The Transatlantic Century

Abstract

This is a fascinating new overview of European-American relations during the long twentieth century. Ranging from economics, culture and consumption to war, politics and diplomacy, Mary Nolan charts the rise of American influence in Eastern and Western Europe, its mid-twentieth century triumph and its gradual erosion since the 1970s. She reconstructs the circuits of exchange along which ideas, commodities, economic models, cultural products and people moved across the Atlantic, capturing the differing versions of modernity that emerged on both sides of the Atlantic and examining how these alternately produced co-operation, conflict and ambivalence toward the other. Attributing the rise and demise of American influence in Europe not only to economics but equally to wars, the book locates the roots of many transatlantic disagreements in very different experiences and memories of war. This is an unprecedented account of the American Century in Europe that recovers its full richness and complexity.

State, Society and the Cultural Cold War: A View from the Periphery

“…Going a step forward recent scholar works have emphasized the primary role of transnational networks of individuals -in comparison to government policies -in promoting Cold War ideology and the anti-communist consensus in both sides of the Atlantic [4]. This perspective is in line with the shift in 20 th century historiography from the "American century" to the "transatlantic century" which also reconstructs the Cold War period as a relationship of interdependence and mutual exchanges between the New and the Old World [5].…”

Westerners, Western Power and Polish Society in the Mid-Twentieth Century: The Poznań International Trade Fair as a Complex Frontier

“…113 Consistently with the model that Mary Nolan aptly characterised as 'America came, Western Europe succumbed, and Eastern Europe envied', the US exhibitors appropriated those images, inaccurately depicting Polish visitors as uncritical recipients of US modernity. 114 Some Poles felt further humiliated by being co-opted into a show that involved US giveaways of frozen potato pancakes. One witness wrote to his family in the countryside: 'The Polish boys who worked there went on telling people "aren't you ashamed, don't you have potatoes in Poland, this stuff isn't good at all".'…”

Integrazione e confl itto. Per una storia materialista della costruzione europea

“…Non tutti, in verità, condividevano i timori riguardo all'ascesa statunitense, né tantomeno vi era un indirizzo comune sulle risposte da darvi 12 ; ma agli occhi di una parte importante delle classi dirigenti europee, il segreto dietro la stupefacente accelerazione economica statunitense appariva lampante: l'assorbimento, con l'avanzata verso Ovest, di vaste regioni ricche di materie prime e terre fertili, inglobate in un unico mercato nazionale e rese accessibili da moderne infrastrutture di comunicazione 13 .…”