Books on the 1970s tend to divide between serious history and fluffy pop culture nostalgia. Crisis? What Crisis? brings the two strands together in a survey of ‘the high politics and low culture of the times’. This political and social history of Britain in the ‘70s pays particular attention to how the events and issues of the decade were reflected in the films, sitcoms, soap operas, popular novels and pop music of the era.

Britain in the 1970s has often been characterised as a decade-long collective nervous breakdown: strikes, the Three-Day Week, power cuts, mass unemployment, runaway inflation and IRA bombs. All this and the Bay City Rollers. Turner’s book suggests that this common characterisation is something of a caricature. He cites research carried out in 2004 by the New Economics Foundation based not on GNP but on ‘the measure of domestic progress’ - including such factors as crime, family stability, pollution & inequality of income. The startling conclusion of the survey was that Britain was a happier country in 1976 than it had been in the 30 years since.

He also points out that the 1970s was something of a golden era for British television, popular fiction and pop music. Having grown up in ‘70s Britain myself I can attest to the truth of Turner’s assertion that it was a great time and place to be young and not in the least depressing or dreary. A time when left-field ideas entered the mainstream and challenging dramas by the likes of Harold Pinter, Dennis Potter and Alan Bennett were shown even on commercial television.

The ‘70s was the decade in which the post-war consensus of full employment and the welfare state began to fracture. Many contemporary expert commentators thought that strike-torn Britain was on the verge of a socialist revolution. This book suggests that if the experts had been watching more popular television they might have been less surprised when the revolution eventually came from the Right in the shape of Margaret Thatcher. There were very few left-wing characters in popular sitcoms, for example, but they were replete with proto-Thatcherites: Basil Fawlty, the seedy landlord Rigsby from Rising Damp and Alf Garnett (intended as a satire on bigoted and reactionary attitudes working class Tory Garnett inadvertently became the idol of the reactionary bigots he was created to lampoon).

The myth of the rebel was widespread in the popular culture of the period with rule breaking detectives on the box and rule breaking footballers on the pitch. It was instructive to be reminded by Turner that, when she became leader of the opposition in 1975, Mrs Thatcher tapped into this mythology. She was admired by many as a rebel against both the old Tory establishment and the perceived new establishment of trade union leaders and bureaucrats.

Given the prevalent disunity it’s no surprise that people took refuge in nostalgia with the spirit of the Blitz being evoked in comedies like Dad’s Army (repeats of which can still be seen pretty much every day on British television. And a good thing too - it’s wonderful). Perhaps paradoxically Thatcher’s radicalism drew on this nostalgic mood. She made a strong appeal to all those who wished to return to the - entirely mythical - united and law-abiding Britain before multiculturalism, counterculture, football hooliganism and the permissive society.

The idealism of the ‘60s had not completely disappeared by the start of the ‘70s. In fact, a number of radical and progressive movements such as gay liberation, feminism and environmentalism first entered mainstream consciousness during the decade. The environmental movement found fictional expression in the amiable sitcom The Good Life. Jack Gold’s groundbreaking television film of Quentin Crisp’s autobiography The Naked Civil Servant was a welcome departure from the usual cliched portrayals of gay men of the time. Glad To Be Gay, by the Tom Robinson Band, became a hit record despite being banned by the BBC and subsequently airbrushed out of history by the Guinness Book of British Hit Singles.

Robinson was active in Rock Against Racism an alliance of punks and politicos which did much to neutralise the emergent neo-fascist National Front. Altogether less honourably, Margaret Thatcher also played her part in sidelining the Front, by echoing much of its poisonous rhetoric with her odious talk of Britain being ‘swamped by people with a different culture’.

Turner’s book is wide-ranging and eminently readable. He stays on the right side of the history/nostalgia divide and skilfully weaves together the fact and fiction, the politics and pop culture. Still, reading it I couldn’t help thinking that no history is as ancient as that of the popular culture from the day before yesterday. Who or what were: George Roper, Meg Richardson, The Likely Lads, Margo Leadbetter, Jack Regan, Hughie Green, A Bouquet of Barbed Wire, Hilda Ogden, Upstairs, Downstairs, Kendo Nagasaki, Brentford Nylons and Blake’s 7? If you don’t know, you probably didn’t live in Britain in the 1970s. ( )

The 1970's was an unfortunate decade almost everywhere, but nowhere was it as unfortunate as in Great Britain.There were feckless politicians in both the Labor and the Conservative parties, a fiscal crisis resulted in a mandated three-day work week, virulent labor strikes along with power outages and work stoppages were seemingly daily occurrences, and violence in society in the form of soccer hooliganism, skinheads and IRA bombings were on the rise.

Britain was regarded as the "sick man of Europe" and the country lurched from a longing nostalgia for their days of past glory to looking for scapegoats for their problems, be it racism/anti-immigration or Europhobia leading up to a referendum whether or not the UK would remain in what was then called the EEC. Additionally, the first strains of serious devolution movements in both Wales and Scotland began to take shape.

Author Alwyn Turner captures the dismal spirit of these times inas eminently readable volume that not only outlines the politics of the decade, but also weaves social trends and pop culture into the story. Today it seems as though history may be trying to repeat itself. The UKIP party is the direct descendent of Enoch Powell's National Front, anti-immigration fervor is again on the rise - this time aimed at immigrants from Romania and Bulgaria, income inequality is widening in the kingdom, a referendum for Scottish independence is scheduled for September 19 and the politicians of both parties are as feckless as ever.

The multiple crises of the 1970's ushered in 18 years of Margaret Thatcher. Let's hope the current malaise in Britain can be cured by less punishing measures. ( )

The 1970s were when I grew up. A 16-year-old still at school in 1970, I was 26 in 1980 and already moving up in the world as my computer skills were honed (yes, we had computer systems in the 1970s!). I remember the 1970s as a decade of turmoil and unrest running alongside my growing understanding of the wider world and, frankly, partying my head off whenever I could; I didn’t stop until the 1980s sobered me up.

Alwyn Turner has captured the decade perfectly. A superficial political history with very little reference to the international stage, this is a masterly integration of the social history of Great Britain in this decade and how that was influenced by, and influenced, great events.

The 1970s was the last decade proper before Britain became the 51st state, culturally, of the USA which it has remained ever since. Readers not from Britain will struggle to fully comprehend all the references made here. Reading this book took me back to a time when we really believed the complete collapse of society was not far away and we really believed loon pants looked good. ( )