Dark Continent: Europe's Twentieth Century (80 page)

Until very recently historians have mostly left the subject of postwar western Europe to social scientists. It is still hard to see this as a period of history rather than as a series of contemporary social, political
and economic issues. The readings cited below necessarily reflect this problem. General treatments include W. Laqueur,
Europe in Our Time, 1945–1992
(New York, 1992), and M. Crouzet’s still excellent
The European Renaissance since 1945
(1970). P. Ginsborg,
A History of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics, 1943–1988
(1990), is a model country study. It is difficult to think of anything quite as comprehensive for another west European country, though Stanley Hoffmann’s writings on France and Ralf Dahrendorf’s on West Germany are indispensable. G. Therborn,
European Modernity and Beyond: The Trajectory of European Societies, 1945–2000
(1995), is a sweeping survey and interpretation of social trends. P. Flora,
State, Economy and Society in Western Europe, 1815–1975
, 2 vols. (Frankfurt, 1983–7), is also valuable.

Historians
have
started to write on post-war reconstruction and the USA’s contribution to it: see D. Ellwood,
Rebuilding Europe: Western Europe, America and Postwar Reconstruction
(1992), a vigorous survey which spans the debate between A. Milward,
The Reconstruction of Western Europe, 1945–1951
(1984), and M. J. Hogan,
The Marshall Plan: America, Britain and the Reconstruction of Western Europe, 1947–1952
(Cambridge, 1987). C. Maier, “The two postwar eras and conditions for stability in twentieth century western Europe,”
American Historical Review
, 86: 2 (April 1981), makes an important comparison. R. Kuisel,
Seducing the French: the Dilemma of Americanization
(Berkeley, Calif., 1993) and I. Wall,
The United States and the Making of Post-war France, 1945–1954
(Cambridge, 1991), cover the USA’s impact on the country which tried hardest to resist it. R. Wagnleiter,
Cocacolonisation and the Cold War: The Cultural Mission of the United States in Austria
(1994), is a rollicking account of the country which arguably resisted it least. For Italy, we have J. Harper,
America and the Reconstruction of Italy, 1945–1948
(Cambridge, 1986); on Greece, there is L. Wittner,
American Intervention in Greece, 1943–1949
(New York, 1982), and H. Jones,
“A New Kind of War”: America’s Global Strategy and the Truman Doctrine in Greece
(New York, 1989). T. Barnes, “ ‘The secret Cold War’: the CIA and American foreign policy in Europe,”
Historical Journal
, 24/25 (1981/2), covers a different kind of influence. Essays in M. Mazower (ed.),
The Policing of Politics in the Twentieth Century
(1997), suggest that Europeans did not need the CIA to teach
them about anti-communism. P. Hennessy and G. Brownfield, “Britain’s Cold War security purge: the origins of positive vetting,”
Historical Journal
, 25 (1982), pp. 965–73, makes fascinating reading.

On the boom, the classic account is M. Postan,
An Economic History of Western Europe, 1945–1964
(1967). To this should be added P. Armstrong, A. Glyn and J. Harrison,
Capitalism since World War II
(1984), A. Boltho (ed.),
The European Economy: Growth and Crisis
(Oxford, 1982), A. Maddison,
Phases of Capitalist Development
(Oxford, 1982), and A. Shonfield,
Modern Capitalism
(Oxford, 1965). The winter 1964 issue of
Daedalus
(“A New Europe?”), contains brilliant analyses of the post-war socio-economic changes in western Europe. A. Sampson,
Anatomy of Europe
(1968), is a misnamed but highly readable view of the same region. J.-E. Lane,
Politics and Society in Western Europe
(1994 edn) has a lot of useful information conveyed very accessibly. The origins of European union are covered by E. Haas,
The Uniting of Europe
(Stanford, Calif., 1958), and more historically—and controversially—by A. Milward
et al., The European Rescue of the Nation State
(1992).

For consumerism, no historical study beats the novel by G. Perec (tr. by D. Bellos),
Things: A Story of the Sixties
(1991), though V. Bogdanor and R. Skidelsky (eds.),
The Age of Affluence, 1951–1964
(1970), has some very readable essays. A. Pizzorno, “The individualistic mobilization of Europe,” in
Daedalus
, 93: 1 (winter 1964) is a remarkable analysis. S. Gundle, “L’americanizzazione del quotidiano: televisione e consumismo nell’Italia degli anni cinquanta,”
Quaderni storici
, 62 (August 1986), pp. 561–94 opens up the Italian case. S. Weiner, “The
consommatrice
in Elsa Triolet’s
Roses à crédit,” French Cultural Studies
, 6 (1995), pp. 123–44, does something similar for France. F. Mort and P. Thompson, “Retailing, commercial culture and masculinity in 1950s Britain,”
History Workshop Journal
, 38 (1994), is good fun. Post-war advertising has still not found its historian. T. R. Nevitt,
Advertising in Britain: A History
(1982), is a good basic guide. Historians have also left the rise of tourism to anthropologists and social theorists, though P. Mandler,
The Fall and Rise of the Stately Home
(1997), shows what can be done.

