 In the second half of the 1970s , the United Kingdom was in a state of social unrest and widespread poverty as a result of the ineffective social politics of both Conservative and Labour Party governments during a three @-@ year period of economic recession . As a consequence of deindustrialisation , the unemployment rate was exceptionally high , especially among working class youth . It continued to rise in the early 1980s , peaking in February 1983 . The discontent of so many people caused social unrest with frequent strikes , and culminated in a series of riots ( see 1981 Brixton riot , 1981 Toxteth riots ) . During this period , the mass of young people , deprived of the prospect of even relatively low @-@ skill jobs that were available to the previous generations , searched for different ways to earn money in the music and entertainment businesses . The explosion of new bands and new musical styles coming from the UK in the late 1970s was a result of their efforts to make a living in the economic depression that hit the country before the governments of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher . 
