A Peoples History of Europe
Peoples History
History tends to be viewed from the perspective of the rich and powerful, where the actions of small numbers are seen to dictate the course of world affairs. But this perspective conceals the role of ordinary women and men, as individuals or as parts of collective organisations, in shaping the course of history. The Peoples History series puts ordinary people and mass movements centre stage and looks at the great moments of the past from the bottom up.
The Peoples History series was founded and edited by
William A. Pelz (19512017).
Also available:
A Peoples History of Tennis
David Berry
Long Road to Harpers Ferry
The Rise of the First American Left
Mark A. Lause
A Peoples History of the German Revolution
191819
William A. Pelz
Foreword by Mario Kessler
A Peoples History of the Portuguese Revolution
Raquel Varela
A Peoples History of Europe
From World War I to Today
Raquel Varela
Foreword by Kevin Murphy
Translated by Antnio Simes do Pao
First published by Bertrand Editora as Breve Histria da Europa Da Grande Guerra aos Nossos Dias
English language edition first published 2021 by Pluto Press
345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA
www.plutobooks.com
Copyright Bertrand Editora and Raquel Varela 2021
Translated by Antnio Simes do Pao
The right of Raquel Varela to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7453 4134 7 Hardback
ISBN 978 0 7453 4135 4 Paperback
ISBN 978 1 7868 0653 6 PDF eBook
ISBN 978 1 7868 0655 0 Kindle eBook
ISBN 978 1 7868 0654 3 EPUB eBook
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental standards of the country of origin.
Typeset by Stanford DTP Services, Northampton, England
Simultaneously printed in the United Kingdom and United States of America
Contents
Foreword
Kevin Murphy
The volume in your hands is in the very best radical tradition of history. It is a modern social history of Europe from below, written not only about, but also for those people often neglected from standard academic texts. Raquel Varelas avowed intellectual debt to the outstanding social historians, Edward Palmer Thompson and Howard Zinn, is hardly accidental. The author is an unabashed advocate of writing history against the grain, from the perspective of the oppressed and combative classes.
Having written the seminal study of the Portuguese Revolution and as activist in many contemporary social movements, Varela is eminently qualified to survey recent history from the vantage point of those who have dedicated their lives to transforming the world in which we live. Her fabulous Peoples History of the Portuguese Revolution details one of the most important and often neglected rebellions of the latter half of the twentieth century the Carnation Revolution a coalition of working-class and social movements, which also incited struggles for independence in Portugals African colonies, the rebellion of the young military captains in the national armed forces and the uprising of Portugals long-oppressed proletarian masses. It was through the organising power of these diverse movements that a popular-front government was instituted and Portugal withdrew from its overseas colonies. Cutting against the grain of mainstream accounts, Raquel Cardeira Varela explores the role of trade unions, women, and even artists in the rebellion, providing a rich account of the challenges faced and the victories gained through revolutionary means.
Varela has an impressive list of publications, leadership positions in labour and social history projects and awards as author and editor of some 32 volumes on labour history, social movements, the welfare state, and European and global history. Among her many awards is the prestigious Santander Prize for Internationalization of Scientific Production in 2013 and Public Intellectual of the Year Prize (Mais Alentejo) in 2014. Varela has also led many social history and labour projects, including the European Social Science History Conference and the Network for Global Labor Studies.
Varelas vast experience and expertise places her in a unique position to write this historical text. The study illuminates the main events and processes in Europe between 1914 and 2018, with a vivid analysis on the structure and dynamics of the twentieth century. Understandably, the two world wars and those who resisted imperialism receive special attention. Starting with the rising militarism and first Great War and the subsequent rebellions that it fostered in The War of Wars, The Revolution of Revolutions, 1917, Varela devotes particular attention to the Russian Revolution and its eventual defeat, admirably placing the revolution in its European wide context. The historic defeat of the world revolution on the European continent, particularly in Germany, Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, helps to explain the context for the rise of Stalinism.
The essay then turns to the tumultuous 1930s in The Crisis of 1929, the Revolutions of the 1930s and Nazism. Varela deftly explains the causes of world economic crisis of 1929, the ensuing depression, and the rise of the fascist solution, particularly the Nazi movement in Germany. The most important popular challenge to fascism during the Spanish Revolution merits special attention. In Midnight in the Century, Varela shows that this was indeed a global confrontation and insists that ordinary people not only defeated the fascists but also pointed to an alternative when the popular resistance emerged near the end of the war.
In The 1945 European Social Pact, Varela posits a provocative argument about the post-war European social contract. This was not some construction benevolently handed down from above by the European powers, but was forged because workers were armed in 194547 and the ruling class feared revolution. The author also discusses the new Cold War, including the Warsaw Pact, the erection of the Berlin Wall and the missile crisis.
The focus then shifts to the Anti-Colonial Revolutions and how these rebellions not only challenged and often defeated imperialist powers in Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East. In Crisis and Revolution: From May 68 to the Carnation Revolution, Varela illustrates the connections between the anti-colonial revolutions and the spectacular May 1968 revolts and how the spirit of rebellion even crossed over to the Soviet bloc during the Prague Spring. Varela provocatively traces the impact of the Carnation Revolution as it spread to the Red Mediterranean in Spain and Greece, and then helped set the parameters for all of Western Europe. These movements helped delay the imposition of neoliberal policies during the 1980s. Once again, workers are the transformative agents in each of the European revolts. Finally, in The End of the Social Pact, Varela traces the dismantling of the social contract and the implementation of neoliberal policies. Trade unions largely accepted the labour restructuring process in the core centres of industrial production in Europe and the dismantling of welfare states.
