insight
工程技術，地產投資，信仰家園，時尚生活
正文
As a student, I personally experienced the golden years of Maggie's reign and learnt about her pragmatism, determination and vision as a strong leader， not to mention her triumph over powerful and stalinist trade unions and communism. Salute to the Iron Lady and a giant in world history, who is and will be an inspiration for many generations.
2013年 04月 09日, 《華爾街日報》
PAUL JOHNSON
瑪格 麗特•撒切爾(Margaret Thatcher)是自俄羅斯帝國的凱瑟琳大帝(Catherine the Great)以來對世界影響最大的女性領導人。她不僅毅然決然地在上世紀80年代扭轉了英國經濟，同時還見證自己的方法被50多個國家效仿。在20世紀後 半葉以及21世紀初，“撒切爾主義”是最流行、最成功的治國之道。
瑪格 麗特•撒切爾(Margaret Thatcher)是自俄羅斯帝國的凱瑟琳大帝(Catherine the Great)以來對世界影響最大的女性領導人。她不僅毅然決然地在上世紀80年代扭轉了英國經濟，同時還見證自己的方法被50多個國家效仿。在20世紀後 半葉以及21世紀初，“撒切爾主義”是最流行、最成功的治國之道。
John Minihan/Evening Standard/Getty Images
圖片：緬懷撒切爾夫人
撒 切爾夫人出身寒微。她生於1925年10月13日，是林肯郡格蘭瑟姆鎮一名雜貨店主的女兒。她父親阿爾弗雷德•羅伯茨(Alfred Roberts)並不是普通商人。他在當地政府地位顯要，而且有著果決的經濟和政治觀點。撒切爾夫人後來聲稱，她的觀點是受到卡爾•波普爾(Karl Popper)和弗裏德裏希•海耶克(Friedrich Hayek)等大師影響，但和議員羅伯茨在她孩提時代為她打下的基礎相比，這些隻不過是點綴而已。這個基礎綜合了亞當•斯密(Adam Smith)與“摩西十誡”(Ten Commandments)，其中三個最重要的元素是，勤奮、誠信和按時付賬單。
憑 借勤奮，瑪格麗特•羅伯茨獲得了一係列獎學金，先後就讀於格蘭瑟姆女子學校(Grantham Girls' School)和牛津大學薩莫維爾學院(Somerville College, Oxford)，並獲得了化學和法學兩個學位。這兩種職業她都從事過，先是當了從事研究的化學家，後來從1954年開始擔任律師。從性格上說，她一直是個 好學的女孩，時刻保持著學習的熱情，甚至在當上首相之後，她仍在自己大大的手提包內放著一個筆記本，隻要聽到她覺得值得記下來的事情就會寫在上麵。
憑 借勤奮，瑪格麗特•羅伯茨獲得了一係列獎學金，先後就讀於格蘭瑟姆女子學校(Grantham Girls' School)和牛津大學薩莫維爾學院(Somerville College, Oxford)，並獲得了化學和法學兩個學位。這兩種職業她都從事過，先是當了從事研究的化學家，後來從1954年開始擔任律師。從性格上說，她一直是個 好學的女孩，時刻保持著學習的熱情，甚至在當上首相之後，她仍在自己大大的手提包內放著一個筆記本，隻要聽到她覺得值得記下來的事情就會寫在上麵。
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與 此同時，她也極具女性特質，喜歡購買和穿著漂亮服飾，擁有英國政界最漂亮的發型，也花費巨資悉心裝扮秀發。在牛津，泛舟伊希斯河(Isis)和查韋爾河 (Cherwell)時，她也會顯得隨意輕佻，而且終其一生都喜歡英俊男士，而不是普通男子。她丈夫丹尼斯•撒切爾算不上型男，但十分富有（石油行業）、 是一名成功的商人，也是她失意時的倚仗，同時還非常擅於說俏皮話。他們二人於1951年結婚，並生有一子一女。
丹尼斯願意（或者說聽之任 之）讓她追求政治事業，1959年，她當選為代表倫敦郊區芬奇利市的議員。她獲得這個堅如磐石的保守黨席位極為幸運，此地靠近英國議會所在地威斯敏斯特， 離她家也很近，十分方便。她毫無阻礙地一直保有這個席位，直到33年後退休。事實上，撒切爾一直算是一位幸運的政治家。英國首相哈羅德•麥克米倫 (Harold Macmillan)不久後（1961年）任命她擔任退休金部門的次官，當1970年保守黨重新掌權時，她幸運地被分到了內閣中唯一由女性出任的職位上， 擔任教育和科學大臣。
她在這個職位上潔身自好，幸運地避免了被卷入災難性的泰德•希思(Ted Heath)政府的金融和經濟重創。70年代是英國戰後衰退的頂點，“英國病”（即過大的工會權力）通過罷工和不斷膨脹的工資方案破壞了經濟。鍋爐工工會 (Boilermakers Union)已經重創了造船行業。工程師總工會(Amalgamated Engineers Union)衝擊著汽車產業殘留的部分。印刷業工會對媒體實施著越來越多的審查。尤其是，在斯大林主義者阿瑟•斯卡吉爾(Arthur Scargill)領導下的礦工工會發明了新的糾察策略，使得他們能夠在任何時候讓整個國家癱瘓。
丹尼斯願意（或者說聽之任 之）讓她追求政治事業，1959年，她當選為代表倫敦郊區芬奇利市的議員。她獲得這個堅如磐石的保守黨席位極為幸運，此地靠近英國議會所在地威斯敏斯特， 離她家也很近，十分方便。她毫無阻礙地一直保有這個席位，直到33年後退休。事實上，撒切爾一直算是一位幸運的政治家。英國首相哈羅德•麥克米倫 (Harold Macmillan)不久後（1961年）任命她擔任退休金部門的次官，當1970年保守黨重新掌權時，她幸運地被分到了內閣中唯一由女性出任的職位上， 擔任教育和科學大臣。
