Hence, the year 1979 always seems to have a ring to it. Foreign Policy's got an interesting new article on the anniversary, "1979: The Great Backlash: What do Ayatollah Khomeini, Margaret Thatcher, Pope John Paul II, and Deng Xiaoping All Have in Common?":
If you want to understand the surge of politicized religion, post-communist globalization, and laissez-faire economics that has defined our modern era, forget 1968. Forget even 1989. It's 1979 that's the most important year of all. A remarkable chapter in international affairs—and intellectual history—began that year, and it had the strangest group of authors imaginable.Check the link for more.
It was in 1979 that Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini seized power in Iran and showed once and for all that "Islamic revolution" is not an oxymoron. The Soviet Union made the fateful decision to invade the poor backwater of Afghanistan, sparking a different kind of Islamic uprising that hammered the first nails into the coffin of the communist empire. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher blazed a conservative resurgence in Britain that not only changed the rules of politics in the West but also shaped the subsequent age of market-driven globalization. Pope John Paul II's first pilgrimage to his Polish homeland in the summer of 1979 emboldened freedom-loving peoples throughout Eastern and Central Europe and set events in motion that would culminate in the nonviolent revolutions of 1989. And throughout 1979, a stoic and unlikely visionary named Deng Xiaoping quietly took the first steps to prepare communist China for its long march toward the age of markets.
See also, John O'Sullivan, "Rebel With a Cause: Margaret Thatcher, Revolutionary" (via Memeorandum): " She matters because she is one of the very few strong leaders dedicated to freedom. And as long as freedom is a political issue, Margaret Thatcher will continue to matter."
5 comments:
Dear Mr. Douglas: Many thanks for the link to O'Sullivan. I think he buttresses your point about 1979 being a critical year. He also by omission, shows how thatcher is still relevant, viz:
Margaret Thatcher was a great champion of free markets. Not the least of her services to this cause was privatizing many of Britain's state owned businesses. But even Thatcher was unable to break up Britain's National Health Service. Had she done so successfully, the world would have had an outstanding example of what to do. Today, The One's lyrical moaning for National Health Care nownownownow and never mind your little heads about details like rationing, would have a lot less force with Thatcher's Britain as a counterexample.
For MT's sake, we'd better get going to defeat this monstrosity.
Sincerely yours,
Gregory Koster
I graduated from high school in 79 too! Don't look now, but we are starting to get a little long in the tooth.
great piece... Keep up the good work!
Some interesting and excellent observations, Professor ... you young whipper-snapper.
(from a Class of 1977 graduate ...)
If I remember it was only a few years after 1979 that the book, “Real Men Don't Eat Quiche,” by Bruce Feirstein, was published. Argentine had invaded and occupied the British controlled Falkland Islands. Margaret Thatcher who launched a naval task force and to engage the Argrentine Navy and Air Force, ultimately retook the islands. Thatcher was awarded “real man stature.” The authors wrote, “it takes a real man to dispatch the fleet.”
Post a Comment