* Paper prepared for delivery at The Thatcher Years: The Rebirth of Liberty? International Conference hosted by the University of Buckingham, Buckingham, England, April 3-4, 2000.

To this scholar of the American presidency and casual observer of British politics, the 1980s remain an exceptional period in Anglo-American relations. At few points since has the depth of the 'special relationship' between leaders of the United States and Britain appeared so great. The strong ties that developed between Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan were kindled by common conservative philosophies of governance that dominated domestic politics on both sides of the Atlantic.

Equally intriguing, however, are the domestic political ramifications of a 'special relationship' of quite another sort that evolved between Britain and the Continent under Margaret Thatcher's watch from 1979-90. It is a well-known fact that the 'Iron Lady's' public antipathy to European political integration became an article of faith by the end of her premiership. While her infamous handbagging incidents with European leaders drew the attention of the press, her dogged, negative rhetoric about steps toward a federal structure of European political union grew considerably more harsh as time passed. Ironically, her intransigence on the question of Britain's adherence to European Monetary Union was paramount in shaping the successful challenge to her leadership in 1990.

Yet the questions surrounding Britain's position vis-à-vis European integration did not fade with the passing of the Thatcher era, as evidenced by John Major's difficult bout to win his own party's approval of the Maastricht 'Paving Motion' to carry the Treaty on European Union into force. While Labour came to view the European Union as an opportunity for the advancement of social objectives by 1987, the issue of Britain's economic and political relations with Europe continued to divide the Conservative Party in Parliament and in the electorate well after Mrs Thatcher's departure from Downing Street.

This research is an exploratory analysis of the structure of Conservative Party opinion regarding European integration in the Thatcher era. Public opinion legacies have become an important benchmark of modern executive leadership against which presidents and prime ministers are now routinely evaluated. Opinions on the issue of Britain's involvement in the European Community (EC) have been subject to tremendous fluctuations prior to the 1980s,⁽¹⁾ with mass attitudes becoming largely negative and stable, at least in the first half of the Thatcher decade.⁽²⁾ Several scholars of British politics have asserted that Thatcher's impact on British attitudes generally, and on the European issue specifically, was quite limited. Ivor Crewe, for example, contends that Thatcher failed to transmit her values to the mass public in a 'crusade that failed'.⁽³⁾ Jorgen Rasmussen tests Crew's assertion on the European question specifically and argues that by the end of her third government, 'Thatcher and the public had evolved in opposite directions in their thinking about Europe'.⁽⁴⁾

This research differs in perspective and approach from the aforementioned studies on the question of Thatcher's legacy on public attitudes toward Europe in several important ways. First, this article investigates changes in Conservative Party opinions on Europe during the 1980s. Rasmussen's test of Thatcher's impact on public opinion may be too general. Any evaluation of Thatcher's legacy on the European question requires separating partisan opinions from those of all voters. The failure to disaggregate partisan opinions may lead to incorrect conclusions, particularly when Labour's pro-European stance after 1987 and Liberal/Alliance support for fuller integration is considered.⁽⁵⁾ It is more reasonable to expect that Thatcher's actions and rhetoric surrounding key events in the 1980s would exert a more powerful effect on Conservative Party identifiers who looked to her for issue leadership.

Second, to the degree that it is possible with available survey data, it is essential to evaluate the status of Conservative Party opinion on European integration in terms of Thatcher's own understanding of European 'union' and 'unity'. As will be shown, Thatcher's conception of European integration emphasised qualified economic cooperation much more than substantive political unification. The paramount test of Thatcher's impact on partisan opinions, then, follows from the answers to two important queries: First, did Conservative Party identifiers who favoured unity in general terms express support for economic integration but show greater ambivalence on questions of political integration? And second, did Conservative Party identifiers who were predisposed against fuller integration on both fronts harden their positions as Mrs Thatcher's stances toward integration became more intransigent? The answers to these questions require going beyond measures of superficial support for Europe to more detailed questions on political and economic union.

Finally, this analysis differs from prior studies by deriving data on Conservative Party support for Europe in the 1980s from Eurobarometer surveys which have not received widespread attention in British political science literature. While Eurobarometer surveys are less ideal for evaluating opinions of Thatcher and her government specifically, they are particularly well-suited for uncovering the subtleties of views toward European integration during Thatcher's successive governments.