她在這個職位上潔身自好，幸運地避免了被卷入災難性的泰德•希思(Ted Heath)政府的金融和經濟重創。70年代是英國戰後衰退的頂點，“英國病”（即過大的工會權力）通過罷工和不斷膨脹的工資方案破壞了經濟。鍋爐工工會 (Boilermakers Union)已經重創了造船行業。工程師總工會(Amalgamated Engineers Union)衝擊著汽車產業殘留的部分。印刷業工會對媒體實施著越來越多的審查。尤其是，在斯大林主義者阿瑟•斯卡吉爾(Arthur Scargill)領導下的礦工工會發明了新的糾察策略，使得他們能夠在任何時候讓整個國家癱瘓。
Corbis
1982年6月，美國總統裏根與英國首相撒切爾夫人在白宮。
1970 年，多次的改革嚐試導致威爾遜(Harold Wilson)領導的工黨政府被推翻。1974年，由於提出了一個反工會的法案，希思未能在大選中獲得多數選票，並被由威爾遜領導的另一個軟弱政府取代， 威爾遜政府使權力進一步向工會傾斜。當時普遍的看法是，英國相當難以治理。
在保守黨的普通議員中，越來越多的人認為希思必須下台。撒切爾 是希思的反對者之一，她鼓勵她所在的政黨派係的領袖約瑟夫(Keith Joseph)與希思相抗衡。不過，約瑟夫在最後關頭害怕了，他拒絕參選。正是在這種形勢下，從來沒認為自己能夠勝任領袖更不用說首相一職的撒切爾走到了 台前。出於禮貌，她來到了希思的辦公室，告訴他自己要爭奪他的位置。希思當時正在桌子前寫東西，他甚至沒有抬頭看撒切爾一眼，隻是說，你知道，你會輸的。希 思的無禮和誤判由此可見一斑。事實上，撒切爾後來輕鬆取勝，就此開始了當代英國政治史上最具浪漫主義色彩的一段冒險。
當時是1975年， 又過了可怕的四年，撒切爾才有機會掌權並拯救英國。最終，是工會讓她得到了首相之位。多個工會在1978到1979年的冬天（所謂的“不滿之冬” (winter of discontent)）擊垮了卡拉漢(James Callaghan)的工黨政府，使保守黨在隨後的5月輕鬆贏得大選。
在保守黨的普通議員中，越來越多的人認為希思必須下台。撒切爾 是希思的反對者之一，她鼓勵她所在的政黨派係的領袖約瑟夫(Keith Joseph)與希思相抗衡。不過，約瑟夫在最後關頭害怕了，他拒絕參選。正是在這種形勢下，從來沒認為自己能夠勝任領袖更不用說首相一職的撒切爾走到了 台前。出於禮貌，她來到了希思的辦公室，告訴他自己要爭奪他的位置。希思當時正在桌子前寫東西，他甚至沒有抬頭看撒切爾一眼，隻是說，你知道，你會輸的。希 思的無禮和誤判由此可見一斑。事實上，撒切爾後來輕鬆取勝，就此開始了當代英國政治史上最具浪漫主義色彩的一段冒險。
當時是1975年， 又過了可怕的四年，撒切爾才有機會掌權並拯救英國。最終，是工會讓她得到了首相之位。多個工會在1978到1979年的冬天（所謂的“不滿之冬” (winter of discontent)）擊垮了卡拉漢(James Callaghan)的工黨政府，使保守黨在隨後的5月輕鬆贏得大選。
視頻：撒切爾夫人一生中的重要時刻
本視頻回顧了英國前首相撒切爾夫人政治生涯中的重要時刻，包括她入主唐寧街10號，發表重要講話以及在掌權11年後被自己的政黨勸退。
本視頻回顧了英國前首相撒切爾夫人政治生涯中的重要時刻，包括她入主唐寧街10號，發表重要講話以及在掌權11年後被自己的政黨勸退。
人 們常常錯誤地認為，撒切爾在將近12年的任期中有過多意識形態化的色彩。事實上，撒切爾曾經是，現在也仍然是極其務實、極其注重經驗的。她並沒有像希思一 樣提出一個單獨的綜合法案來解決工會問題，而是通過一係列措施，每一個措施都解決一個具體的問題，比如激進的糾察。與此同時，她和警方還為一些內部的行政 改變可能引起的麻煩做好準備，這些改變使得國家不同的警力在任何需要的時候都能集結成大的移動的總隊。然後，她靜靜地等待，等待愚蠢的工會領導人自投羅 網。他們並沒有讓她失望。
她經過鬥爭戰勝了兩個最強大的公會──礦工和印刷業者工會。這兩次戰役的勝利都是以長達數周的鬥爭和一些人的犧 牲為代價的。在強硬的工會被打敗後，其他的工會投降了，當工黨最終奪回權力的時候，新的立法被欣然接受，沒有人試圖做出任何撤銷或改變。英國從受罷工影響 最嚴重的國家變成了行業性活動相當少見的國家。這對管理者們經營企業和引入創新的自由而言，幾乎產生了奇跡般的效果，並且一直在繼續。
撒切爾通過對稅製進行了革命性的簡化，加強了重要的改革行動，她把稅率分級從20多個減少到兩個，將最高稅率從83%（工資收入）和98%（非工資收入）下調到40%。
她還縮減了英國龐大且虧損的國有產業，使其規模從經濟的三分之一左右減少到不到十分之一，方法就是推進私有化：以較低的股價邀請公眾購買煤炭、鋼鐵、公用設施和交通等領域的國有產業。因此，原本靠稅收支持的虧損企業成了盈利企業，並且成為稅收收入的重要來源。
這種改革很快被世界各國所效仿。不過，比這些具體的改革更重要的，是撒切爾所營造的氛圍，英國重新成為讓企業受到歡迎並獲得回報的地方。在這裏，企業不論大小，政府都笑臉相迎，投資者都能賺到錢。
因此，英國在歐洲所吸收的全部投資的占比很快超過了50%，英國的經濟規模從世界第六升至第四位，人均產出在上世紀70年代曾經是德國的一半，而在本世紀頭幾年已經比德國高出三分之一。
撒 切爾在和平時期對英國的治理與丘吉爾在戰爭時期對英國的治理具有同等重要的意義。如果是在戰時，或許她也會成為一名卓越的領導人。剛開始執政時，她對外交 的了解微乎其微。同樣，外國人一開始也不樂意看到一個新的更強硬領導人控製英國。但也有例外。裏根從一開始聽說撒切爾就喜歡上了她的風格。他表示，他和撒 切爾在精神上是同一類人，即便當時他仍在競選總統，他的言論也與撒切爾的行為互相呼應。
裏根剛成功入主白宮，他和撒切爾夫人立即讓美國和 英國恢複了“特殊關係”。這再好不過了。一些外國人並未重視這位開始被克裏姆林宮稱作鐵娘子的人物的力量。1982年，阿根廷的軍事獨裁政權被英國外交部 對阿方威脅的冷淡應對所誤導，邁出了入侵並占領英國福克蘭群島這一危險步驟。這一無緣無故的侵略行動讓撒切爾夫人猝不及防，有36個小時的時間她陷入了不 知所措和猶豫不決的境地：英國軍方和後勤部門反對政府派遣聯合作戰部隊從距福克蘭群島8,000英裏以外的地方對阿根廷發起反擊，這種反對聲音當時是相當 強大。
