Europe since 1945

Catalog description

After 1945, Europe entered into an unprecedented era of political and economic stability. How do we account for this? Were political parties such as the Christian Democratic parties in Western Europe or the new European Union responsible? Or was it darker realities - the polarizing effects of the Cold War, repression in Eastern Europe, widespread ethnic cleansing in the immediate postwar years, decolonization, and whitewashing tainted pasts from the wartime years? The second half of the course examines challenges to the postwar European order - destalinization, student protests, economic stagnation, neo-conservatism, radical Islam, populism and renewed authoritarianism.