It is the central argument of this analysis that Thatcher's impact on party opinion regarding Europe was moderate but substantive. Conservative Party identifiers did not generally become considerably more sceptical on questions of economic or political integration by the end of her premiership. Nor was there a wholesale move to unconditional support of the European project. Instead, party divisions in the electorate--and within Parliament--became more acute during her premiership. Support for further integration among the majority of Conservative Party identifiers grew more tentative and conditional by issue area. A small contingent of Europhiles largely parted ways with Thatcher on the benefits of European union. But opposition among a small but substantial core of Conservative Party identifiers in the electorate already disinclined toward greater political and economic integration followed Thatcher's lead. The result was growing dissensus in the party, with a deepening chasm regarding the desirability of monetary union.

This research scarcely posits that Thatcher's legacy on the European question was inconsequential. Rather, the divide in the electorate underpinned cleavages within the Conservative Party in Parliament. Thatcher's uncompromising stances carried an enormous impact on institutional politics. The sharpened intra-party divisions over European integration that followed Thatcher's unflagging critiques of any federal regime extended well into the 1990s and emboldened Conservative opposition to monetary and political union. The full consequences of her legacy as primary spokesperson against a federal Europe--as prime minister and later as Lady Thatcher in the 1990s--were not felt until John Major's troubled bid to ratify the Maastricht agreement when Eurosceptical elements of the Party redoubled their efforts to thwart Britain's participation in a federal political union.

This article unfolds in three stages. The first section outlines briefly Thatcher's understanding of Europe and the type of integration she conceived of in order to evaluate her public rhetoric toward the European Community and the increasingly unyielding stands she took toward the end of her premiership.⁽⁶⁾ The second section assesses changes in Conservative Party identifiers' attitudes toward European integration over the course of the 1980s. The concluding section of the paper places the divisions in the Conservative Party electorate on the question of European integration into perspective with the institutional divisions of the party in Parliament that have lingered since Thatcher's resignation.

Thatcher and Europe

Viewed from an historical vantage point, the Tories have traditionally taken a favourable stance toward a united Europe.⁽⁷⁾ But while post-War Conservatives recognised the importance of access to continental markets and some level of political cooperation, the retention of national sovereignty remained paramount. Political idealism did not play a significant role in MacMillan's initial application to the European Economic Community (EEC), later vetoed by French President Charles DeGaulle. Rather, it was 'practical economics' that fueled Britain's drive for membership in the EEC, which was eventually accepted by her continental partners in 1973.⁽⁸⁾

Margaret Thatcher did not break with this traditional view. Her growing differences with pro-Europeans centred on the various definitions of, and proposals for, 'unity' and 'cooperation' bantered about in the national and continental dialogue on the future of the European Community. Before her premiership as well as during her three governments, Mrs Thatcher was remarkably consistent in terms of conceiving European unity largely in economic ­ not political ­ terms. As she stated in November 1990, 'My own vision of Europe can be summed up in two words. It should be free, politically and economically. And it should be open'.⁽⁹⁾ This perspective was the cornerstone of her understanding of the future direction of Europe and Britain's interests therein. The duality that characterised Thatcher's view to Europe represented an established, though perhaps 'uncomfortable marriage of two contradictory nineteenth-century ideologies ­ nationalistic conservatism and economic liberalism'.⁽¹⁰⁾ Thatcher would subsequently reject any moves to include Britain in a federal political union. And though she accentuated the need to dismantle barriers to free trade in Europe, her enthusiasm was tempered by incredulity about the wisdom of replacing the British pound sterling with a single European currency.

Before her rather dramatic clashes with European Commission President Jacques Delors from 1987 onward, Thatcher focused her early efforts on reforming Britain's payments to the Community. Thatcher's confrontational style at the Dublin Conference in 1979, at which she refused to compromise on a rebate of no less than £1,000 million in British contributions to the Community, indubitably irritated her European counterparts as much as the Foreign Office. But by the end of 1980, pushed by Lord Carrington and Sir Ian Gilmour, she accepted, albeit reluctantly, a temporary rebate of £700 million. Her indefatigable criticisms of the Brussels 'Eurocracy' as excessively wasteful ensured that the issue of Britain's payments to the Community would continue at future budget summits in the early 1980s. The longer-term resolution to Britain's inequitable contributions came at Fontainebleau in 1984, following a series of disputes between Thatcher, Helmut Kohl, and François Mitterand during which Mrs Thatcher ­ though she never suggested taking Britain out of the Community ­ firmly held her ground on the need for substantial reductions in transfers. Ultimately, Mrs Thatcher secured a permanent rebate from the Community in addition to ceilings on spending.⁽¹¹⁾ In sum, from 1980-1985 budget reimbursements to Britain added up to £4.32 billion.⁽¹²⁾ Though her tactics drew criticism at home and abroad, Thatcher succeeded in winning a better financial 'deal' for Britain in the Community.