但英國後勤事務主管官員們的話給撒切爾夫人吃了定心丸，他們說隻要下定決心，任務就有可能完成。撒切爾夫人最終下了決心：需要對阿 根廷做出反擊。自那以後，她取得勝利的意誌，她不理睬損失和風險的態度從未動搖過。他的朋友裏根當時還保證說，除了派兵，美國會動用其龐大國力在其他任何 方麵向英國提供幫助，裏根信守了這一諾言。此後現代軍事和道德曆史上最著名的戰役之一開始了，英國最終贏得了福克蘭群島上所有阿根廷軍隊的無條件投降這一 輝煌戰果，戰爭結束後不久阿根廷的軍人獨裁政權也垮台了。
這一軍事上的驚人成功，再加上撒切爾夫人使英國經濟實現複興，使她在1983年 的大選中以明顯優勢贏得了勝利。此後撒切爾夫人又於1987年第三次贏得大選。撒切爾夫人在勸說英國選民支持她方麵從未遇到任何真正的困難，如果有機會繼 續參選的話，她預計會連續贏得第四次大選。
但撒切爾夫人要想讓她所在的英國保守黨順從地支持她，卻又是另外一碼事了。由此看來，保守黨曾 被它的一位領袖稱作“笨蛋黨”不是沒有理由的。一些保守黨的顯要人物從未甘心服從於撒切爾夫人的領導，這其中尤其包括那些支持建立歐洲聯邦 (European federation)的人，而撒切爾夫人則執拗的反對歐洲聯邦。保守黨一些顯要人物的加盟壯大了黨內反撒切爾夫人的陣營，這些人曾在她手下擔任要職，但 後來都被她毫不客氣地棄用了。這一現象也反映了一個令人悲哀的事實，即多年的一路勝利使撒切爾夫人變得更為專橫，權力敗壞了她的判斷力。
這 一點在她著手改革英國地方政府的財政時明顯地顯現出來。改革本身是明智的，甚至是崇高的，但這一改革的具體推介過程卻讓人不敢恭維，這項改革的眾多反對者 輕而易舉地就贏得了宣傳戰。在這場災難逐步發生的過程中，撒切爾夫人在保守黨內那些持親歐盟態度的反對者們1990年策劃了一場旨在推翻她的陰謀，他們讓 自己陣營的一個人成為保守黨領導人年度選舉的一名候選人（此人曾因工作缺乏效率而被解除了在內閣的職務）。撒切爾夫人在選舉中未能完勝，她在朋友們的勸說 下辭去了保守黨領袖的職務。英國政治史上一段最不尋常的從政生涯也因此而告終結。
撒切爾夫人最強烈的特征是她身體上和道德上所具有的勇 氣。而她也一次又一次地展示了這種勇氣，其中引人注目的一次是愛爾蘭共和軍(IRA)在英國保守黨1984年召開大會期間試圖謀殺她。那次謀殺幾乎得手， 她居住的酒店在午夜時分被炸毀。撒切爾夫人堅持第二天的會議準時隆重召開。她僅次於勇氣的另一性格特征是勤勉。撒切爾夫人肯定是英國曆史上最勤奮的首相， 她經常每天工作16小時，常常徹夜不睡撰寫演講稿。她的丈夫雖然早已習慣了她的這種工作習慣，但曾經依然忍不住抱怨說：你要明白，你不是在寫《聖經》。
撒 切爾夫人不是一位女權主義者，她將女權人士貶斥為“時尚的腐爛物”，不過她確也曾經講過一句具有女權主義色彩的話。在一次有500名男性經濟學家出席的冗 長公共晚宴上，撒切爾夫人在耐著性子聽完九個人的演講後終於輪到了她來發言，她此時的興奮之情是可以理解的。撒切爾夫人開講後的第一句話就是：作為第十位 發言者以及唯一一名女性發言人，我想說的是，公雞或許能夠打鳴，但下蛋的是母雞。
撒切爾夫人在政治上的成功再次證明，懷著熱情和韌性堅持 兩到三個信念對政治人物而言具有重要意義，裏根也有同樣的優點。其中一個信念是，共產主義“邪惡帝國”能夠被摧毀也終將被摧毀。撒切爾夫人與裏根及羅馬教 皇約翰•保羅二世(John Paul II)肯定應該因促成這一“邪惡帝國”的垮台而被記上一功。
在英國公眾中，強烈讚美撒切爾夫人和十分反感她的人幾乎占有相同的比例，但在世界其他地區，她則被公認為一位偉大而富有創造性的政治人物，人們認為她讓世界變得更好、更繁榮，她的影響在21世紀的很長一段時間都將繼續存在。
（編者按：本文作者PAUL JOHNSON是一位曆史學家。）
她經過鬥爭戰勝了兩個最強大的公會──礦工和印刷業者工會。這兩次戰役的勝利都是以長達數周的鬥爭和一些人的犧 牲為代價的。在強硬的工會被打敗後，其他的工會投降了，當工黨最終奪回權力的時候，新的立法被欣然接受，沒有人試圖做出任何撤銷或改變。英國從受罷工影響 最嚴重的國家變成了行業性活動相當少見的國家。這對管理者們經營企業和引入創新的自由而言，幾乎產生了奇跡般的效果，並且一直在繼續。
撒切爾通過對稅製進行了革命性的簡化，加強了重要的改革行動，她把稅率分級從20多個減少到兩個，將最高稅率從83%（工資收入）和98%（非工資收入）下調到40%。
她還縮減了英國龐大且虧損的國有產業，使其規模從經濟的三分之一左右減少到不到十分之一，方法就是推進私有化：以較低的股價邀請公眾購買煤炭、鋼鐵、公用設施和交通等領域的國有產業。因此，原本靠稅收支持的虧損企業成了盈利企業，並且成為稅收收入的重要來源。
這種改革很快被世界各國所效仿。不過，比這些具體的改革更重要的，是撒切爾所營造的氛圍，英國重新成為讓企業受到歡迎並獲得回報的地方。在這裏，企業不論大小，政府都笑臉相迎，投資者都能賺到錢。
因此，英國在歐洲所吸收的全部投資的占比很快超過了50%，英國的經濟規模從世界第六升至第四位，人均產出在上世紀70年代曾經是德國的一半，而在本世紀頭幾年已經比德國高出三分之一。
撒 切爾在和平時期對英國的治理與丘吉爾在戰爭時期對英國的治理具有同等重要的意義。如果是在戰時，或許她也會成為一名卓越的領導人。剛開始執政時，她對外交 的了解微乎其微。同樣，外國人一開始也不樂意看到一個新的更強硬領導人控製英國。但也有例外。裏根從一開始聽說撒切爾就喜歡上了她的風格。他表示，他和撒 切爾在精神上是同一類人，即便當時他仍在競選總統，他的言論也與撒切爾的行為互相呼應。
裏根剛成功入主白宮，他和撒切爾夫人立即讓美國和 英國恢複了“特殊關係”。這再好不過了。一些外國人並未重視這位開始被克裏姆林宮稱作鐵娘子的人物的力量。1982年，阿根廷的軍事獨裁政權被英國外交部 對阿方威脅的冷淡應對所誤導，邁出了入侵並占領英國福克蘭群島這一危險步驟。這一無緣無故的侵略行動讓撒切爾夫人猝不及防，有36個小時的時間她陷入了不 知所措和猶豫不決的境地：英國軍方和後勤部門反對政府派遣聯合作戰部隊從距福克蘭群島8,000英裏以外的地方對阿根廷發起反擊，這種反對聲音當時是相當 強大。
