Robert Gildea – författare

Nineteenth-century France was one of the world's great cultural beacons, renowned for its dazzling literature, philosophy, art, poetry and technology. Yet this was also a tumultuous century of political anarchy and bloodshed, where each generation of the French Revolution's 'children' would experience their own wars, revolutions and terrors. From soldiers to priests, from peasants to Communards, from feminists to literary figures such as Victor Hugo and Honoré de Balzac, Robert Gildea's brilliant new history explores every aspect of these rapidly changing times, and the people who lived through them.

The last fifty years of French history have seen immense challenges for the French: constructing a new European order, building a modern economy, searching for a stable political system. It has also been a time of anxiety and doubt. The French have had to come to terms with the legacy of the German Occupation, the loss of Empire, the political and social implications of the influx of foreign immigrants, the rise of Islam, the destruction of rural life, and the threat of Anglo-American culture to French language and civilization.Robert Gildea's account examines the French political system and France's role in the world from 1945 to 2000. He looks at France's attempt to recover national greatness after the Second World War, its attempt to deal with the fear of German resurgence by building the European Community, and its struggle to preserve its Empire. He also discusses the Algerian War and its legacy, and the later development of a neo-colonialism to preserve its influence in Africa and the Pacific. Gildea also examines the rise and fall of the two Republics, the rise of and fall of De Gaulle, and the revolution of 1968, along with topics such as the construction of the myth of the Resistance, the painful truths of French involvement in anti-Semitic persecution, and France's continuing obsession with national identity.

By the late 1960s, in a Europe divided by the Cold War and challenged by global revolution in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, thousands of young people threw themselves into activism to change both the world and themselves. This new and exciting study of "Europe's 1968" is based on the rich oral histories of nearly 500 former activists collected by an international team of historians across fourteen countries. Activists' own voices reflect on how they were drawn into activism, how they worked and struggled together, how they combined the political and the personal in their lives, and the pride or regret with which they look back on those momentous years. Themes explored include generational revolt and activists' relationship with their families, the meanings of revolution, transnational encounters and spaces of revolt, faith and radicalism, dropping out, gender and sexuality, and revolutionary violence. Focussing on the way in which the activists themselves made sense of their revolt, this work makes a major contribution to both oral history and memory studies. This ambitious study ranges widely across Europe from Franco's Spain to the Soviet Union, and from the two Germanys to Greece, and throws new light on moments and movements which both united and divided the activists of Europe's 1968.

Robert Gildea presents an ambitious and wide-ranging but succinct history of France from 1945 to 2024, which seeks to provide a sympathetic understanding of the forces that have shaped a country that is so close to Britain and yet so different. This third edition, following the second in 2002 and first in 1996, takes into account twenty more years of French history, history writing, and changing historical approaches, notably in colonial history and gender history.France Since 1945 explores France's bid to restore political stability and international greatness after the Second World War which was marked by defeat and occupation, and the loss of greatness and crisis of democracy that began in the 1990s. These chapters are interleaved by eight thematic chapters, on the legacy of the Second World War and the Algerian War, which arguably continues in France to this day; on the economy and society; on French culture; and on gender and sexuality.

This is a comprehensive survey of European history from the coup d'etat of Napoleon Bonaparte in France to the assassination of the Archduke Ferdinand at Sarajevo, which led to the First World War. It concentrates on the twin themes of revolution and nationalism, which often combined in the early part of the century but which increasingly became rival creeds. Going beyond traditional political and diplomatic history, the book incorporates the results of recent research on population movements, the expansion of markets, the accumulation of capital, social mobility, education, changing patterns of leisure, religious practices, and intellectual and artistic developments.The work falls into three chronological sections. The first, starting in 1800 (rather than the more usual 1815) follows the build-up of the revolutionary currents which were eventually going to erupt in the `Year of Revolutions' 1848. The second, from 1850 to 1880, deals with the golden age of capitalism, the successful culmination of struggles for national unification, and the threat of anarchism. The concluding chapters look at the social and political stresses caused by socialism and national minorities, at new attempts by government to order society, imperial rivalry, and the descent into a war which was to mark the end of nineteenth-century Europe. For this third edition, Dr Gildea has substantially revised the text and maps, and completely updated the bibliography. Newly-added introductory sections guide the reader through the wealth of material in each chapter. The new edition also includes for the first time a full Chronology of the period, a list of leading state ministers, and family trees for all the major dynasties.