Even before her premiership, Thatcher had long taken issue with the regulatory structure in the EC. The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), the most interventionist and 'federalist' of Community policies, was symbolic of the Europe she feared. 'The right and Mrs. Thatcher used the issue of agricultural policy as a means of attacking the EC and its profligacy'.⁽¹³⁾ The CAP was the most expensive part of the EC budget. The programme, designed to encourage agricultural production, subsidised inefficient farm practices (largely outside Britain) and resulted in large Community surpluses that translated into higher costs to British consumers. At a speech in Rome in 1977 Thatcher seized the occasion to point out the deleterious effects of overproduction by fixing agricultural prices.⁽¹⁴⁾ And she returned to her free market orientation a year later in Brussels, calling European unity a 'grand concept' that is 'surely not advanced by hundreds of petty internal regulations."⁽¹⁵⁾ Spurred by Thatcher's explicit critiques before and during her first government, there was widespread acceptance among the Community partners that the CAP needed urgent reform.⁽¹⁶⁾ Initial proposals emerged as early as 1983, ultimately culminating in a substantial revision of the programme in 1988.

Thatcher's successes pushing the Community toward budgetary reform indubitably shaped her acceptance of the Single European Act (SEA) in 1986, which set forth the creation of a single internal market in Europe. Economic freedom was a leitmotiv in Thatcher's public rhetoric, and her agreement to the SEA was largely consistent with her vision of Europe. As she expressed in 1984, 'We want to see greater unity of the Community market, greater unity of Community action in world affairs, greater unity of purpose and action in tackling unemployment and the other problems of our time, and greater unity in the development of new technology. That is what I understand by a united Europe'.⁽¹⁷⁾ Indeed, it may appear as a paradox to many who characterise Thatcher as the most Euro-sceptical prime minister in Britain's post-War history that she agreed to a qualified majority voting scheme that removed Britain's veto over European legislation.⁽¹⁸⁾ But her agreement to the SEA, in large measure, was a product of a dual approach to the European Community, one that emphasised British interests while recognizing the necessity of flexibility on the international front.⁽¹⁹⁾

As the European Community continued to progress toward economic union, which Thatcher conceived of in terms of free trade, she was satisfied. In 1987, for example, the Conservative Party manifesto stated that 'Britain has led the way in establishing a genuine common market, with more trade and services moving freely across Europe' and promised to exercise a constructive role in the Community while protecting British interests.⁽²⁰⁾ It was only when Jacques Delors, Commission President and strident social democrat, accentuated political union and stepped up his calls for a 'federal' Europe that Thatcher's rhetoric hardened and she assumed principal leadership of the Euro-sceptical element of the Conservative Party. A series of hard-hitting, pro-federalist speeches by Delors fanned the fires of Thatcher's discontent. In a speech to the European Parliament in July 1988 Delors asserted that within a decade European legislation in the economic, fiscal, and social spheres would inevitably come to supplant national legislation.⁽²¹⁾ Delors' comments brought a scathing rebuke from Mrs Thatcher while traveling in Belgium. At the College of Europe, she emphasised 'co-operation between independent sovereign states' and forcefully asserted that 'We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them reimposed at a European level, with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels'.⁽²²⁾ Thatcher's speech sent shock waves through Europe, and spawned the 'Bruges Group' of the Conservative Party to combat movement toward a centralised, federalist Europe which Lady Thatcher continues to chair.

The Bruges speech was a watershed. 'Mrs. Thatcher's own attitude changed from a reluctant acceptance of Europe while it was advancing towards the single market to outright hostility, and opposition to any restraint on the independence of the component nation-states'.⁽²³⁾ In August of 1990 Thatcher continued to advance a free trade area fusing Europe and North America as a preferred alternative to a federal Europe.⁽²⁴⁾ The proposal reflected Thatcher's Atlanticist orientations and the belief that the United States was critical not only for Europe's security but for a free market world economy.⁽²⁵⁾ Delors, on the other hand, increased the rhetoric in Britain in 1990 when, in a speech to the Trades Union Congress, he contended that while workers had failed to oust Thatcher, Brussels and Strasbourg could act as conduits for their social objectives.⁽²⁶⁾