但英國後勤事務主管官員們的話給撒切爾夫人吃了定心丸，他們說隻要下定決心，任務就有可能完成。撒切爾夫人最終下了決心：需要對阿 根廷做出反擊。自那以後，她取得勝利的意誌，她不理睬損失和風險的態度從未動搖過。他的朋友裏根當時還保證說，除了派兵，美國會動用其龐大國力在其他任何 方麵向英國提供幫助，裏根信守了這一諾言。此後現代軍事和道德曆史上最著名的戰役之一開始了，英國最終贏得了福克蘭群島上所有阿根廷軍隊的無條件投降這一 輝煌戰果，戰爭結束後不久阿根廷的軍人獨裁政權也垮台了。
這一軍事上的驚人成功，再加上撒切爾夫人使英國經濟實現複興，使她在1983年 的大選中以明顯優勢贏得了勝利。此後撒切爾夫人又於1987年第三次贏得大選。撒切爾夫人在勸說英國選民支持她方麵從未遇到任何真正的困難，如果有機會繼 續參選的話，她預計會連續贏得第四次大選。
但撒切爾夫人要想讓她所在的英國保守黨順從地支持她，卻又是另外一碼事了。由此看來，保守黨曾 被它的一位領袖稱作“笨蛋黨”不是沒有理由的。一些保守黨的顯要人物從未甘心服從於撒切爾夫人的領導，這其中尤其包括那些支持建立歐洲聯邦 (European federation)的人，而撒切爾夫人則執拗的反對歐洲聯邦。保守黨一些顯要人物的加盟壯大了黨內反撒切爾夫人的陣營，這些人曾在她手下擔任要職，但 後來都被她毫不客氣地棄用了。這一現象也反映了一個令人悲哀的事實，即多年的一路勝利使撒切爾夫人變得更為專橫，權力敗壞了她的判斷力。
這 一點在她著手改革英國地方政府的財政時明顯地顯現出來。改革本身是明智的，甚至是崇高的，但這一改革的具體推介過程卻讓人不敢恭維，這項改革的眾多反對者 輕而易舉地就贏得了宣傳戰。在這場災難逐步發生的過程中，撒切爾夫人在保守黨內那些持親歐盟態度的反對者們1990年策劃了一場旨在推翻她的陰謀，他們讓 自己陣營的一個人成為保守黨領導人年度選舉的一名候選人（此人曾因工作缺乏效率而被解除了在內閣的職務）。撒切爾夫人在選舉中未能完勝，她在朋友們的勸說 下辭去了保守黨領袖的職務。英國政治史上一段最不尋常的從政生涯也因此而告終結。
撒切爾夫人最強烈的特征是她身體上和道德上所具有的勇 氣。而她也一次又一次地展示了這種勇氣，其中引人注目的一次是愛爾蘭共和軍(IRA)在英國保守黨1984年召開大會期間試圖謀殺她。那次謀殺幾乎得手， 她居住的酒店在午夜時分被炸毀。撒切爾夫人堅持第二天的會議準時隆重召開。她僅次於勇氣的另一性格特征是勤勉。撒切爾夫人肯定是英國曆史上最勤奮的首相， 她經常每天工作16小時，常常徹夜不睡撰寫演講稿。她的丈夫雖然早已習慣了她的這種工作習慣，但曾經依然忍不住抱怨說：你要明白，你不是在寫《聖經》。
撒 切爾夫人不是一位女權主義者，她將女權人士貶斥為“時尚的腐爛物”，不過她確也曾經講過一句具有女權主義色彩的話。在一次有500名男性經濟學家出席的冗 長公共晚宴上，撒切爾夫人在耐著性子聽完九個人的演講後終於輪到了她來發言，她此時的興奮之情是可以理解的。撒切爾夫人開講後的第一句話就是：作為第十位 發言者以及唯一一名女性發言人，我想說的是，公雞或許能夠打鳴，但下蛋的是母雞。
撒切爾夫人在政治上的成功再次證明，懷著熱情和韌性堅持 兩到三個信念對政治人物而言具有重要意義，裏根也有同樣的優點。其中一個信念是，共產主義“邪惡帝國”能夠被摧毀也終將被摧毀。撒切爾夫人與裏根及羅馬教 皇約翰•保羅二世(John Paul II)肯定應該因促成這一“邪惡帝國”的垮台而被記上一功。
在英國公眾中，強烈讚美撒切爾夫人和十分反感她的人幾乎占有相同的比例，但在世界其他地區，她則被公認為一位偉大而富有創造性的政治人物，人們認為她讓世界變得更好、更繁榮，她的影響在21世紀的很長一段時間都將繼續存在。
（編者按：本文作者PAUL JOHNSON是一位曆史學家。）
The World-Changing Margaret Thatcher
PAUL JOHNSON
Margaret Thatcher had more impact on the world than any woman ruler since Catherine the Great of Russia. Not only did she turn around─decisively─the British economy in the 1980s, she also saw her methods copied in more than 50 countries. 'Thatcherism' was the most popular and successful way of running a country in the last quarter of the 20th century and into the 21st.
Her origins were humble. Born Oct. 13, 1925, she was the daughter of a grocer in the Lincolnshire town of Grantham. Alfred Roberts was no ordinary shopkeeper. He was prominent in local government and a man of decided economic and political views. Thatcher later claimed her views had been shaped by gurus like Karl Popper and Friedrich Hayek, but these were clearly the icing on a cake baked in her childhood by Councillor Roberts. This was a blend of Adam Smith and the Ten Commandments, the three most important elements being hard work, telling the truth, and paying bills on time.