By the late 1960s, in a Europe divided by the Cold War and challenged by global revolution in Latin America, Asia, and Africa, thousands of young people threw themselves into activism to change both the world and themselves. This new and exciting study of "Europe's 1968" is based on the rich oral histories of nearly 500 former activists collected by an international team of historians across fourteen countries. Activists' own voices reflect on how they were drawn into activism, how they worked and struggled together, how they combined the political and the personal in their lives, and the pride or regret with which they look back on those momentous years. Themes explored include generational revolt and activists' relationship with their families, the meanings of revolution, transnational encounters and spaces of revolt, faith and radicalism, dropping out, gender and sexuality, and revolutionary violence. Focussing on the way in which the activists themselves made sense of their revolt, this work makes a major contribution to both oral history and memory studies. This ambitious study ranges widely across Europe from Franco's Spain to the Soviet Union, and from the two Germanys to Greece, and throws new light on moments and movements which both united and divided the activists of Europe's 1968.

This fascinating book examines how the past pervades French public life, how the French both commemorate their past triumphs, heroes, and martyrs and attempt to erase the more violent events in their history. The book surveys the ways that various political communities in France during the past two centuries have manufactured different versions of the past in order to define their identities and legitimate their goals. Beginning with a discussion of the bicentenary of the French Revolution in 1989, Robert Gildea moves backward in time to show how rival factions have used various elements of French political culture—from the grandeur of the ancien régime to Catholicism, Jacobinism, Anarchism, and Bonapartism—to further their ends. Gildea shows how proponents of revolution and counterrevolution, church and state, centralism and regionalism, and national identity and nationalism campaigned to achieve the widest possible acceptance of their own view of the past. He describes the continuing battle between Left and Right for association with national heroes such as Joan of Arc and Napoleon. He exposes the reworking of collective views of the past by political communities, in order to increase or recover political legitimacy. Written in clear and trenchant prose, the book offers a new perspective on French history and political culture.

A powerful new history of the Great Strike in the miners’ own voices, based on more than 140 interviews with former miners and their familiesForty years ago, Arthur Scargill led the National Union of Mineworkers on one of the largest strikes in British history. A deep sense of pride existed within Britain’s mining communities who thought of themselves as the backbone of the nation’s economy. But they were vilified by Margaret Thatcher’s government and eventually broken: deprived of their jobs, their livelihoods, and in some cases, their lives.In this groundbreaking new history, Robert Gildea interviews those miners and their families who fought to defend themselves. Exploring mining communities from South Wales to the Midlands, Yorkshire, County Durham, and Fife, Gildea shows how the miners and their families organized to protect themselves, and how a network of activists mobilized to support them.Amid the recent wave of industrial action in the United Kingdom, Backbone of the Nation highlights anew the importance of labor organization—and intimately records the triumphs, losses, and resilience of these mining communities.

Writing Contemporary History brings together some of the world's most pre-eminent historians to discuss the core issues confronting students of contemporary history today. Tackling ten key questions of current historiographical debate, each chapter sets in parallel and in opposition the contributions of two scholars. Questions include: Does gender history have a future? When does colonial history end? What is cultural history now about? This volume takes to heart the central rationale of the Writing History series, namely to combine theoretical reflection with the practice of producing historical texts. It introduces the reader to a variety of important theoretical approaches in the field of contemporary history writing and asks how these approaches have shaped historical writing in this important sub-discipline. Writing Contemporary History is an invaluable introduction to the central debates that have shaped the field of contemporary history.

The story of the French Resistance is central to French identity, but it is a story built on myths. Not simply an effort to free the country from German occupation, it was part of a Europe-wide anti-fascist struggle, which included Spanish republicans, Italian and German anti-Nazis, communists, Jewish resisters and Christian rescuers. Robert Gildea returns to the testimonies of those involved, asking who they were, and what compelled them to take the terrible risks they did, bringing to the fore stories of the women resisters, whom history has neglected. Fighters in the Shadows is a vivid, gripping and entirely new account of one of the most compelling narratives of the Second World War.

