New Departures .sx Changes in lifestyles , living standards , opportunities and patterns of cultural behaviour are apparent in all the Western societies between the late 1950s and late 1960s .sx A major feature , indeed , is a greater cultural interchange than ever before , along with a marked reversal of the one-way movement from America :sx Italian espresso machines and Italian fashion ; French discos ; British pubs , British pop music , and British pop design ; European film directors and a medley of European film actors and actresses .sx Many of the developments to be discussed in this chapter , then , are international ; some , in origins at least , are specifically British .sx The phrase 'cultural revolution' , which I have used on a number of occasions , may or may not be an apt one .sx It is certainly contentious .sx From the left it is contended that no fundamental shifts in the structure of power , no serious attacks on the deprivations suffered by substantial minorities , took place , and that those features of sixties culture which hit the headlines were shallow , commercial and sexist .sx From the right , it is argued that the steady abandonment since the war of older disciplines and older values escalated into an orgy of self - indulgence supported on income which had not been earned .sx Mrs Thatcher's comment of March 1982 is well known :sx " We are reaping what was sown in the Sixties .sx .. fashionable theories and permissive claptrap set the scene for a society in which the old virtues of discipline and restraint were denigrated .sx " Certainly , what happened between the late fifties and the early seventies was not a political revolution , not a revolution in economic thought and practice ; but it was , I believe , a transformation in the opportunities and freedoms available both to the majority as a whole and to distinctive individuals and groups within that majority .sx These transformations were not imposed from above , nor were they the achievement of a coherent group of 'revolutionaries' .sx They helped to make possible the events of 1968 , but their significance had nothing to do with the success or failure of these events , on which too much attention has been lavished .sx More critically , the real changes in ordinary lives have been obscured by the attention lavished on the minority practices of 'underground culture' whose long-term influence was minimal .sx Fundamental was the marked economic recovery of Western Europe from the early to mid-fifties , creating new kinds of consumer demand both internal , and as already been sic !sx suggested , international .sx The principal new markets can be defined as youth , the working class , the provinces , racial minorities and , in lesser degree , women .sx The new consumers were in a position to reject the canons laid down by established authority , metro - politan , upper-class and old .sx America was escaping from the insular parochialism which had gripped it during the Cold War period :sx even in the Mid West outlets appeared for foreign cultural products , including British ones .sx Hollywood had ossified , so had Tin Pan Alley :sx therein lay the opportunity .sx But the challenges to established authority were particularly striking in Britain , partly because Britain had long been such a conservative and homogeneous society , but partly also because Britain had generally been such a sensible society , characterized , as I have expressed it elsewhere , by 'Secular Anglicanism' .sx The codes of behaviour which had grown up , generally enforced with discretion , were not absurd given their historical context ( the economic dependence of women on men , for instance , and of youth on age) .sx Now a country which lacked the antediluvian bigotries of the American Bible Belt , the clerical and anti - clerical factionalism of France and Italy , or the reviving bourgeois stolidity of Christian Democratic Germany , showed itself specially responsive to the new pressures .sx British developments can be summed up under six overlapping headings .sx The first is defined by the two clich e s 'affluence' and 'consumerism' .sx Average weekly earnings for industrial workers rose 34 per cent between 1955 and 1960 and 130 per cent between 1955 and 1969 ; average earnings of middle-class salaried employees rose 127 per cent between 1955 and 1969 .sx While prices of food and other necessities were steadily rising ( retail prices rose by 63 per cent between 1955 and 1969 ) , the prices of small cars , in relation to earning power , were falling , and many products of new technology such as television sets and washing machines were , despite inflation , actually costing less .sx Still a rarity in the early 1950s , TV sets were to be found in 75 per cent of homes by 1961 , and 91 per cent of homes by 1971 .sx Second , though the basic class structure remained unaltered , there were significant changes in detail and attitudes .sx The working class became visible and assertive as it had never been before .sx Some of its most talented escapees held the limelight and while doing so retained , with bravado , working-class accent and manner .sx The vogue for 'classlessness' was somewhat spurious , but the very advocacy of the notion altered the old indicators of status :sx 'posh cockney' replaced the plummy Oxford accent .sx Third , there was the power of , and preoccupation with , youth .sx Both rock-based pop music and pop fashion were products of , and even when fully commercialized remained products for , youth .sx Fourth , is the transformation in sexual attitudes and behaviour .sx The survey material is copious :sx perhaps the single most significant statistic is that , while in 1951 only 51 per cent of women interviewed had declared sex to be very important in marriage , in 1969 the percentage was 67 .sx 'Permissiveness' was the word brought into use to describe the whole complex of developments within the sexual arena .sx Yet in characterizing the social legislation of the period a better heading might be that of fairness towards , and freedom for , each individual .sx To the fifth heading , I would add a sixth , pervading all aspects of private and communal life , frankness and openness to the extent of ( another word of the time ) 'explicitness' , these together being part of the general reaction against the emollient fibbing of the older generation ( including the fashionable clothing , male and female , that concealed the imperfections of form and figure) .sx In the voting preferences of the British people there were , as ever , no great swings .sx At the beginning