Hard work took Miss Roberts, via a series of scholarships, to Grantham Girls' School, Somerville College, Oxford, and two degrees, in chemistry and law. She practiced in both professions, first as a research chemist, then as a barrister from 1954. By temperament she was always a scholarship girl, always avid to learn, and even when prime minister still carried in her capacious handbag a notebook in which she wrote down anything you told her that she thought memorable.
At the same time, she was intensely feminine, loved buying and wearing smart clothes, had the best head of hair in British politics and spent a fortune keeping it well dressed. At Oxford, punting on the Isis and Cherwell rivers, she could be frivolous and flirtatious, and all her life she tended to prefer handsome men to plain ones. Her husband, Denis Thatcher, whom she married in 1951 and by whom she had a son and daughter, was not exactly dashing but he was rich (oil industry), a capable businessman, a rock on which she could always lean in bad times, and a source of funny 19th-hole sayings.
Denis was amenable (or resigned) to her pursuing a political career, and in 1959 she was elected MP for Finchley, a London suburb. She was exceptionally lucky to secure this rock-solid Tory seat, so conveniently placed near Westminster and her home. She held the seat without trouble until her retirement 33 years later. Indeed, Thatcher was always accounted a lucky politician. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan soon (in 1961) gave her a junior office at Pensions, and when the Conservatives returned to power in 1970, she was fortunate to be allotted to the one seat in the cabinet reserved for a woman, secretary of state for education.
There she kept her nose clean and was lucky not to be involved in the financial and economic wreckage of the disastrous Ted Heath government. The 1970s marked the climax of Britain's postwar decline, in which 'the English disease'─overweening trade-union power─was undermining the economy by strikes and inflationary wage settlements. The Boilermakers Union had already smashed the shipbuilding industry. The Amalgamated Engineers Union was crushing what was left of the car industry. The print unions were imposing growing censorship on the press. Not least, the miners union, under the Stalinist Arthur Scargill, had invented new picketing strategies that enabled them to paralyze the country wherever they chose.
