Zeitenwende 1979: Als die Welt von heute begann

Extract

The focus on events in a single year is one way to approach global history. Scholars have, for instance, dedicated monographs with a worldwide coverage to the years 1688, 1800 and 1916. Recently, some authors, including the journalist Christian Caryl and the historian Hamit Borzaslan, suggested adding 1979 to the list of years that marked a global rupture. Among those who argue for 1979 as a decisive break is Frank Bösch, whose new study makes a highly compelling case for this claim. Bösch not only illustrates how a series of events during this year prefigured the world in which we live today—from the advent of political Islam in the Iranian revolution to the rise of neoliberalism through the election of Margret Thatcher—but he does so with a focus on German history. In this way, his book provides a pioneering analysis that relates global dynamics to the trajectory of the two German states 10 years before the fall of the Berlin Wall.