The relationship between the US and Europe in the 20th century is one of the key considerations in any understanding of international relations/international history during this period. David Ryan first sets the context by looking at the trends and traditions of America’s foreign relations in the 19th century, and then considers the changing nature of America's vision of Europe from 1900 to the present. The book examines America’s response to and involvement in the two World Wars, including the structure of international power after the First World War and American reaction to the rise of Nazi Germany. American/European relations during the Cold War (1945-1970) are discussed, and Ryan considers the contentious debate that America was trying to establish an empire by invitation. Finally, the book looks at the ever-increasing unification of Europe and how this has affected America's role and influence.

An unflinching and intelligent alternative history of the twentieth century that provides a provocative vision of Europe's past, present, and future. "[A] splendid book." —The New York Times Book Review Dark Continent provides an alternative history of the twentieth century, one in which the triumph of democracy was anything but a forgone conclusion and fascism and communism provided rival political solutions that battled and sometimes triumphed in an effort to determine the course the continent would take. Mark Mazower strips away myths that have comforted us since World War II, revealing Europe as an entity constantly engaged in a bloody project of self-invention. Here is a history not of inevitable victories and forward marches, but of narrow squeaks and unexpected twists, where townships boast a bronze of Mussolini on horseback one moment, only to melt it down and recast it as a pair of noble partisans the next.

The most significant conquest of the twentieth century may well have been the triumph of American consumer society over Europe's bourgeois civilization. It is this little-understood but world-shaking campaign that unfolds in de Grazia's account of how the American standard of living defeated the European way of life and achieved the global cultural hegemony that is both its great strength and its key weakness today. Tracing the peculiar alliance that arrayed New World salesmanship, statecraft, and standardized goods against the Old World's values of status, craft, and good taste, de Grazia describes how all alternative strategies fell before America's consumer-oriented capitalism--first the bourgeois lifestyle, then the Third Reich's command consumption, and finally the grand experiment of Soviet-style socialist planning.--From publisher description.

Twentieth-Century Europe: A Brief History presents readers with a concise and accessible survey of the most significant themes and political events that shaped European history in the 20th and 21st centuries. Features updates that include a new chapter that reviews major political and economic trends since 1989 and an extensively revised chapter that emphasizes the intellectual and cultural history of Europe since World War II Organized into brief chapters that are suitable for traditional courses or for classes in non-traditional courses that allow for additional material selected by the professor Includes the addition of a variety of supplemental materials such as chronological timelines, maps, and illustrations

The first comprehensive history of the Vatican’s agenda to defeat the forces of secular liberalism and communism through international law, cultural diplomacy, and a marriage of convenience with authoritarian and right-wing rulers. After the United States entered World War I and the Russian Revolution exploded, the Vatican felt threatened by forces eager to reorganize the European international order and cast the Church out of the public sphere. In response, the papacy partnered with fascist and right-wing states as part of a broader crusade that made use of international law and cultural diplomacy to protect European countries from both liberal and socialist taint. A Twentieth-Century Crusade reveals that papal officials opposed Woodrow Wilson’s international liberal agenda by pressing governments to sign concordats assuring state protection of the Church in exchange for support from the masses of Catholic citizens. These agreements were implemented in Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, as well as in countries like Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. In tandem, the papacy forged a Catholic International—a political and diplomatic foil to the Communist International—which spread a militant anticommunist message through grassroots organizations and new media outlets. It also suppressed Catholic antifascist tendencies, even within the Holy See itself. Following World War II, the Church attempted to mute its role in strengthening fascist states, as it worked to advance its agenda in partnership with Christian Democratic parties and a generation of Cold War warriors. The papal mission came under fire after Vatican II, as Church-state ties weakened and antiliberalism and anticommunism lost their appeal. But—as Giuliana Chamedes shows in her groundbreaking exploration—by this point, the Vatican had already made a lasting mark on Eastern and Western European law, culture, and society.

This volume is the result of a conference held at Duquesne University in November 2000. The conference brought together sixty scholars, primarily historians but also specialists in other fields, as well as survivors of ethnic cleansing from seven different countries who presented forty-eight papers.