Attempts at reform had led to the overthrow of the Harold Wilson Labour government in 1970, and an anti-union bill put through by Heath led to the destruction of his majority in 1974 and its replacement by another weak Wilson government that tipped the balance of power still further in the direction of the unions. The general view was that Britain was 'ungovernable.'
Among Tory backbenchers there was a growing feeling that Heath must go. Thatcher was one of his critics, and she encouraged the leader of her wing of the party, Keith Joseph, to stand against him. However, at the last moment Joseph's nerve failed him and he refused to run. It was in these circumstances that Thatcher, who had never seen herself as a leader, let alone prime minister, put herself forward. As a matter of courtesy, she went to Heath's office to tell him that she was putting up for his job. He did not even look up from his desk, where he was writing, merely saying: 'You'll lose, you know'─a characteristic combination of bad manners and bad judgment. In fact she won handsomely, thereby beginning one of the great romantic adventures of modern British politics.
The date was 1975, and four more terrible years were to pass before Thatcher had the opportunity to achieve power and come to Britain's rescue. In the end, it was the unions themselves who put her into office by smashing up the James Callaghan Labour government in the winter of 1978-79─the so-called Winter of Discontent─enabling the Tories to win the election the following May with a comfortable majority.
Thatcher's long ministry of nearly a dozen years is often mistakenly described as ideological in tone. In fact Thatcherism was (and is) essentially pragmatic and empirical. She tackled the unions not by producing, like Heath, a single comprehensive statute but by a series of measures, each dealing with a particular abuse, such as aggressive picketing. At the same time she, and the police, prepared for trouble by a number of ingenious administrative changes allowing the country's different police forces to concentrate large and mobile columns wherever needed. Then she calmly waited, relying on the stupidity of the union leaders to fall into the trap, which they duly did.
She fought and won two pitched battles with the two strongest unions, the miners and the printers. In both cases, victory came at the cost of weeks of fighting and some loss of life. After the hard men had been vanquished, the other unions surrendered, and the new legislation was meekly accepted, no attempt being made to repeal or change it when Labour eventually returned to power. Britain was transformed from the most strike-ridden country in Europe to a place where industrial action is a rarity. The effect on the freedom of managers to run their businesses and introduce innovations was almost miraculous and has continued.
Thatcher reinforced this essential improvement by a revolutionary simplification of the tax system, reducing a score or more 'bands' to two and lowering the top rates from 83% (earned income) and 98% (unearned) to the single band of 40%.
She also reduced Britain's huge and loss-making state-owned industries, nearly a third of the economy, to less than one-tenth, by her new policy of privatization─inviting the public to buy from the state industries, such as coal, steel, utilities and transport by bargain share offers. Hence loss-makers, funded from taxes, became themselves profit-making and so massive tax contributors.
This transformation was soon imitated all over the world. More important than all these specific changes, however, was the feeling Thatcher engendered that Britain was again a country where enterprise was welcomed and rewarded, where businesses small and large had the benign blessing of government, and where investors would make money.
As a result Britain was soon absorbing more than 50% of all inward investment in Europe, the British economy rose from the sixth to the fourth largest in the world, and its production per capita, having been half that of Germany's in the 1970s, became, by the early years of the 21st century, one-third higher.
The kind of services that Thatcher rendered Britain in peace were of a magnitude equal to Winston Churchill's in war. She also gave indications that she might make a notable wartime leader, too. When she first took over, her knowledge of foreign affairs was negligible. Equally, foreigners did not at first appreciate that a new and stronger hand was now in control in London. There were exceptions. Ronald Reagan, right from the start, liked what he heard of her. He indicated that he regarded her as a fellow spirit, even while still running for president, with rhetoric that was consonant with her activities.
Once Reagan was installed in the White House, the pair immediately reinvigorated the 'special relationship.' It was just as well. Some foreigners did not appreciate the force of what the Kremlin was beginning to call the Iron Lady. In 1982, the military dictatorship in Argentina, misled by the British Foreign Offices's apathetic responses to threats, took the hazardous step of invading and occupying the British Falkland Islands. This unprovoked act of aggression caught Thatcher unprepared, and for 36 hours she was nonplused and uncertain: The military and logistical objections to launching a combined-forces counterattack from 8,000 miles away were formidable.
But reassured by her service chiefs that, given resolution, the thing could be done, she made up her mind: It would be done, and thereafter her will to victory and her disregard of losses and risks never wavered. She was also assured by her friend Reagan that, short of sending forces, America would do all in its considerable power to help─a promise kept. Thus began one of the most notable campaigns in modern military and moral history, brought to a splendid conclusion by the unconditional surrender of all the Argentine forces on the islands, followed shortly by the collapse of the military dictatorship in Buenos Aires.
This spectacular success, combined with Thatcher's revival of the U.K. economy, enabled her to win a resounding electoral victory in 1983, followed by a third term in 1987. Thatcher never had any real difficulty in persuading the British electorate to back her, and it is likely that, given the chance, she would have won her fourth election in a row.
But it was a different matter with the Conservative Party, not for nothing once categorized by one of its leaders as the 'stupid party.' Some prominent Tories were never reconciled to her leadership. They included in particular the supporters of European federation, to which she was implacably opposed, their numbers swollen by grandees who had held high office under her but whom she had dumped without ceremony as ministerial failures. It was, too, a melancholy fact that she had become more imperious during her years of triumph and that power had corrupted her judgment.
This was made clear when she embarked on a fundamental reform of local-government finance. The reform itself was sensible, even noble, but its presentation was lamentable and its numerous opponents won the propaganda battle hands down. In the midst of this disaster, her Europhile opponents within her party devised a plot in 1990 to overthrow her by putting up one of their number (sacked from the cabinet for inefficiency) in the annual leadership election. Thatcher failed to win outright and was persuaded by friends to stand down. Thus ended one of the most remarkable careers in British political history.
