Europe and the Wider World (What is Europe?)

✍ Scribed by Bernard Waites (editor)

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 1995
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 225
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book examines the concept of Europe in its relations to those areas of the globe beyond its borders. In particular it is concerned with the historical evolution and contemporary setting of Europe vis-a-vis The United States of America, the developing world and the former Soviet Union. This involves drawing on the perspectives of international history, politics and economics.
A unifying feature of the analysis included here is provided by the fact that the "bi-polar world" that emerged in the aftermath of the Second World War has effectively been brought to an end with the collapse first of Soviet control in Eastern Europe, and then by the break-up of the Soviet Union itself and a prospective reduction of American influence in western Europe. What will Europe look like in an increasingly "multi-polar world"? An answer to this depends not only on the evolving external connections between Europe and other parts of the world but also on the internal development of European political and economic integration. The dynamic of this crucial dual relationship is examined here.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
EUROPE AND THE WIDER WORLD
Copyright
Contents
General preface to ‘What is Europe?’
Introduction to Book 4
Essay 1 Europe and the Third World
Introduction
The European encompassment of the world after 1450
The origins of the ‘modern world system’?
Europe and Asia in the first imperial age
The opening of China
Industrial capitalism and the ‘imperialism of free trade’
Europe and Africa
Who profited from modern colonialism?
The economic and social legacy of colonialism in the Third World
The political legacy of colonialism in the Third World
Decolonization
Asian decolonization
African decolonization
Western aid to the Third World
Conclusions
References and further reading
Essay 2 Europe and Russia
Introduction
Russia and Europe
The origins of the Russian state
Ambiguities of Russian modernization
The Soviet response
Russia in Europe
The origins of post-war eastern Europe
Europe’s shifting frontier
The establishment of Soviet Europe
Soviet-European relations after 1945
Europe in the age of superpower rivalry
Developments after Stalin
Détente and the resurgence of Europe
Russia in the ‘common European house’
Gorbachev and the ‘new thinking’
The return to Europe
Russia and the new Europe
References
Essay 3 The United States and Europe, 1945 to 1991
Introduction
The inter-war background
The Cold War declared: 1945–1953
The early stages
The Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan and NATO
European responses
Cultural and economic developments
Summary
America dominant: 1953–1973
International developments
Alternative visions: Kennedy, de Gaulle and Monnet
Economic and cultural developments
A changing balance: 1973–1989
International developments
Economic and cultural developments
Conclusion
After the Cold War: the future of the Atlantic Partnership?
References
Essay 4 Europe in the global economy
Introduction
What is the European economic space?
The institutional matrix of economicEurope
Patterns of European economic interactions
The intemational economic order and Europe’s place within it
The evolving European economic order
Europe and the management of the global economy
A partial break-up of the ERM? The events of September 1992
The three blocs considered
Conclusions
Appendix 1: Glossary of abbreviations
Appendix 2: World economic groupings References
References
Postscript, April 1994
Acknowledgements
Notes on contributors
Index to Book 4