Why Looking South? European Civil Society Towards Southern European Dictatorships in a Globalizing World (1950s-early 1970s).

During the Cold War, large strata of European societies were moved by a plethora of international issues which occurred often hundreds of miles away from their homes. Although Cold War studies usually see Europe as a divided continent, the violation of human rights and democracy by dictatorial regimes in Portugal and Spain, complemented from 1967 onwards by those by a military junta in Greece, stirred a variety of organizations in democratic Europe into action, until these regimes collapsed in the mid-1970s. This project intends to inquire into the political and social reaction provoked by the plight of these Southern European societies in democratic Europe. It analyzes how campaigns for Southern Europe came along with solidarity with the Third World and debates about European integration, globalization, and human rights on the agenda of Western European social and political movements in the first three decades after the end of WWII. In doing so, this project wants to assess the role of "Europe" in the emergence of a postwar international human rights regime and to open new perspectives on the rise of European civil society.

Keywords:Dictatorships in a Globalizing World

Disciplines:History