Thatcher's strongest characteristic was her courage, both physical and moral. She displayed this again and again, notably when the IRA tried to murder her during the Tory Party Conference in 1984, and nearly succeeded, blowing up her hotel in the middle of the night. She insisted on opening the next morning's session right on time and in grand style. Immediately after courage came industry. She must have been the hardest-working prime minister in history, often working a 16-hour day and sitting up all night to write a speech. Her much-tried husband once complained, 'You're not writing the Bible, you know.'
She was not a feminist, despising the genre as 'fashionable rot,' though she once made a feminist remark. At a dreary public dinner of 500 male economists, having had to listen to nine speeches before being called herself, she began, with understandable irritation: 'As the 10th speaker, and the only woman, I wish to say this: the cock may crow but it's the hen who lays the eggs.'
Her political success once again demonstrates the importance of holding two or three simple ideas with fervor and tenacity, a virtue she shared with Ronald Reagan. One of these ideas was that the 'evil empire' of communism could be and would be destroyed, and together with Reagan and Pope John Paul II she must be given the credit for doing it.
Among the British public she aroused fervent admiration and intense dislike in almost equal proportions, but in the world beyond she was recognized for what she was: a great, creative stateswoman who left the world a better and more prosperous place, and whose influence will reverberate well into the 21st century.
(Mr. Johnson is a historian.)
Margaret Thatcher had more impact on the world than any woman ruler since Catherine the Great of Russia. Not only did she turn around─decisively─the British economy in the 1980s, she also saw her methods copied in more than 50 countries. 'Thatcherism' was the most popular and successful way of running a country in the last quarter of the 20th century and into the 21st.
Her origins were humble. Born Oct. 13, 1925, she was the daughter of a grocer in the Lincolnshire town of Grantham. Alfred Roberts was no ordinary shopkeeper. He was prominent in local government and a man of decided economic and political views. Thatcher later claimed her views had been shaped by gurus like Karl Popper and Friedrich Hayek, but these were clearly the icing on a cake baked in her childhood by Councillor Roberts. This was a blend of Adam Smith and the Ten Commandments, the three most important elements being hard work, telling the truth, and paying bills on time.
Hard work took Miss Roberts, via a series of scholarships, to Grantham Girls' School, Somerville College, Oxford, and two degrees, in chemistry and law. She practiced in both professions, first as a research chemist, then as a barrister from 1954. By temperament she was always a scholarship girl, always avid to learn, and even when prime minister still carried in her capacious handbag a notebook in which she wrote down anything you told her that she thought memorable.
At the same time, she was intensely feminine, loved buying and wearing smart clothes, had the best head of hair in British politics and spent a fortune keeping it well dressed. At Oxford, punting on the Isis and Cherwell rivers, she could be frivolous and flirtatious, and all her life she tended to prefer handsome men to plain ones. Her husband, Denis Thatcher, whom she married in 1951 and by whom she had a son and daughter, was not exactly dashing but he was rich (oil industry), a capable businessman, a rock on which she could always lean in bad times, and a source of funny 19th-hole sayings.
Denis was amenable (or resigned) to her pursuing a political career, and in 1959 she was elected MP for Finchley, a London suburb. She was exceptionally lucky to secure this rock-solid Tory seat, so conveniently placed near Westminster and her home. She held the seat without trouble until her retirement 33 years later. Indeed, Thatcher was always accounted a lucky politician. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan soon (in 1961) gave her a junior office at Pensions, and when the Conservatives returned to power in 1970, she was fortunate to be allotted to the one seat in the cabinet reserved for a woman, secretary of state for education.
There she kept her nose clean and was lucky not to be involved in the financial and economic wreckage of the disastrous Ted Heath government. The 1970s marked the climax of Britain's postwar decline, in which 'the English disease'─overweening trade-union power─was undermining the economy by strikes and inflationary wage settlements. The Boilermakers Union had already smashed the shipbuilding industry. The Amalgamated Engineers Union was crushing what was left of the car industry. The print unions were imposing growing censorship on the press. Not least, the miners union, under the Stalinist Arthur Scargill, had invented new picketing strategies that enabled them to paralyze the country wherever they chose.
Attempts at reform had led to the overthrow of the Harold Wilson Labour government in 1970, and an anti-union bill put through by Heath led to the destruction of his majority in 1974 and its replacement by another weak Wilson government that tipped the balance of power still further in the direction of the unions. The general view was that Britain was 'ungovernable.'
Among Tory backbenchers there was a growing feeling that Heath must go. Thatcher was one of his critics, and she encouraged the leader of her wing of the party, Keith Joseph, to stand against him. However, at the last moment Joseph's nerve failed him and he refused to run. It was in these circumstances that Thatcher, who had never seen herself as a leader, let alone prime minister, put herself forward. As a matter of courtesy, she went to Heath's office to tell him that she was putting up for his job. He did not even look up from his desk, where he was writing, merely saying: 'You'll lose, you know'─a characteristic combination of bad manners and bad judgment. In fact she won handsomely, thereby beginning one of the great romantic adventures of modern British politics.
The date was 1975, and four more terrible years were to pass before Thatcher had the opportunity to achieve power and come to Britain's rescue. In the end, it was the unions themselves who put her into office by smashing up the James Callaghan Labour government in the winter of 1978-79─the so-called Winter of Discontent─enabling the Tories to win the election the following May with a comfortable majority.
