A biography of this controversial figure of the Labour movement and the first since his retirement as Prime Minister in 1976. For some Harold Wilson is a failed socialist hero, for others an unmitigated disaster. Drawing on years of research including extensive interviews with Wilson's contemporaries, this independent political biography constructs a fair, but not uncritical, picture of Wilson's private and public faces. Austen Morgan traces Wilson's life from his childhood, through Oxford, his civil service career and election as a Labour MP in 1945, to his surprise resignation as Prime Minister in 1976 and his fading from the public eye. Through a critical examination of the priorities of economic management, foreign policy in the Cold War and technological revolution, Morgan raises pertinent questions about why Labour's last period in government ended in failure. He argues that Harold Wilson's reputation will be affected, not only by how history judges his periods in office but also by how the Labour Party performs in the 1990s.