POL200
Barraclough
7.10.98
Contemporary v. Modern
I.
What is contemporary history?
A. The future ain’t what it used to be
B. Contemporary v. Modern
1. contemporary history
 distinct period from modern era
 medieval era  modern  contemporary
 Medieval  modern: renaissance/ reformation
 Modern  contemporary: WWI & WWII
 European dominance  global (USA/USSR)
 Highpoints of modernism:
 Renaissance
 Enlightenment
 French Revolution
2. shift from modern to contemporary
a. 1890s – change begins – long period of shift
 the world of 1900 much more familiar to us
than that of 1875
POL200
Barraclough
7.10.98
b. 1960 ends shift
 1960 contemporary era firmly in place
II.
Barraclough’s project
A. Contemporary history – distinguishing marks
1. Formative influences – identifying ruptures
2. Qualitative differences between periods
3. Global perspectives – a new framework
4. Clarifying the basic structural changes that have
shaped history
 contemporary history begins when the
problems of the world today first take visible
shape
 but there is no sharp break – long period of
transition where one period’s ethos is replaced
by another
B. What is history?
POL200
Barraclough
7.10.98
III. Barraclough’s method
A. looks back in history from current vantage point
 instead of working forward from a big event
 identifying structural changes
B. Analysis
1. analytical unit
 epoch of history
 comparison of periods
2. actors
 social institutions: states, classes
 not a history of kings
3. causality
 consequences of events & forces of history
 focus on big events & central forces
 e.g. industrial revolution, social transformation
 non-universality
 different periods, different histories
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Barraclough
7.10.98
IV. The Impact of Scientific Advance
A. Two forces: industrialism & imperialism
B. Industrial Revolution -- 2nd Industrial Revolution
 impact of steel, electricity, oil, chemicals, &
transportation
 scientific, technological change, & industrial
change
  changes in social structure
  business/ industrialism
  urbanisation
  concentration
  global integration
 Modernisation
C. Imperialism
 based on industrialism
 scramble for colonies
  spread of Europeanism
  gap between rich countries & poor
 paradox of imperialism
 profits elusive
 white dominions rebelled -- stretching
of European influence leads to its
erosion
 later decolonialisation 1950s & 60s
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V.
Barraclough
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The Demographic Transition
A. The Rev. Malthus
 exponential nature of population growth
 the limits to growth – mortality
B. The demographic transition
1. The mortality transition
a. the shift – graph
b. explanation: infant mortality, public health
c. consequence of modernisation
– industrialisation, scientific understanding of
disease
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Barraclough
7.10.98
2. The fertility transition
a. Graph
b. explanation: family income, access to birth
control, female education
c. industrialisation, modernisation
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Barraclough
3. Neo-Malthusianism
C. Shift in population  shift in global power
 role of imperialism
 role of fertility transition
VI. Balance of Power to Bipolarity
A. Multi-polar balance of power
1. Concert of Europe – Metternich
2. Poles & balance – the role of the balancer
B. The collapse of the Balance of Power
1. Europe – Fragmentation & the World Wars
2. Rise of non-Europe
3. Rise of the Pacific
4. Decline of European superiority
5. Rise of USA/ USSR
C. Bi-polar balance of power
1. more than legacy of WWII
2. consequence of systemic change
3. role of nuclear weapons in Cold War
4. Balance of Terror MAD
D. How many poles in the world today?
1. fall of the Soviet Union
2. what world replaces the bi-polar world?
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Barraclough
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VII. Individualism to Mass Democracy
A. Rise of the masses
1. extension of suffrage
2. mass participation
 1825 manhood suffrage – slave states
 Andrew Jackson 1828 USA
 1870 Black voting rights 15th amedment
(south 1960s)
 womens suffrage
– many states by 1850s
– 1920 amendment to the
constitution
 New Zealand, Australia, Canada 1820s – 40s
* womens suffrage 1893
 UK
 1867 2nd reform bill
 1884 – 3rd reform bill
 1906 general election
 1918
 General Manhood suffrage
 France & German empire 1871
 Switzerland 1874, 1972 women’s
suffrage
 Spain 1890
 Belgium 1893
 The Netherlands 1896
 Norway 1898
 Italy 1882, 1912
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B. Rise of political parties
 center  out
 Van Buren & Jacksonian democracy
VIII.Do we live in a post-contemporary history?
A. Fall of the Berlin Wall
B. Barraclough – the ideological challenge of MarxistLeninism
C. The end of history?
 Fukuyama’s neo-hegelianism
D. A new era?