In 1918 the victorious powers punished Germany and attempted to reshape the European State system in accordance with ideas of nationality. Those actions sowed the seeds for World War 2. Economic chaos created the conditions for the emergence of new ideologies promising a new vision for the nations of Europe. The pursuit of these new visions by fascist regimes plunged Europe into a new war, terrifying in its brutality. After 1945 the continent of Europe was at the centre of the global division of the Cold War, the most dangerous division in history and one that threatened universal annihilation. Yet the European States succeeded in finding a basis for a new era of integration that has led to the longest period of peace the continent has enjoyed in its history. The political, social, economic and cultural causes and consequences of 'The Breaking of Nations' explored and explained in this module.

• Reshaping Europe in 1918. • The development of fascist ideologies. • The experience of Total War. • The legacy of war and the necessity of forgetting. • The origins of the Cold War. • Decolonisation and the end of Empire. • The European Economic Community. • Men, Women, Youth: The 1960s and cultural revolution. • The crisis decades: 1970s-1980s. • The end of socialist Eastern Europe, 1989-90. • German integration and European union. • The New Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals? • Globalisation and Being “European” Today.