That Never Happened Paperback – 18 Oct 2004
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Synopsis
The grand passage of political history is steered by a combination of events great and small, assessing how matters might have turned out under different circumstances is one of the most intriguing - and entertaining - historical exercises. What if Lenin's train had crashed on the way to the Finland Station? If Lee Harvey Oswald had missed, would JFK have become one of the greatest US Presidents, or one of the worst? What if John Smith had not died suddenly in 1994? In this book a collection of distinguished commentators consider how things might have been otherwise. Among them are Sir Bernard Ingham, who ponders the consequences of Margaret Thatcher's resignation over the Westland crisis; John Charmley, who asks, 'What if Lord Halifax had become Prime Minister in 1940 instead of Churchill?'; and Anne Perkins, who wonders how the history of the Labour Party would have unfolded had Aneurin Bevan outlived Hugh Gaitskell.
Diverting and thought-provoking as they can be, counterfactuals also have a serious historical purpose, for close examination of what did not happen serves to test interpretations of what actually did happen, and provides a prism through which the great events can be viewed. It is not only Michael Portillo who is left to ponder what might have been ...
