"France is our fatherland, Europe is our future," François Mitterrand used to say. He thus summed up the lesson to be drawn for him from the 20th century. After two world wars that brought Europeans to the brink of collective suicide, after the loss of European hegemony in the world, the citizens of the continent would have no other choice but to build a new, common fatherland.
The theme of this series is the European history of the 20th century, the subject of this volume is France. The first question is, therefore, what place does France occupy in European contemporary history? What is distinctive about France's development in the last century? What is the difference between France and its partners in the European Union? What is particularly French about this history and what is generally European? In short, what is France's place in the European history of the 20th century?
Starting from the third French Republic, which saw itself as an avant-garde in a Europe of monarchies, a country that stagnated demographically and expanded colonially, the book describes France's 20th century: the First World War with the subsequent "lost" peace and the turbulent inter-war period; the "strange war" of 1939/40 against Nazi Germany, followed by the occupation of the country and collaboration and resistance under the Vichy regime; the drama of decolonisation with wars in Vietnam and Algeria and the key year 1958, from which France's political constitution, which is still valid today, emerged, surviving even the upheavals of May 1968; the takeover of power by the Socialists under Mitterrand in 1981, who helped to shape the turn of events of 1989/90, and the path to the unsettled nation of the present day
Published at C.H.Beck Verlag, Munich 2019
https://www.chbeck.de/waechter-geschichte-frankreichs-20-jahrhundert/product/27160856
Reviews:
- On German radio SWR2 (in German)
- "Die lädierte Republik" von Clemens Klünemann, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 20.5.2019
- "Der Nachbar: Geschichte Frankreichs im 20. Jhd.", Hamburger Abendblatt, 25.6.2019
- "Die Provinz bleibt sich treu" von Albrecht Meier, Der Tagsspiegel, 26.6.2019
- "In der republikanischen Monarchie haben Revolten Tradition" von Günther Nonnenmacher, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 5.7.2019
A look into the book - Reading sample (in German)