The period 1870-1914 saw the consolidation of republican government and recovery of national self-confidence in France, establishing firm parliamentary rule and building up an empire. This text offers an introduction to the period and incorporates recent research.

'The empires of the future would be the empires of the mind' declared Churchill in 1943, envisaging universal empires living in peaceful harmony. Robert Gildea exposes instead the brutal realities of decolonisation and neo-colonialism which have shaped the postwar world. Even after the rush of French and British decolonisation in the 1960s, the strings of economic and military power too often remained in the hands of the former colonial powers. The more empire appears to have declined and fallen, the more a fantasy of empire has been conjured up as a model for projecting power onto the world stage and legitimised colonialist intervention in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. This aggression, along with the imposition of colonial hierarchies in metropolitan society, has excluded, alienated and even radicalised immigrant populations. Meanwhile, nostalgia for empire has bedevilled relations with Europe and played a large part in explaining Brexit.

The period 1870 - 1914 in France saw the consolidation of republican government and the recovery of national self-confidence. Though political crises such as the Dreyfus Affair threatened to tear it apart, the Republic established firm parliamentary rule, built up an Empire and an army which was to see it through the Great War. The new edition of this key text - first published as The Third Republic From 1870 to 1914 - offers a clear introduction to the period and incorporates the latest research.

'The empires of the future would be the empires of the mind' declared Churchill in 1943, envisaging universal empires living in peaceful harmony. Robert Gildea exposes instead the brutal realities of decolonisation and neo-colonialism which have shaped the postwar world. Even after the rush of French and British decolonisation in the 1960s, the strings of economic and military power too often remained in the hands of the former colonial powers. The more empire appears to have declined and fallen, the more a fantasy of empire has been conjured up as a model for projecting power onto the world stage and legitimised colonialist intervention in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria. This aggression, along with the imposition of colonial hierarchies in metropolitan society, has excluded, alienated and even radicalised immigrant populations. Meanwhile, nostalgia for empire has bedevilled relations with Europe and played a large part in explaining Brexit.

This landmark book, the product of years of research by a team of two dozen historians, reveals that resistance to occupation by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy during the Second World War was not narrowly delineated by country but startlingly international. Tens of thousands of fighters across Europe resisted ‘transnationally’, travelling to join networks far from their homes. These ‘foreigners’ were often communists and Jews who were already being persecuted and on the move. Others were expatriate business people, escaped POWs, forced labourers or deserters. Their experiences would prove personally transformative and greatly affected the course of the conflict. From the International Brigades in Spain to the onset of the Cold War and the foundation of the state of Israel, they played a significant part in a period of upheaval and change during the long Second World War.

“History”, suggests Robert Gildea, “is a battlefield.” Questions of power, rights, identity and nationhood always have an ancient and modern historical dimension and countries still go to war over their interpretation of history. Yet accounts of history are just as prone to fabrication as fake news, so how can we tell good history from bad? How can history be critical, learning from the past and righting wrongs, rather than divisive, such as riding roughshod over the rights of others?In this passionately argued book, Gildea suggests that the more people who really understand what good history entails, the more likely history is to triumph over myth. He sees positive signs in public history, citizen historians and community projects, among other developments. And he debunks claims that ‘you cannot rewrite history’, arguing that good history that’s attuned to its times must be rewritten time and again.

Surviving Hitler and Mussolini examines how far everyday life was possible in a situation of total war and brutal occupation. Its theme is the social experience of occupation in German- and Italian-occupied Europe, and in particular the strategies ordinary people developed in order to survive. Survival included meeting the challenges of shortage and hunger, of having to work for the enemy, of women entering into intimate relations with soldiers, of the preservation of culture in a fascist universe, of whether and how to resist, and the reaction of local communities to measures of reprisal taken in response to resistance. What emerges is that ordinary people were less heroes, villains or victims than inventive and resourceful individuals able to maintain courage and dignity despite the conditions they faced.The book adopts a comparative approach from Denmark and the Netherlands to Poland and Greece, and offers a fresh perspective on the Second World War.