Delors' three-stage plan for monetary union in Europe, which called first for a common monetary system, then a central bank, and finally a single currency, set in motion a series of events that exposed the deep rift in the Conservative Party in Parliament over European integration and eventually brought about Thatcher's downfall. Delors' plan, along with his willingness to issue directives that 'interfered' with the internal politics of member states, ⁽²⁷⁾ confirmed Thatcher's worst suspicion that pro-federalist forces were attempting to impose 'socialism through the backdoor'. Isolated at successive European Council meetings in which Britain was the only member to vote against the plan for monetary union, Thatcher declared she would veto any attempt to move to a single currency. Her declaration was followed by a resounding 'three noes' to increasing the power of Community institutions in a speech to Parliament. Her intransigence over monetary union spurred the resignation of Sir Geoffrey Howe, a prominent cabinet minister and leader of the Conservative Party, who believed that further integration was inevitable and that Thatcher's stances were harming Britain's position in the Community. Howe's powerful resignation speech, in which he criticised Thatcher roundly, prompted Michael Heseltine's leadership challenge, ultimately culminating in John Major's election to head the Conservative Party in November 1990.

The central paradox in Thatcher's eventual fall is that it occurred over the very issue of further integration, and despite her significant impact on Community politics over the course of the 1980s. Obviously, there was substantial dissension in the ranks of the parliamentary party on the question of monetary union and its ramifications for British sovereignty. But to what degree did Thatcher's rhetoric coincide with Conservative Party opinion in the electorate? Did Conservative party identifiers follow Thatcher's orientation to economic union while remaining highly sceptical toward political unity, or did Thatcher's stance represent a minority viewpoint in the party's electorate? Time-series analysis and issue-focused Eurobarometer surveys from 1979-90 cast light on the intricacies of support for European integration.

Data and Analysis

In the last three decades, opinions about European integration have been collected regularly through Eurobarometer surveys in all member states of the European Union. The analysis of Conservative Party opinions in the United Kingdom presented here spans the period 1979-90.⁽²⁸⁾ Conservative Party identifiers were ascertained by responses to their voting intentions (which party the respondent would vote for if a domestic election were held tomorrow).

The advantages of the Eurobarometer surveys are considerable. Some questions about integration have been asked consistently over time, allowing longitudinal analysis to uncover changes in opinions. Moreover, a number of surveys emphasise specific questions of notable interest to this research endeavour, such as opinions concerning economic and political integration, the role of the European Parliament, and monetary union. These latter surveys do not provide longitudinal data but do furnish a basis to assess opinions at various times during Thatcher's premiership. Even though the surveys do not provide data on opinions about Thatcher and her government's handling of various issues specifically, the surveys do afford the opportunity to evaluate whether the Conservative Party electorate followed Thatcher's fundamental distinction between economic and political union with the Continent and to examine the subtleties of support for integration.

Initial analysis of Conservative Party identifiers' general feelings about Britain's membership in the European Community in the 1980s reveals both relative stability and ambivalence over time. Figure 1 shows that a plurality and sometimes a slight majority of Conservatives believed that membership was a 'good thing'. From 1983-90, the trend fluctuates little. Yet it is clear that a sizable proportion of the Conservative electorate viewed membership with hesitation and reservation. While those who viewed membership as a 'bad thing' were clearly in the minority by 1987, the year the SEA was implemented, between 25 and 30 percent were consistently indifferent to membership, citing Britain's participation as 'neither good nor bad.'

Similar questions result in equivalent findings, with a higher or lower amount of scepticism depending on phrasing used. From 1983-90, when asked about how they would feel if the European Community were scrapped, a range of 40 and 50 percent of Conservative Party identifiers were consistently indifferent, with about a third 'very sorry' and between 20 and 25 percent 'relieved'. On the question of whether Britain had benefited from membership in the European Community, Figure 2 shows that a strong plurality to just over a majority of Conservative Party voters believed that this is indeed the case. There is a slightly positive trend, with the high points above 50 percent coming in May 1987, November 1988, and November 1990. The latter two dates are coincident to Thatcher's Bruges speech and month of resignation, respectively, but it is impossible to ascertain what effect, if any, these events may have had on party opinions. The trend may be argued two ways--either that Thatcher's efforts to secure a better financial arrangement for Britain in Europe carried a modestly positive impact on general evaluations in the Conservative electorate concerning the benefits of membership or that a slight increase in perceptions on the benefits of membership progressed despite Thatcher's efforts. Either way, there is little evidence of considerable movement in general opinions.

Still, net evaluations of Conservative Party identifiers about 'efforts to unify Europe' are quite divided. Figure 3 traces opinions from the beginning to the end of Thatcher's three governments and shows a core of about 20 percent of solidly Euro-sceptical Conservatives against efforts to unify Europe. The trend which is particularly noteworthy in Figure 3, however, is that the proportion of respondents who were in favour of unification efforts 'a great deal' declined somewhat proportionally to the increase in the per cent of respondents who supported efforts 'to some extent.'

