A survey of the main trends and forces in the history of Europe from 1914 to the present. The course stresses the interaction of political, economic, and socio-cultural changes and explores the relationship between domestic and international politics. Topics discussed include the two world wars, the rise and fall of fascism and communism, imperialism, European integration, the cultural revolution of the 1960s.

The twentieth century was the most devastating in the history of Europe. This course surveys the major developments that led to the wars and revolutions for which the century is famous. It stresses the supreme importance of the commanding actors on the political stage as the century unfolded--Lenin and Stalin, Mussolini and Hitler, Churchill and de Gaulle, Walesa and Thatcher and Gorbachev, and focuses on the differing approaches to European relations taken by American presidents from Wilson to Joe Biden. The course will seek to squeeze every ounce of drama out of the century's most famous -- and infamous -- events: Europe's last summer -- the incredible days of July 1914; the slaughter of World War I; the rise of Communism, Fascism, and Nazism; Munich; the Nazi-Soviet Pact of 1939; the decimation of World War II; the bombing of London and Dresden; the destruction of the European Jewry; the German invasion of Russia; D-Day, the suicide of Hitler, the origins and development of the Cold War; the fall of the Berlin Wall; the revolutions of 1989; the disintegration of the Soviet Union; the collapse of Yugoslavia; the first and second Gulf wars; and the current crises in central Europe, especially that between Russia and Ukraine. All this and more we will explore through books, documents and, not least, films and documentaries. Instructor bio: David Wetzel has been a lecturer in the Berkeley Department of History since 2003. In 2012 he was one of seven Berkeley faculty members listed among America's best professors in a book published by The Princeton Review. He specializes in the international relations of modern Europe, and is author, most recently, with William Carr of A History of Germany since 1800 (2022). He received his PhD from the University of Chicago. For more information, please see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wetzel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogD3g3TYUi0

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills