Lecture 9 – Europe United 1968

Question 1

Why 1968?

Answer 1

A truly global event
1968 around the world = major student destruction between 1968-69
Leaving WW2 behind
Vichy syndromes, problem of historical memory, psychology trauma of war is repressed – only remembers the good aspects of the war,
Broken mirrors – become adults and truly independence when we break the models parents make – need to break the window to achieve independence
Demographic bubble
1968 – trying to move beyond WW2 as defining existence
E.g. Prague Spring – graffiti
1968 as flashpoint and spotlight

Question 2

Origins: Crisis of civilisation

Answer 2

– somehow European values had come into disrepute
– system failures both in the East and West
– democratic deficits
– uneven modernisation
– undelivered promises

Question 3

Origins: Generation Conflict?

Answer 3

o Developing age group affinities, visible in shared styles, leisure, nuclear threat,
o Silence over WW2, heart of different over power a direction of society,
o Explosion in international youth culture,
o Education expansion,
o The student experience, living in an advancing environment
o Killing the father?

Question 4

Origins: Politics

Answer 4

o The New Left – organisation, action and pressure points
o “Third Worldism”
o Vietnam – first televised war, who to support? – America or Peasant?
o Students want a balance of new power, identifying with revolutionary figures

Question 5

Events: Global Context

Answer 5

o Tet Offensive (January 1968)
o Death of Martin Luther King (April 1968)
o “Czechago” (August 1968)

Question 6

Events: Educational Unrest

Answer 6

o E.g. West Berlin, Poland, Yugoslavia, Madrid
o Demand for new content
o Occupation to university premises (dormitories, classrooms)
o Challenges to teachers, professors
o Politics on campus
o Street protests and confrontations with Police
o Universities should be above politics, its autonomous

Question 7

Events: Regime Challenge –

Answer 7

o E.g. Prague, Paris, Italy
o Trans social movement – workers and students – outburst of sharing of ideas
o Workers follow students
o National conversations: pamphlets, manifestos, discussions
o Art and protest – street as a theatre, agit prop
o Occupying public spaces

Question 8

Impacts:

Answer 8

Fundamental challenge to the settlement and distribution of power

Question 9

Impacts: Society responds

Answer 9

o Liberalisation (West)
 Educational reform
 Social legislation
 Adult-youth relations – more equal relationship
 Censorship
o Repression (West and East)
 Policing the New Left – prohibition of education
 New left in particular ensures reinforcement of security measures

Question 10

Impacts: The Utopian Years (West)

Answer 10

o Politicising counter-culture
o Becoming workers (“establishment”)
o Terrorism: RAF, Baader-Meinhof, IRA
o New Social movements: feminism, ecology
o The long march through the institutions (Dutschke coined phrase)
o Liberalisation of culture and institutions

Question 11

Impacts: Internal Exile (East)

Answer 11

o The counter-society

o “Power of the Powerless” (Havel coined phrase)

Question 12

Conclusions:

Answer 12

Two “lefts”: 1945 and 1968 – is politics based on class or other forms of identity? 
 	No hope from the East - utopian movements elsewhere 
 	The “other sixties”: new conservatism – on the whole neo-liberal politics is probably the dominate story 
 	Why did 1968 not have a long-term impact? – in all political actions of 60s conservatism became apparent