The turning point in the increase for tentative support is 1985, the approximate half-way point in Thatcher's premiership as she hammered away on the 'BBQ' or British Budgetary Question. The data thus far do not support the thesis that Thatcher moved the Conservative Party electorate substantially toward a more sceptical position on Europe. But neither do the data suggest that Conservatives became considerably more comfortable with the notion of European integration. The time series furnishes preliminary, indirect evidence of an increase in qualified support for European integration which merits further exploration. In particular, the wording of the question about general 'efforts to unify Europe' is problematic because individual respondents may define the meaning of 'unity' quite differently. To examine if Conservative Party identifiers drew Thatcher's basic distinction between the benefits of economic cooperation and potential hazards of political union as an explanation for tentative support for integration, general evaluations of efforts to unify Europe must be compared to responses on specific issues.

Cross-tabular analysis was performed to identify the relationship between responses to the general question of Conservative Party identifiers' support for efforts to unify Europe (Figure 3) and specific questions regarding political and economic union, including views toward role of the European Parliament, a single European market by 1992, and a single currency.⁽²⁹⁾ For these specific issues, some questions vary in wording across time, hindering a 'true' time series. Nonetheless, the data offer a snapshot of changes in opinion at specific points during Thatcher's three governments and provide an acceptable means to test the hypothesis of conditional support for integration.

One important indicator is to compare general support for unity with opinions concerning the European Parliament. Although turnout for elections to the European Parliament diminished after the first vote in 1979, the European Parliament is the only democratically elected, supranational body with direct connections to the electorate in the member states.⁽³⁰⁾ Theoretically, the European Parliament would serve as the central democratic institution in a more fully integrated Europe. While the institution retains a largely symbolic role now, as it did in the 1980s, opinions on an expanded role for the European Parliament form an important benchmark of support for political union. Eurobarometer data tap the extent of the role Conservative Party identifiers' wished the European Parliament to play as discussions of integration evolved under Thatcher's watch.

Examining responses spanning 1983-90, there was very little movement in opinions during Thatcher's premiership. For the eight year period, Eurobarometer surveys show that an average of 36.5 percent of Conservative Party identifiers preferred that the European Parliament play a more important role than at present, with a standard deviation of only 3 percentage points. There was no appreciable increase in support for an expanded role for the European Parliament in 1985 or 1990 following the second and third European elections, respectively. A consistent plurality of Conservatives polled favoured a static or decreased role. An average of 24.7 percent wished the European Parliament to play the same role (std. dev. = 5.4%) and 25.5 percent (std. dev. = 3.0%) were in favour of a lesser role. Thatcher referred to the European Parliament as a 'talk shop', and Conservative Party identifiers appeared largely content to see the institution remain a negligible political force in the Community.

Even among self-proclaimed Conservative 'Euro-enthusiasts' the data do not point to much eagerness to expand the role of the European Parliament. In 1983, when asked whether the future of the EEC should include a parliament and government, stay the same, or if real power should always remain with the member states, a bare majority overall, 50.1 percent, believed that power should remain with Britain--while 29.9 percent favoured keeping current arrangments. Less than a sixth of Conservative Party identifiers desired a parliament and government responsible to it. Among those who favoured unity 'a great deal' and 'to some extent' the percentages favouring power remaining with Britain were 47 and 52, respectively (T-_b = .10; X²=.02). The second round of European elections did not result in a wellspring of support for the European Parliament. In the Spring of 1984 only 29 percent of Conservatives agreed strongly or somewhat that the primary concern of the newly elected MEPs should be to work toward political union. Of those who were for unity 'a great deal' 70 percent agreed, but those who favoured unity 'to some extent' were more divided: Only 45 percent wished the EP to work toward political union (T-_b = .29).⁽³¹⁾ Attitudes among pro-European elements in the Conservative electorate did not change substantially by 1989, with the third round of Euro-elections hanging in the balance after the implementation of the SEA. Among those who favoured unity 'to some extent' only 42 percent preferred a greater role for the EP. Significantly, stronger combined majorities (85%) of those respondents against unity 'to some extent' or 'a great deal' wished a lesser role (T-_b = .40). Eurosceptics had hardened their positions on integration in lockstep with Thatcher's increasingly harsh rhetoric.

