Empire Of Democracy: The Remaking Of The West Since The Cold War, 1971–2017

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Synopsis

The first panoramic history of the Western world from the 1970s to the present day—from the Cold War to the 2008 financial crisis and wars in the Middle East—Empire of Democracy is “a superbly informed and riveting historical analysis of our contemporary era” (Charles S. Maier, Harvard University).

Half a century ago, at the height of the Cold War and amidst a world economic crisis, the Western democracies were forced to undergo a profound transformation. Against what some saw as a full-scale “crisis of democracy”—with race riots, anti-Vietnam marches and a wave of worker discontent sowing crisis from one nation to the next—a new political-economic order was devised and the postwar social contract was torn up and written anew.

In this epic narrative of the events that have shaped our own times, Simon Reid-Henry shows how liberal democracy, and western history with it, was profoundly reimagined when the postwar Golden Age ended. As the institutions of liberal rule were reinvented, a new generation of politicians emerged: Thatcher, Reagan, Mitterrand, Kohl. The late twentieth century heyday they oversaw carried the Western democracies triumphantly to victory in the Cold War and into the economic boom of the 1990s. But equally it led them into the fiasco of Iraq, to the high drama of the financial crisis in 2007/8, and ultimately to the anti-liberal surge of our own times.

The present crisis of liberalism is leading us toward as yet unscripted decades. The era we have all been living through is closing out, and democracy is turning on its axis once again. “Brilliantly, Reid-Henry calls for the salvation of democracy from the choices of its own leaders if it is to survive” (Samuel Moyn, Yale University).

Chapters

  • 001 EmpireOfDemocracy Open Introduction

    Duration: 31min
  • 002 EmpireOfDemocracy Prologue TwoHelicopters

    Duration: 31min
  • 003 EmpireOfDemocracy PartI DemocracyUnbound Ch1 TheUnravelling

    Duration: 01h27min
  • 004 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch2 TheCrisisOfCapitalism a

    Duration: 01h11min
  • 005 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch2 TheCrisisOfCapitalism b

    Duration: 01h08min
  • 006 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch3 TheReckoning a

    Duration: 01h19min
  • 007 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch3 TheReckoning b

    Duration: 01h08min
  • 008 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch4 ASplitInTheWorld

    Duration: 01h26min
  • 009 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch5 LetFuryHaveTheHour a

    Duration: 01h05min
  • 010 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch5 LetFuryHaveTheHour b

    Duration: 01h03min
  • 011 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch6 TheVictoryRemakingEurope

    Duration: 01h29min
  • 012 EmpireOfDemocracy PartII NovusOrdoSeclorum Ch7 AmericaAndAWorldTransformed a

    Duration: 01h02min
  • 013 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch7 AmericaAndAWorldTransformed b

    Duration: 44min
  • 014 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch8 TheGreatConvergence a

    Duration: 01h10min
  • 015 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch8 TheGreatConvergence b

    Duration: 49min
  • 016 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch9 ADemocraticPeace

    Duration: 01h12min
  • 017 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch10 TheNewProsperity a

    Duration: 56min
  • 018 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch10 TheNewProsperity b

    Duration: 51min
  • 019 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch11 FarewellToAllThat a

    Duration: 01h14min
  • 020 EmpireOfDemocracy Ch11 FarewellToAllThat b

    Duration: 58min
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