Contemporary Europe

• What challenges did the world face as communism fell?
• What changes occurred in Germany after it unified?
• What was the outlook for Russia as it transitioned from communism?
• Margaret Thatcher


  Did not support the European Union (EU) for fear that the larger nations would dominate the European Parliament and the smaller nations would not have as loud a voice and be forced into obeying the will of nations like France and Germany
• Margaret Thatcher remained prime minister until 1990, making her the longest-serving leader of Britain in the 20th century
• John Major


  Was an outspoken advocate of the European Union and argued that the EU would help Great Britain achieve economic success
• John Major had conservative members of Parliament conform to the Maastricht Treaty (or Treaty on European Union)
• Tony Blair


  Was a staunch supporter of the United States, especially during George W. Bush's War on Terror
• In 1987, workers began constructing the "Chunnel," a thirty-one-mile-long tunnel beneath the English Channel that linked Great Britain and France
• In 1994, the first high-speed train raced through the Chunnel, cutting the travel time between the nations from hours to just 35 minutes
• Helmut Kohl


  The chancellor of former West Germany, continued as the leader of united Germany, and in 1996 he became the longest-serving leader in Germany's post-war history
• Kohl's long tenure brought stability to Germany, although there was a tremendous economic burden of reintegrating the economically backward East Germany
• The Germans also had to pay for the removal of Russian troops from East Germany
• Gerhard Schröder


  Wanted to solve the problem of Germany's high unemployment rate and wanted to bolster East Germany's economy
• In 2003, Schröder cut the country's welfare system to try to solve Germany's struggling economy
• This move made Schröder unpopular, and he stepped down as leader of Germany and was replaced by Angela Merkel
• Angela Merkel


  As of 2020, still sits as chancellor of Germany, riding the waves of consistent support in her country
• Criticism over her handling of the refugee crisis has put her in jeopardy of not winning reelection in the next term
• Her party, the CDU, lost votes by large margins in recent elections in the provinces of Hesse and Bavaria
• Merkel has stated that she will not run for a fifth term as German chancellor, a position she has held since 2005
• The elections for the federal chancellor will be held in 2021
• François Mitterand

  His administration ended in May 1995 after fourteen years in power in France
• Jacques Chirac

  His administration represented a coalition of conservatives who opposed Mitterand's Socialist supporters
• Most of the French supported the move toward privatization and free-market reform
• In 2012, France elected another Socialist, François Hollande, as president
• Emmanuel Macron


  France took a populist route in selecting its next president in 2018, and Macron has already been critical of US President Trump, especially on foreign policy issues
• Upon the death of the communist leader, Marshall Tito, in 1980, a shaky communist coalition government dominated by the Serbs held Yugoslavia together
• The collapse of communism in Eastern Europe at the end of the 1980s resulted in armed conflict between the Serbs and several of the other ethnic groups
• When the republics of Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence in 1991, Serbian forces attacked Croatia
• Macedonia declared its independence, followed by Bosnia-Herzegovina in February 1992
• All that remained of former Yugoslavia was a union of Serbia and Montenegro
• Shortly after Bosnia declared independence, a three-way fight broke out among the country's Serbs, Croats, and Muslims
• Serbian forces laid siege to the city of Sarajevo, the Muslim capital of Bosnia, and began to bombard the city with artillery
• Reports of ethnic cleansing and genocide of Muslims by the Serbs resulted in the UN condemnation of Serbia
• The UN sent peacekeeping troops to set up safe areas for refugees in Bosnia
• The UN requested military intervention when it realized that the aggression of the Bosnian Serbs could not be restrained
• NATO forces intervened, and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic urged the Bosnian Serbs to end hostilities in October 1995
• The various factions met in Dayton, Ohio, and agreed to the Dayton Peace Accords
• Boris Yeltsin emerged as the most powerful man in Russia in December 1991
• Yeltsin made it clear that the breakup of the Soviet Union did not mean that the former Soviet republics had complete autonomy