Conflicted Memories: Europeanizing Contemporary Histories(3 Studies in Contemporary European History)

Despite the growing interest in general European history, the European dimension is surprisingly absent from the writing of contemporary history. In most countries, the historiography on the 20th century continues to be dominated by national perspectives. Although there is cross-national work on specific topics such as occupation or resistance, transnational conceptions and narratives of contemporary European history have yet to be worked out. This volume focuses on the development of a shared conception of recent European history that will be required as an underpinning for further economic and political integration so as to make lasting cooperation on the old continent possible. It tries to overcome the traditional national framing that ironically persists just at a time when organized efforts to transform Europe from an object of debate to an actual subject have some chance of succeeding in making it into a polity in its own right.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments List of Acronymns Introduction: Contours of a Critical History of Contemporary Europe: A Transnational Agenda Konrad H. Jarausch and Thomas Lindenberger Part I: Contested Memories Chapter 1. History of Memory, Policies of the Past: What For? Henry Rousso Chapter 2. Communist Legacies in the ‘New Europe’: History, Ethnicity, and the Creation of a ‘Socialist’ Nation in Romania, 1945–1989 Dragos¸ Petrescu Chapter 3. Writing National Histories in Europe: Refl ections on the Pasts, Presents and Futures of a Tradition Stefan Berger Chapter 4. Between Europe and the Nation: The Inward Turn of Contemporary Historical Writing Pieter Lagrou Part II: Multiple Conflicts Chapter 5. War and Conflict in Contemporary European History, 1914–2004 John Horne Chapter 6. In Search of a Second Historicization: National Socialism in a Transnational Perspective Kiran Klaus Patel Chapter 7. The Origins of the Cold War in Eurasia: A Borderland Perspective Alfred J. Rieber Part III: Transnational Interactions Chapter 8. Europe as Leisure Time Communication: Tourism and Transnational Interaction since 1945 Thomas Mergel Chapter 9. Integration from Below? Migration and European Contemporary History Karen Schönwälder Chapter 10. Twentieth-Century Culture, ‘Americanization,’ and European Audiovisual Space Marsha Siefert Chapter 11. Economics of West European Integration? Proving the Benefi ts 1952–1973 André Steiner Part IV: Unfinished Political Processes Chapter 12. A European Civil Society? Hartmut Kaelble Chapter 13. International Socialist Attempts at Bridge-Building in the Early Postwar Period Örjan Appelqvist Chapter 14. Nation Building in the Era of Integration: The Case of Moldova Igor Casu Postscript: The Subject(s) of Europe Michael Geyer Selected Bibliography List of Contributors

About the Author :
Konrad H. Jarausch is director of the Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam and Lurcy Professor of European Civilization at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. His research interest is currently focused on the German unification in 1989/90, the nature of the East German dictatorship and the problem of interpreting 20th-century German history in general. His publications include The Shattered Past: Reconstructing German Histories with Michael Geyer (Princeton 2002) and Die Umkehr: Deutsche Wandlungen 1945-1995 (München 2004).