If the Conservative Party electorate had moved away from Thatcher's growing scepticism about political union over the course of the 1980s, support of specific powers for the European Parliament should have been much less reserved. But a majority of respondents (53%) did not favour the European Parliament putting forward laws on its own initiative by 1990, the last year of Thatcher's premiership. Even among respondents who favoured unity 'a great deal' or 'to some extent' 51 percent and 63 percent, respectively, were against a legislatively ambitious European Parliament (T-_b = .21, X² = .01). Consistent with data in earlier surveys, then, British Conservatives--even those who leaned toward favouring greater unity--remained largely skeptical of surrendering power to European institutions. There is little evidence of a rising tide of support for European integration on this front. In fact, in 1990 81 percent and 64 percent of respondents who favoured unity 'a great deal' or 'to some extent', respectively, continued to assert that the European Parliament should decide laws only with the advice of the Council of Ministers, which is comprised of the national political leaders of the member states (T-_b = .21, X² = .02).

Thatcher's championing of free trade did not envisage the need for a single European currency. And the Eurobarometer data suggest that a strong and consistent majority of Conservative Party identifiers supported Thatcher's view on monetary union and showed signs of significant doubt about steps to form the single market, even among those who claimed to be in favour of unity. In 1986 66 percent of Conservatives surveyed agreed strongly or somewhat about the desirability of the freer movement of people, goods and services in the Community in five to six years' time. But when asked about their prospective orientation to the single market specifically in 1989, only 47.1 percent thought it would be 'a good thing'. Little changed on the eve of Thatcher's fall. By Spring of 1990, there is evidence of a decline optimism as only 40 percent thought that the advent of the single market was a 'good thing', with 31 percent referring to it as 'neither good nor bad'.

More to the point on monetary union, strong and consistent majorities of Conservative Party identifiers coincided with Thatcher in the belief that retaining the pound sterling was essential. It is regarding this policy issue that the strongest dose of scepticism among pro-European Conservatives comes to the fore. In 1985 two-thirds of Conservatives surveyed were against the idea of replacing the pound sterling with a European Currency Unit (ECU). Only 12 percent favoured the ECU. When responses are divided out by general support for unity, even ardent Europhiles balked at the ECU: Sixty-seven percent of those who favoured unity 'a great deal' were against a single currency, and the figure rises to 80 percent among those who favoured unity 'to some extent' (T-_b = .16; X² = .04).

Little consensus emerged among Conservatives relative to the single currency by the end of Thatcher's third government. At this juncture, the issue moved to the front and center of debates over European integration. And the data point to stronger cleavages in the party in the electorate over time. In 1989 only 38 percent felt that the Community should develop a common currency policy. Positions among Eurosceptics had hardened, following Thatcher's rhetoric: 82 percent of those against unity shunned a common policy. Pro-European elements in the party divided amongst themselves, with 58 percent of those in favour of unity 'a great deal' agreeing that there should be a common currency policy, and 58 percent of those in favour of unity 'to some extent' opposing the idea (T-_b = .25). The pattern is repeated in the Spring of 1990. Sixty-one percent of Conservative Party identifiers favoured currency matters being decided by the national government--not jointly with other members of the European Community. Euro-enthusiasts remained highly split over currency policy. Just less than a majority, 46 percent, of those favouring unity 'a great deal' felt that currency decisions should remain in the purview of the national government. And among Conservatives who favoured unity 'to some extent', over two-thirds--69 percent--favoured retaining national control (T-_b = -.305).

The survey data on the question of monetary union place into sharp relief the growth of pervasive divisions in the Conservative Party electorate at the end of Thatcher's premiership. These divisions were mirrored in Parliament and ultimately precipitated Mrs Thatcher's fall. A small contingent of pro-European MPs, including Geoffrey Howe, were prepared to go forth with monetary union and decided Thatcher's stubbornness was hindering Britain's future place in the Community. Yet an equally vocal coterie of Eurosceptics sided with Thatcher on the potential perils of the Delors plan. Between these polar opposites lay a multitude of positions on monetary union that did not necessarily follow party divisions on other issues.⁽³²⁾

Public opinion on European integration in the 1980s is as complex as the institutional dynamics that ended Thatcher's incumbency. This research has surely not explored the entire universe of potential questions and issues surrounding Britain's place in Europe and Thatcher's leadership. But the Eurobarometer data brought to bear in the analysis do suffice to accentuate the subtleties of support for Europe when the point of reference is moved from measures of superficial support for integration to issue-focused questions. Examining party opinions reveals the limited and conditional nature of support for European integration, largely following Thatcher's distinction between economic and political union. Setting the bar at whether mass opinions became overwhelmingly negative is an inappropriate test of Thatcher's legacy.