of the sixties the Conservatives were in power , led by the one-nation , patrician Tory , Harold Macmillan .sx In 1964 Labour scraped into office under Harold Wilson , also very much a consensus politician , going on to win a substantial majority in 1966 .sx In 1970 , to the surprise of many , the Conservatives , led by Edward Heath , certainly no fanatic of the radical right , returned to office .sx Unsuccessful confrontation with the miners pushed Heath into another election early in 1974 .sx Although the Conservatives polled 37.9 per cent of the popular vote , Labour with 37.1 per cent had four more seats and formed a minority government till October when Labour polled 39.2 per cent to 35.9 for the Conservatives .sx The government of first Wilson , then James Callaghan ( yet another middle-of-the-road figure ) , in effect depended on the support of the Liberals .sx Continuity is clearly seen in arts policy , as Arts Council funding and local authority initiatives increased .sx Indeed the entire period could be characterized as marking a culmination of the idea enunciated towards the end of the war of culture as a form of social welfare .sx The major stages were the transference in 1964 of the source of Arts Council funding from the Treasury to the Department of Education , the appointment of Jennie Lee as Minister for the Arts , and the publication in 1965 of Jennie Lee's government paper A Policy for the Arts .sx In education , too , the sixties marked a climax in post-war developments , with the expansion in higher education providing part of the basis for enhanced interest in artistic and intellectual practices - from opera to feminism .sx Outside of consensus politics there were , indeed , mighty political issues , principally hostility to American military policy in general and , above all , to American activities in Viet Nam in particular , revulsion against the commercialism of contemporary society and the power of multi-national corporations , and protests over nuclear weaponry .sx These matters of concern often appeared in 'alternative' or 'underground' culture .sx Yet that very culture also benefited from Arts Council and local authority patronage .sx The key Acts of the period were not part of some political blueprint for transforming society , but resulted from pressures generated from within society :sx 1960 , the Betting and Gaming Act ( recognizing working-class vices as well as more aristocratic ones ) ; 1967 , the Abortion Act , the National Health Service ( the Family Planning ) Act and the Sexual Offences Act ( legalizing homosexual acts between two consenting adults in private ) ; 1968 , the Theatres Act ( abolishing censorship ) ; 1969 the Representation of the People Act ( reducing the voting age to eighteen ) and the Divorce Reform Act ; 1970 the Matrimonial Property Act ( establishing that a wife's work , whether as a housewife within the home or as a money-earner outside it , should be considered as an equal contribution towards creating the family home if , as a result of divorce , that had to be divided ) , the Equal Pay Act ( imperfect , certainly , and not intended to become fully effective for another five years ) and the Chronic Sick and Disabled Persons Act ( which symbolized and ratified the new openness towards the problems of the disabled) .sx Acts of Parliament must never be mistaken for the reality of social change ; but in fact the reality of change was palpable in the archaeology of everyday life , in attitudes , behaviour and artefacts .sx Of course , there were many sources of tension and deprivation - race relations and high-rise housing for instance .sx This era was not a golden age , simply a time of release and change .sx Mrs Thatcher , indeed , was right , if for the phrase " the old virtues of discipline and restraint were denigrated " we substitute 'the social controls established by the Victorians were overthrown' .sx This was a revolution which could not easily be reversed since , in fact , it had little to do with the state and everything to do with society .sx It was not a revolution towards socialism , but if it had its too-evident male chauvinist aspects it also contributed to the launching , partly in response to the manifestations of decontrolled male sexuality , of activist feminism .sx The culture of the day was influenced by these developments , contributed greatly to them , and indeed was an integral part of Britain's striking new departures .sx 'The Snobbery that Used to Exist .sx ..' .sx The central role of cinema .sx Rick Wakeman was one of a number of musicians who moved from a strictly classical training into the world of pop music .sx He explained to Michael Cable , chronicler of the pop industry , that :sx the whole attitude to serious pop music is changing in the colleges and academies .sx .. Even members of the staff , the tutors and the professors , are beginning to accept that at the top end of the scale rock is musically valued .sx The snobbery that used to exist is gradually disappearing .sx .. How far , and in what ways , were barriers between different 'levels' of culture flattened ?sx Here I want to begin by looking at the conversion of Braine's novel Room at the Top into a popular film carried out by Romulus Films ( a company with a profitable specialization in 'problem' films for minority audiences) .sx Romulus employed three competent professionals , Jack Clayton to direct , Neil Paterson to write the screenplay , and Mario Nascimbene to produce the musical score , and one very distinguished one , cameraman Freddie Francis .sx As was the custom , the film was planned throughout in consultation with the British Board of Film Censors .sx What becomes utterly clear from the censorship correspondence is that , influenced by wider trends in British society , the censorship was itself changing its views as to what was now acceptable to British audiences .sx Where it did put up a fight ( usually over words like 'bitch' and 'lust' ) , it nearly always gave way in the end .sx By concentrating , altering and frequently developing material in the novel , the film presents two major preoccupations ( or 'meanings') :sx class power , class rigidities and the possibility of social mobility ; and sex , frankly presented and still more frankly discussed .sx As visual medium , the film gives very strong representations of the physical differences in social environments .sx While Joe Lampton in the novel was fastidious and self-questioning , Joe Lampton in the film is straightforwardly predatory , a figure much more likely to impact strongly on mass audiences .sx