T. Marshall,
Class, Citizenship and Social Development
(Chicago, 1963), and R. Titmuss,
Essays on the “Welfare” State
(1963 edn) show
the thinking of two major British social theorists. A French view is F. Ewald,
L’État de providence
(Paris, 1986). The best treatment of the German social market is A. J. Nicholls,
Freedom with Responsibility: The Social Market Economy in Germany, 1918–1963
(Oxford, 1994). More comparative treatments are to be found in P. Flora and A. Heidenheimer (eds.),
The Development of Welfare States in Europe and America
(1987), G. Esping-Andersen,
The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism
(Cambridge, 1990), P. Baldwin,
The Politics of Social Solidarity
(Cambridge, 1990), A. de Swaan,
In Care of the State: Health Care, Education and Welfare in Europe in the Modern Era
(Oxford, 1988), A. Cochrane and J. Clarke (eds.),
Comparing Welfare States: Britain in International Context
(1993), and P. Thane,
The Foundations of the Welfare State
(1982). J. Harris, “Enterprise and welfare states: a comparative perspective,”
Transactions of the Royal Historical Society
(1990), pp. 175–95, scrutinizes the Thatcherite critique of welfare spending. On politics, the Left is covered in S. Padgett and W. Patterson,
A History of Social Democracy in Postwar Europe
(1991); there is nothing comparable for the Right. C. Lemke and G. Marks (eds.),
The Crisis of Socialism in Europe
(Durham, NC, 1992), is very useful: we must await a similar account of the crisis of contemporary conservatism. Christian Democracy is well treated in several excellent works, M. P. Fogarty,
Christian Democracy in Western Europe, 1820–1953
(1957), D. L. Hanley (ed.),
Christian Democracy in Europe
(1996), and the excellent K. van Kersbergen,
Social Capitalism: A Study of Christian Democracy and the Welfare State
(1995). There is a good essay by M. Mitchell, “Materialism and secularism: CDU politicians and National Socialism, 1945–1949,”
Journal of Modern History
, 67 (June 1995), pp. 278–308, and the whole question of post-war political Catholicism is put in historical perspective in T. Buchanan and M. Conway (eds.),
Political Catholicism in Europe, 1918–1965
(Oxford, 1996). The extreme Right is the subject of L. Cheles
et al
. (eds.),
Neo-Fascism in Europe
(1991).

Demographic trends are surveyed in D. V. Glass, “Population trends in Europe since the Second World War,”
Population Studies
, 22: 1 (March 1968), pp. 103–47, M. Kirk,
Demographic and Social Change in Europe, 1975–2000
(Liverpool, 1981), and D. Noin and R. Woods (eds.),
The Changing Population of Europe
(Oxford, 1993). C. Dyer,
Population and Society in 20th Century France
(1978), covers the post-war
period. On women, and official policies towards them, see D. Dahlerup (ed.),
The New Women’s Movement
(1986), C. Duchen,
Women’s Rights and Women’s Lives in France, 1944–1968
(1994). C. Haste,
Rules of Desire: Sex in Britain, World War 1 to the Present
(1992), is good on British sexual politics. On the rise of the teenager, see J. G. Gillis,
Youth and History
(New York, 1974), T. R. Fyvel,
The Insecure Offenders
(1961), and S. Piccone Stella, “ ‘Rebels without a cause’: Male youth in Italy around 1960,”
History Workshop Journal
, 38 (1994), pp. 157–74. On the revolting student, G. Statera,
Death of a Utopia: The Development and Decline of Student Movements in Europe
(New York, 1975), is admirably clear-sighted. There are also fine essays in
Daedalus
in the 1968–9 issues. On crime, we have N. Christie’s polemic,
Crime Control as Industry
(1993), and on penal policy, V. Ruggiero, M. Ryan and J. Sim (eds.),
West European Penal Systems
(1995). Still, there is little comparative research in this area, and virtually none with any kind of historical perspective.

Immigration is discussed in R. King (ed.),
Mass Migrations in Europe
(1993), and J. Salt and H. Clout (eds.),
Migration in Postwar Europe: Geographical Essays
(Oxford, 1976). S. Collinson,
Beyond Borders: West European Migration Policy and the 21st Century
(1993), is clear. Rogers Brubaker,
Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany
(Cambridge, Mass., 1992), is an important treatment of forms of citizenship. Racial attitudes and their influence on policy are dealt with by P. Rich,
Race and Empire in British Politics
(Cambridge, 1990), Z. Layton-Henry,
The Politics of Immigration
(1992), G. Freeman,
Immigrant Labor and Racial Conflict: The French and British Experiences, 1945–1975
(1979), and T. Hammar (ed.),
European Immigration Policy
(1985). M. Wievorka (ed.),
Racisme et xénophobie en Europe
(1994), is a good survey.

