FROM A SHOPKEEPER’S DAUGHTER TO THE LEADER OF A NATION

The well-known Iron Lady, a legend of world politics and former British prime minister, Baroness Margaret Thatcher died at the age of 87 as a result of a stroke she had suffered earlier. During her career she held several ministerial posts and was engaged in legal practice and social work, but the most important thing is that she was the boss of Downing Street from 1979 to 1990, becoming the first and only woman in history who headed the United Kingdom cabinet. This woman will remain in history as one of the brightest and most controversial politicians of the 20th century.

Perhaps today's Europe, mired in financial problems, lacks a personality as tough and confident as Margaret Thatcher. A staunch conservative and supporter of classical liberal values, she ushered in a political line that was later dubbed Thatcherism. The prime minister defended the need for privatization and unrestricted competition and sought to reduce inflation by all means and weaken the trade unions that could dictate their terms to the market by organizing strikes. Thatcher believed that the state is not obliged to help all its citizens, whom she regarded as free individuals, both in business and private life. That is to say the foundation of Thatcherism was the principle of the freedom of options with full respect for the law and with minimum interference from the state.

And although by the end of the 1980s, Thatcher's popularity ratings had plummeted, resulting in her own former colleagues forcing the prime minister to resign, the fact remains - during the reign of the Iron Lady, Britain achieved sustainable economic growth.

However, rank-and-file Britons cannot forget the price they had to pay for her reforms - particularly in the tax system. Economic measures supported by Thatcher repeatedly caused mass protests that ended in injuries and arrests of their participants.

For this reason, while British officials such as Prime Minister David Cameron and Foreign Minister William Hague, as well as world leaders are talking about the loss of a "prominent political figure", some ordinary Britons have no qualms about celebrating the demise of Thatcher in the literal sense. In Bristol, in Brixton in southern London (where the police broke up a demonstration by those disgruntled with the decisions of the Thatcher cabinet in 1981), in Glasgow and other cities of the United Kingdom, lavish and joyous processions were held under the slogan of "Rejoice, Thatcher is dead!". Participants smashed shop windows and cars, drank champagne and sang. Especially popular was the song "Ding-Dong! The Witch Is Dead" from the legendary movie-musical "The Wizard of Oz". In the first days after the news of the death of Margaret Thatcher, this piece of music soared to 54th place in the UK charts and 16th place in iTunes sales.

However, the most active area for exchanging views was Facebook. Here are some of the tough remarks that can be found on the social network: "This is not a hate campaign. This is an opportunity for those who believe that Britain suffered enough from neo-liberal ideas to speak out", "Thatcher ruined many people in this country, and we cannot forget or forgive this", "She was the personification of evil as her policy destroyed people's lives", "I cannot stand her ... She dumped most of my generation as a handful of rubbish and was the cause of the biggest social division in this country".

As for representatives of the young generation, here is, for example, what Diane Roberts from Bristol says: "My opinion of Margaret Thatcher is quite negative, mainly due to her idea of privatization, which once led to mass unemployment. As an example, I know from my history teacher who was from northern England that Thatcher closed many coal mines, and as a result, a large number of young men lost their jobs at once. What also made me think about her negatively is her statement about Nelson Mandela, whom she described as a 'terrorist' ... Though I am certainly proud of the fact that she is not only the first female prime minister in the UK, but also the first woman political leader of this magnitude throughout the West..."

In foreign policy, Thatcher strongly supported the strengthening of the UK's image in the international arena. In April 1982, Thatcher did not yield to Argentina in the dispute over the Falkland Islands and forced that country to surrender. Her expression from the Realpolitik series is also widely known: "A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us."

Thatcher was always able to soberly assess the situation, and even after her departure from politics, she remained "in the saddle" for a long time. For example, the former British prime minister played a role in the delivery of Azerbaijani energy resources to the world market. In 1992, the Baroness visited Baku, where she participated in the signing of an agreement on the evaluation development of the Azari-Ciraq fields between the governments of Azerbaijan, Britain's BP and Norway's Statoil. Expressing condolences to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland David Cameron, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev stressed that "Margaret Thatcher made a great contribution to the establishment and expansion of relations between Azerbaijan and the United Kingdom and the development of relations of friendship and cooperation". By the way, just a few days before her death, the former British prime minister was awarded the Nizami Prize for which the secretariat of Margaret Thatcher expressed profound gratitude to Baku. The Nizami Prize is given to individuals for their exceptional services to the world community. This award was given to the 42nd US President Bill Clinton, 9th President of Turkey Suleyman Demirel, as well as other prominent political figures.

If you go back to the Soviet period, the Iron Lady's negative attitude to those who lived on the other side of the Iron Curtain can be considered proverbial. Thatcher was convinced that one could speak to the Soviet Union only from the position of force and that the Soviet Union was a "major threat" to the Western way of life. Soviet-British relations went especially sour after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. For example, documents were recently declassified about how much effort Thatcher made to organize a boycott of the Olympics-1980 in Moscow. By the way, the prime minister got her famous nickname Iron Lady because of her harsh criticism of the Soviet Union.

In the Cold War and in the spread of liberal ideas, Thatcher had a true ally - US President Ronald Reagan. Together they formed a liberal axis that contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1984, Thatcher, to the surprise of everybody, suddenly decided to go to Moscow for the funeral of Yuriy Andropov. A year later, Thatcher once again came to the capital of the Soviet Union - this time for the funeral of Konstantin Chernenko. Before that, a delegation of the USSR Supreme Soviet headed by a member of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee, Mikhail Gorbachev, was invited to the UK. It was Thatcher who said the well-known words about Gorbachev: "We can do business together." Indeed, the Iron Lady, as she admitted herself, was a master of the art of studying the enemies and even turning them into friends...

The Baroness was a great strategist, and if she could choose the time of her death, she would have considered the present moment to be the most unfortunate. of course. Now that Europe is plunged into crisis and its population is suffering from smouldering discontent with austerity measures that affect their financial well-being and social security, the neo-liberal principles supported by Thatcher annoy too many people. In their view, this economic and political ideology is not very suitable for crisis times...

But in any case, the story of a shopkeeper's daughter, who managed to become the Iron Lady and the leader of a nation, will now remain in the Foggy Albion forever. Thatcher can be respected at least for the fact that she was not only able to make tough, difficult decisions, but also take full responsibility for them. This woman was certainly a Personality with a capital letter. Even after her death, she made people all over the world take stock, look back and maybe rethink their values...