{"product_id":"9780141975979","title":"The Rise and Fall of the British Nation : A Twentieth-Century History by David Edgerton","description":"Forget almost everything you thought you knew about Britain ... You  will not find a better informed history' David Goodhart, Evening Standard'A striking new perspective on our past' Piers Brendon, Literary ReviewFrom the acclaimed author of Britain's War Machine and The Shock of the Old, a bold reassessment of Britain's twentieth century.   It  is usual to see the United Kingdom as an island of continuity in an  otherwise convulsed and unstable Europe; its political history a smooth  sequence of administrations, from building a welfare state to coping  with decline. Nobody would dream of writing the history of Germany, say,  or the Soviet Union in this way. David Edgerton's major new  history breaks out of the confines of traditional British national  history to redefine what it was to British, and to reveal an unfamiliar  place, subject to huge disruptions. This was not simply because of the  world wars and global economic transformations, but in its very nature.  Until the 1940s the United Kingdom was, Edgerton argues, an exceptional  place: liberal, capitalist and anti-nationalist, at the heart of a  European and global web of trade and influence. Then, as its global  position collapsed, it became, for the first time and only briefly, a  real, successful nation, with shared goals, horizons and  industry, before reinventing itself again in the 1970s as part of the  European Union and as the host for international capital, no longer  capable of being a nation.  Packed with surprising examples and arguments, The Rise and Fall of the British Nation gives us  a grown-up, unsentimental history which takes business and warfare  seriously, and which is crucial at a moment of serious reconsideration  for the country and its future.\u003cbr\u003eBinding: Paperback \/ softback","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43201479639218,"sku":"9780141975979","price":18.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/products\/9780141975979_020deeb8-eba9-441f-a859-4de679bbe8a3.jpg?v=1699016228","url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/products\/9780141975979","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}