Concluding Comments

Two essential points merit re-emphasis from the analysis of changes in Conservative Party opinion during the Thatcher era. First, the results of the Eurobarometer data challenge the assertion that public opinion abandoned Mrs Thatcher en masse by the end of her third government. Quite to the contrary, when partisan opinions are separated out from all opinions, there is little evidence of a groundswell of support for integration in a general sense among Conservative identifiers. There is even less evidence of growing support for a federal Europe when degrees of support are analyzed alongside specific issues. True, by 1990 the data show that roughly half of all Conservative Party identifiers supported unity 'to some extent'. But that support was tentative and qualified. Support diminished on questions of political unity, was reserved, at best, on the benefits of a single market, and largely vanished on monetary union except among the most ardent Europhiles in the party electorate. And those most adverse to integration, though a minority in the party electorate, found much fuel in Thatcher's rhetoric to stiffen their resistance. In sum, the structure of party opinion became more divided during the Thatcher era.

Second, it is important to recognise how the divisions in the Conservative Party electorate translated into Thatcher's longer-term institutional legacy. Although the composition of attitudes in the parliamentary party may not have become more solidly 'Thatcherite' from 1979-90 any more than general attitudes in the electorate at large,⁽³³⁾ Thatcher did leave the issue of European integration front and center in debates within the Conservative Party. MPs devoted to her stance organised into visible conferences, including both the Fresh Start Group and the Bruges Group formed under the tutelage of Lord Harris of High Cross, in opposition to a federal Europe. As Kavanaugh explains, 'it was after her departure that a growing number of Conservative MPs came to share her hostility to the European Union, which replaced the EC at the Maastricht Treaty'.⁽³⁴⁾ The subsequent backbench rebellion over the Maastricht 'Paving Motion' and John Major's difficulties have been analyzed elsewhere in detail.⁽³⁵⁾ The point is that backbench Tories continued to share many of the reservations about British sovereignty in an 'ever greater union' uncovered in this analysis of public opinion in the 1980s, creating enormous problems for Mrs Thatcher's immediate successor.⁽³⁶⁾

This analysis leaves to future research to chart changes in Conservative Party opinions on European integration at the turn of the new millennium. Thatcher left a substantial imprint on British politics as prime minister, and she remains a revered and influential figure in Conservative Party circles. Clearly, when she left office in 1990 the structure of Conservative Party opinion insured that her view of a Europe des Patries would continue to be taken seriously in party circles. Symbolically, as chair of the Bruges Group, Lady Thatcher continues to inject pragmatism into debates about Britain's future in Europe. If significant segments of the political élite continue to believe that 'there is no alternative' to Britain's participation in a more deeply integrated Europe,⁽³⁷⁾ Thatcher's legacy has been, and will continue to be, to present an alternative viewpoint to a federal arrangement for European political union that stresses Britain's sovereignty and national interests--in Europe and the world.
 
 

¹ J. Spence, 'Movements in the Public Mood: 1961-75', in R. Jowel and G. Hoinville, eds., Britain into Europe: Public Opinion and the EEC 1961-75 (London: Croom Helm, 1976).

² J. Rasmussen, 'What Kind of Vision is That?' British Public Attitudes Towards the European Community During the Thatcher Era', British Journal of Political Science 27, no. 1 (1997), p. 112.

³ I. Crewe, 'Values: The Crusade that Failed', in D. Kavanagh and A. Seldon, eds., The Thatcher Effect: A Decade of Change (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989).

⁴ J. Rasmussen, 'What Kind of Vision is That?' p. 117.

⁵ See A. Philip, 'Europeans First and Last: British Liberals and the European Community', The Political Quarterly 64, no. 4 (1993), pp. 447-461. Professor Butt suggests that Liberal Party voters may be more divided on European integration compared to party leaders.

⁶ The term European Union did not come into usage until 1994. All survey questions used in this analysis referred to the 'European Economic Community' or 'European Community' in the 1980s. The usage of the latter terms in this article reflects the terminology of the Thatcher years.

⁷ S. George, An Awkward Partner: Britain in the European Community (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994).

⁸ E. Reitan, Tory Radicalism: Margaret Thatcher, John Major, and the Transformation of Modern Britain, 1979-1997 (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 1997), p. 10.

⁹ M. Thatcher, "My Vision of Europe: Open and Free', Financial Times, 19 November 1990, p. 17.

¹⁰ C. Pilkington, Britain in the European Union Today (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995), p. 217.

¹¹ For a detailed treatment of events on the 'British Budgetary Question' and its resolution, see P. Sharp, Thatcher's Diplomacy: The Revival of British Foreign Policy (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997), pp. 145-159.

