Britain

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Britain, Expo 67

The British Pavilion has as its theme “The Challenge of Change”. It shows how the British people are meeting this challenge in the modern world, as they have done many times in the past. The story is told in five chapters – SHAPING THE NATION, the opening section, tells how an island people were moulded by successive invasions, by the coming of Christianity and the influence of the Church, by the authority of kings and the disputes between throne and people, into a society based on law and order. It shows how Britain then became a great outward-looking democracy whose influence spread throughout the world. Some living links with 3,000 years of Britain’s history, preserved in the present, are illustrated on the next page.

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The world’s first supersonic airliner, the Concord, is a joint Anglo-French enterprise. This photograph shows the shock waves round a Concord model under test in a wind tunnel at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Bedford, centre of British aerodynamic research. The Concord is designed to cruise at about 1,450 miles per hour.

Britain in the world

As a trading nation, Britain is one of the world’s main sources of manufactured goods and its largest market for food and agricultural products. A third of world trade is financed in sterling.

Britain is also active in world affairs, both through the United Nations and through the close ties of the Commonwealth, whose membership consists of 26 independent nations, occupying a quarter of the world’s area, and linked through consultation and cooperation, through trade and many common institutions and interests.

British ideals of freedom and justice, the British parliamentary system and British culture and sports have made their impact throughout the world. A major export is the English language, spoken today by over 800 million people.

Sharing knowledge and experience is part of Britain’s ‘good neighbour’ policy. More than 15,000 British experts are serving in developing countries. Britain provides about £200 million annually in overseas aid and is assisting in over 300 food-producing projects in many parts of the world. By these and other efforts to resolve the problems facing the world, Britain is working for a better future for mankind.

The genius of Britain

Britain’s genius is the sum of the achievements of many outstanding men and women, both great names of the past and those whose work receives international recognition today. They include writers, musicians and artists; statesmen, philosophers and social reformers; discoverers of new lands and of the secrets of nature; pioneers in medicine, transport and technology. Those pictured below, whose achievements range over many different fields of endeavour, are representative of a much larger company of Britons whose contributions to human progress are recorded in the British Pavilion.