Atlantic Rules: Markets, Democracy and the End of the Cold War

In Global Rules: America, Britain and a Disordered World, James Cronin uses the Anglo-American relationship as a lens through which to view the last years of the Cold War.  This perspective leads him to argue that the turn to markets in the US and the UK during the 1980s and to the promotion of democracy and human rights were critical in setting the terms on which the Cold War ended and on which the post-Cold War order would be constructed.

James Cronin is Professor of History at Boston College and an affiliate of the Center for European Studies at Harvard University. His previous books include What’s Left of the Left (co-edited with G. Ross and James Shoch, 2011), New Labour’s Pasts (2004), The World the Cold War Made (1996), The Politics of State Expansion: War, State and Society in Twentieth-Century Britain (1991), Labour and Society in Britain (1984), and Industrial Conflict in Modern Britain (1979).

The Washington History Seminar is sponsored jointly by the National History Center of the American Historical Association and the Wilson Center's History and Public Policy Program. It meets weekly during the academic year. See www.wilsoncenter.org/collection/washington-history-seminar for the schedule, speakers, topics, and dates as well as webcasts and podcasts. The seminar thanks the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations for their support.