Thatcher's long ministry of nearly a dozen years is often mistakenly described as ideological in tone. In fact Thatcherism was (and is) essentially pragmatic and empirical. She tackled the unions not by producing, like Heath, a single comprehensive statute but by a series of measures, each dealing with a particular abuse, such as aggressive picketing. At the same time she, and the police, prepared for trouble by a number of ingenious administrative changes allowing the country's different police forces to concentrate large and mobile columns wherever needed. Then she calmly waited, relying on the stupidity of the union leaders to fall into the trap, which they duly did.
She fought and won two pitched battles with the two strongest unions, the miners and the printers. In both cases, victory came at the cost of weeks of fighting and some loss of life. After the hard men had been vanquished, the other unions surrendered, and the new legislation was meekly accepted, no attempt being made to repeal or change it when Labour eventually returned to power. Britain was transformed from the most strike-ridden country in Europe to a place where industrial action is a rarity. The effect on the freedom of managers to run their businesses and introduce innovations was almost miraculous and has continued.
Thatcher reinforced this essential improvement by a revolutionary simplification of the tax system, reducing a score or more 'bands' to two and lowering the top rates from 83% (earned income) and 98% (unearned) to the single band of 40%.
She also reduced Britain's huge and loss-making state-owned industries, nearly a third of the economy, to less than one-tenth, by her new policy of privatization─inviting the public to buy from the state industries, such as coal, steel, utilities and transport by bargain share offers. Hence loss-makers, funded from taxes, became themselves profit-making and so massive tax contributors.
This transformation was soon imitated all over the world. More important than all these specific changes, however, was the feeling Thatcher engendered that Britain was again a country where enterprise was welcomed and rewarded, where businesses small and large had the benign blessing of government, and where investors would make money.
As a result Britain was soon absorbing more than 50% of all inward investment in Europe, the British economy rose from the sixth to the fourth largest in the world, and its production per capita, having been half that of Germany's in the 1970s, became, by the early years of the 21st century, one-third higher.
The kind of services that Thatcher rendered Britain in peace were of a magnitude equal to Winston Churchill's in war. She also gave indications that she might make a notable wartime leader, too. When she first took over, her knowledge of foreign affairs was negligible. Equally, foreigners did not at first appreciate that a new and stronger hand was now in control in London. There were exceptions. Ronald Reagan, right from the start, liked what he heard of her. He indicated that he regarded her as a fellow spirit, even while still running for president, with rhetoric that was consonant with her activities.
Once Reagan was installed in the White House, the pair immediately reinvigorated the 'special relationship.' It was just as well. Some foreigners did not appreciate the force of what the Kremlin was beginning to call the Iron Lady. In 1982, the military dictatorship in Argentina, misled by the British Foreign Offices's apathetic responses to threats, took the hazardous step of invading and occupying the British Falkland Islands. This unprovoked act of aggression caught Thatcher unprepared, and for 36 hours she was nonplused and uncertain: The military and logistical objections to launching a combined-forces counterattack from 8,000 miles away were formidable.
But reassured by her service chiefs that, given resolution, the thing could be done, she made up her mind: It would be done, and thereafter her will to victory and her disregard of losses and risks never wavered. She was also assured by her friend Reagan that, short of sending forces, America would do all in its considerable power to help─a promise kept. Thus began one of the most notable campaigns in modern military and moral history, brought to a splendid conclusion by the unconditional surrender of all the Argentine forces on the islands, followed shortly by the collapse of the military dictatorship in Buenos Aires.
This spectacular success, combined with Thatcher's revival of the U.K. economy, enabled her to win a resounding electoral victory in 1983, followed by a third term in 1987. Thatcher never had any real difficulty in persuading the British electorate to back her, and it is likely that, given the chance, she would have won her fourth election in a row.
But it was a different matter with the Conservative Party, not for nothing once categorized by one of its leaders as the 'stupid party.' Some prominent Tories were never reconciled to her leadership. They included in particular the supporters of European federation, to which she was implacably opposed, their numbers swollen by grandees who had held high office under her but whom she had dumped without ceremony as ministerial failures. It was, too, a melancholy fact that she had become more imperious during her years of triumph and that power had corrupted her judgment.
This was made clear when she embarked on a fundamental reform of local-government finance. The reform itself was sensible, even noble, but its presentation was lamentable and its numerous opponents won the propaganda battle hands down. In the midst of this disaster, her Europhile opponents within her party devised a plot in 1990 to overthrow her by putting up one of their number (sacked from the cabinet for inefficiency) in the annual leadership election. Thatcher failed to win outright and was persuaded by friends to stand down. Thus ended one of the most remarkable careers in British political history.
Thatcher's strongest characteristic was her courage, both physical and moral. She displayed this again and again, notably when the IRA tried to murder her during the Tory Party Conference in 1984, and nearly succeeded, blowing up her hotel in the middle of the night. She insisted on opening the next morning's session right on time and in grand style. Immediately after courage came industry. She must have been the hardest-working prime minister in history, often working a 16-hour day and sitting up all night to write a speech. Her much-tried husband once complained, 'You're not writing the Bible, you know.'
She was not a feminist, despising the genre as 'fashionable rot,' though she once made a feminist remark. At a dreary public dinner of 500 male economists, having had to listen to nine speeches before being called herself, she began, with understandable irritation: 'As the 10th speaker, and the only woman, I wish to say this: the cock may crow but it's the hen who lays the eggs.'
Her political success once again demonstrates the importance of holding two or three simple ideas with fervor and tenacity, a virtue she shared with Ronald Reagan. One of these ideas was that the 'evil empire' of communism could be and would be destroyed, and together with Reagan and Pope John Paul II she must be given the credit for doing it.
Among the British public she aroused fervent admiration and intense dislike in almost equal proportions, but in the world beyond she was recognized for what she was: a great, creative stateswoman who left the world a better and more prosperous place, and whose influence will reverberate well into the 21st century.
(Mr. Johnson is a historian.)
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