¹² P. Riddell, The Thatcher Decade: How Britain Changed During the 1980s (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1989), p. 193.

¹³ M. Smith, "CAP and Agricultural Policy," in D. Marsh and R.A.W. Rhodes, eds., Implementing Thatcherite Policies (Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1992), p. 141.

¹⁴ M. Thatcher, speech to the Centro Italiano di Studi per la Conciliazione Internazionale, Rome, 24 June 1977.

¹⁵ M. Thatcher, speech to Les Grandes Conférences Catholiques, Brussels, 23 June 1978.

¹⁶ P. Nailor, 'Foreign and Defense Policy', in H. Drucker, P. Dunleavy, A. Gamble, and G. Peele, eds., Developments in British Politics (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1983), p. 193.

¹⁷ M. Thatcher, speech at the Franco-British Council Dinner, Avignon, France, 30 November 1984.

¹⁸ E. Evans, Thatcher and Thatcerism (New York: Routledge, 1997), p. 84.

¹⁹ D. Elles, 'The Foreign Policy of the Thatcher Government,' in K. Minogue and M. Biddiss, eds., Thatcherism: Personality and Politics (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987), pp. 100-101.

²⁰ Quoted in S. Letwin, The Anatomy of Thatcherism (London: HarperCollins 1992), p. 284.

²¹ London Times, 7 July 1988.

²² M. Thatcher, speech to the College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium, 20 September 1988.

²³ Pilkington, p. 45.

²⁴ M. Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (London: Harper Collins, 1993), p. 720.

²⁵ S. George and M. Sowemimo, 'Conservative Foreign Policy towards the European Union', in S. Ludlam and M. Smith, eds., Contemporary British Conservatism (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996), p. 255.

²⁶ London Times, 10 June 1990.

²⁷ E. Evans, Thatcher and Thatcherism, p. 85.

²⁸ The Eurobarometer data from 1979-90 utilised in the analysis were made available by the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA. Neither the collector of the original data nor the Consortium bears any responsibility for the analyses or interpretations presented here. All results reported in this analysis for the Eurobarometer data reflect appropriate weighting of responses for the United Kingdom.

²⁹ Responses were treated as ordinal-level data. Kendall's tau-b (T-_b) measure of association is reported in the text. The scale runs from +1 to -1. For details, see H. Blalock, Jr., Social Statistics (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1972), pp. 418-421. Responses to the question about 'efforts to unify Europe' were coded as follows: 1 'for, a great deal'; 2 'for, to some extent'; 3 'against, to some extent'; 4 'against, a great deal'. Similar coding was employed for the specific issues areas. Chi-square (X²) tests were performed to test the null hypothesis of no relationship between general support for efforts to unify Europe and select issues. Unless otherwise noted in the text, the ² statistics from the cross-tabular analyses are significant at p < .001. The weighted N for the analyses varied between 200 and 600.

³⁰ See I. Galen, 'Second-order or Third-rate? Issues in the Campaign for the Elections for the European Parliament 1994', Electoral Studies 14, no. 2 (1995), pp. 183-198.

³¹ Over 75 percent of those who were against unity 'to some extent' or 'a great deal' were against a stronger role for the European Parliament.

³² D. Baker, A. Gamble, and S. Ludlam '184619061996? Conservative Splits and European Integration', The Political Quarterly 64, no. 4 (1993), pp. 420-434.

³³ Philip Nortion, 'The Lady's Not For Turning: But What About The Rest? Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative Party 1979-89', Parliamentary Affairs 43, no. 1 (1990), pp. 41-58; I. Crewe and D. Searing, 'Ideological Change in the British Conservative Party', American Political Science Review 82, no. 2 (1988), pp. 361-384.

³⁴ D. Kavanaugh, The Reordering of British Politics: Politics After Thatcher (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), p. 117.

³⁵ D. Baker, A. Gamble, and S. Ludlam, 'The Parliamentary Siege of Maastricht: Conservative Divisions and British Ratification', Parliamentary Affairs 47, no. 1 (1994), pp. 37-60; D. Baker, A. Gamble, and S. Ludlam, 'Whips or Scorpions? The Maastricht Vote and the Conservative Party', Parliamentary Affairs 46, no. 2 (1993), pp. 151-166.

³⁶ D. Baker, 'Backbench Conservative Attitudes to European Integration', The Political Quarterly 66, no. 2 (1995), pp. 221-233.

³⁷ J. Bulpitt, 'Conservative Leaders and the 'Euro-Ratchet': Five Doses of Scepticism', The Political Quarterly 63, no. 3 (1992), pp. 258-275.