Europe's Postwar Periods - 1989, 1945, 1918 Writing History Backwards

by Conway, Martin; Lagrou, Pieter; Rousso, Henry

• ISBN13: 9781474276504
• ISBN10: 1474276504
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2017-09-21
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic

Summary

This book brings together world-renowned scholars from the UK, Ireland, Germany, France and elsewhere across mainland Europe to provide a multi-authored history of 20th-century Europe from the present to the past. It analyses how successive Europes have been constructed in the wake of the key conflicts of the period: the Cold War and the two World Wars. By regressively tracing Europe's path back to these pivotal moments as part of a unique methodology, Europe's Postwar Periods - 1989, 1945, 1918 reveals the defining characteristics of these postwar periods more clearly and at the same time integrates the changes that followed 1989 into a more substantial historical perspective.

Martin Conway and the author team address the crucial themes in recent European history on a chapter-by-chapter basis that gives comprehensive coverage to the whole of the European region for topics like:

* Borders
* States
* Empires
* Democracy
* Justice
* Markets
* Futures

The volume highlights the fact that Europe was made less by wars than is commonly thought, and more by the nature of the settlements – international, national, political, economic and social – that followed the two World Wars and the Cold War. It is an important, innovative text for all students and scholars of 20th-century European history.

Author Biography

Martin Conway is Professor of Contemporary European History at the University of Oxford, UK. He is the author of The Sorrows of Belgium: Liberation and Political Reconstruction 1944-47 (2012), Catholic Politics in Europe 1918-1945 (1997) and Collaboration in Belgium (1993).

Pieter Lagrou teaches contemporary European history at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium. He is the author of The Legacy of Nazi Occupation: Patriotic Memory and National Recovery in Western Europe, 1945-1965 (1999).

Henry Rousseau is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique at the Institut D'histoire du Temps Présent, Paris, France and coordinates the European Network on Contemporary History (EURHISTXX).

Table of Contents

Preface – Henry Rousso (French National Centre for Scientific Research, France)
Introduction – Martin Conway (University of Oxford, UK)
1. Borders - Dariusz Stola (Polish Academy of Sciences and Warsaw University, Poland)
2. Demobilizations – John Horne (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland)
3. Empires - Malika Rahal (French National Centre for Scientific Research, France)
4. States – Pieter Lagrou (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium)
5. Democracy - Martin Conway (University of Oxford, UK)
6. Pasts – Peter Apor (Institute of History of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary) and Henry Rousso (French National Centre for Scientific Research, France)
7. Justice - Annette Weinke (Friedrich Schiller University, Germany) and Guillaume Mouralis (National Centre for Scientific Research, France)
8. Markets - Paolo Capuzzo (University of Bologna, Italy)
9. Futures - Peter Apor (Institute of History of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary)
Conclusion - Thomas Lindenberger (University of Potsdam, Germany)
Bibliography
Index