Forging democracy : the history of the left in Europe, 1850-2000 / Geoff Eley.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 593-685) and index.

Print version record.

Machine generated contents note: I. Making Democracy Social -- 1. Defining the Left: Socialism, Democracy, and the People -- 2. Marxism and the Left: Laying the Foundations -- 3. Industrialization and the Making of the Working Class -- 4. Rise of Labor Movements: History's Forward March -- 5. Challenges beyond Socialism: Other Fronts of Democracy -- 6. Permanence of Capitalism? -- II. War and Revolution, 1914-1923 -- 7. Rupture of War: Crisis and Reconstruction of the Left, 1914-1917 -- 8. Russian Revolution -- 9. Breaking the Mold of Socialism: Left-Wing Communism, 1917-1923 -- 10. Germany and Italy: Two Cases -- 11. Remolding Militancy: The Foundation of Communist Parties -- 12. Politics of Gender: Women and the Left -- 13. Living the Future: The Left in Culture -- 14. Broadening the Boundaries of Democracy -- III. Stabilization and the "War of Position" -- 15. Capitalist Stabilities: Future Deferred -- 16. Stalinism and Western Marxism: Socialism in One Country -- 17. Fascism and Popular Front: The Politics of Retreat, 1930-1938 -- 18. People's War and People's Peace: Remarking the Nation, 1939-1947 -- 19. Closure: Stalinism, Welfare Capitalism, and Cold War, 1945-1956 -- 20. 1956 -- IV. Future Imperfect -- 21. 1968: It Moves After All -- 22. Feminism: Regendering the Left -- 23. Class and the Politics of Labor -- 24. New Politics, New Times: Remaking Socialism and Democracy -- 25. Gorbachev, the End of Communism, and the 1989 Revolutions -- 26. New Social Movements: Politics Out of Doors -- 27. Center and the Margins: Decline or Renewal?

Democracy in Europe has been a recent phenomenon. Only in the wake of World War II were democratic frameworks secured, and, even then, it was decades before democracy truly blanketed the continent. Neither given nor granted, democracy requires conflict, often violent confrontations, and challenges to the established political order. In Europe, Geoff Eley convincingly shows, democracy did not evolve organically out of a natural consensus, the achievement of prosperity, or the negative cement ofthe Cold War. Rather, it was painstakingly crafted, continually expanded, and doggedly defended by varying constellations of socialist, feminist, Communist, and other radical movements that originally blossomed in the later nineteenth century. Parties of the Left championed democracy in therevolutionary crisis after World War I, salvaged it against the threat of fascism, and renewed its growth after 1945. They organized civil societies rooted in egalitarian ideals which came to form the very fiber of Europe's current democratic traditions. The trajectories of European democracy andthe history of the European Left are thus inextricably bound together. Geoff Eley has given us the first truly comprehensive history of the European Left--its successes and failures; its high watermarks and its low tides; its accomplishments, insufficiencies, and excesses; and, most importantly, its formative, lasting influence on the European political landscape. At atime when the Left's influence and legitimacy are frequently called into question, Forging Democracy passionately upholds its vital contribution.

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