Inflation as a political phenomenon is analysed by C. Maier, “The politics of inflation in the 20th century,” in his
In Search of Stability
(Cambridge, 1987). N. Kaldor,
The Scourge of Monetarism
(Oxford, 1985) is a vigorous polemic against the kind of neo-liberalism whose revival is wittily recounted in R. Cockett,
Thinking the Unthinkable: Think-Tanks and the Economic Counter-Revolution, 1931–1983
(1995). S. Graubard (ed.), “The European predicament,”
Daedalus
(spring 1979) gives the gloomy flavour of the time. D. Dyker (ed.),
The European Economy
(1992) is comprehensive and clear. G. Baglioni and C. Crouch (eds.),
European Industrial Relations: The Challenge of Flexibility
(1990) covers the reality of “flexibilization.” On the rise of mass unemployment, changing attitudes to work and the crisis of the post-war consensus, see B. Showler and A. Sinfield (eds.),
The Workless State
(Oxford, 1981). The politics of the welfare state in the 1980s is dissected in P. Pierson,
Dismantling the Welfare State? Reagan, Thatcher and the Politics of Retrenchment
(Cambridge, 1994); see also N. Barr
et al., The State of Welfare: The Welfare State in Britain since 1974
(Oxford, 1991), and, for poverty, A. B. Atkinson,
Incomes and the Welfare State: Essays on Britain and Europe
(Cambridge, 1995). J. Vickers and V. Wright, “The politics of privatisation in Western Europe: an overview,”
West European Politics
, 11 (1988), pp. 1–30, is excellent, as too V. Wright, “Reshaping the state: implications for public administration,”
West European Politics
, 17 (1994), pp. 102–33. Some of the more thoughtful and historically nuanced accounts of “modernity” and its aftermath include D. Harvey,
The Condition of Postmodernity
(1989), A. Giddens,
Modernity and Self-Identity
(1991).

J. Rothschild,
Return to Diversity: A Political History of East Central Europe since World War Two
(1989 edn), is good on the final phase of Soviet rule. The rumblings of discontent with communism are best described by T. Garton Ash,
The Uses of Adversity
(Cambridge, 1989): brilliant political reportage. On Solidarity there is B. Kaminski,
The Collapse of State Socialism: the Case of Poland
(Princeton, NJ, 1991), R. Laba,
The Roots of Solidarity
(Princeton, NJ, 1991), a good collection of documents and testimonies in L. Labedz (ed.),
Poland under Jaruzelski
(New York, 1984) and T. Garton Ash,
The Polish Revolution
(1991). D. N. Nelson (ed.),
Communism and the Politics of Inequality
(Toronto, 1983) analyses communism’s social crisis. Gorbachev’s reforms are discussed by K. Dawisha,
Eastern Europe, Gorbachev and Reform
(Cambridge, 1990 edn) and by M. Gorbachev,
Perestroika
(1988). J. Valdez,
Internationalism and the Ideology of Soviet influence in Eastern Europe
(Cambridge, 1993), is a thoughtful study. S. Graubard (ed.),
Eastern Europe … Central Europe … Europe
(1991) is an incisive collection of essays on communism’s collapse. A. J. McAdams, “Crisis in the Soviet empire: three ambiguities in search of a prediction,”
Comparative Politics
, 20: 1 (October 1987), pp. 107–18 asks what kind
of crisis there really was. G. Hosking and J. Aves (eds.),
The Road to Post-Communism
(1992), looks at the rise of opposition inside the Soviet Union. The revolutions are analysed in I. Banac (ed.),
Eastern Europe in Revolution
(Ithaca, NY, 1992); a vivid eyewitness account is T. Garton Ash,
The Magic Lantern
(1990). G. Lundestad (ed.),
The Fall of Great Powers: Peace, Stability and Legitimacy
(Oxford, 1994), sets the Soviet withdrawal in historical context. On eastern Europe after communism, I found A. E. Dick Howard (ed.),
Constitution Making in Eastern Europe
(Washington, 1993), full of echoes of the past.
Dissent
(summer 1996) has some good articles on minorities. T. Rosenberg,
The Haunted Land
(1993), is one of the most evocative of many accounts of the region’s efforts to settle past scores. A. Applebaum,
Between East and West: Across the Borderlands of Europe
(1995) is a highly readable travelogue informed by a fine historical sensibility.