Ideologies in the age of extremes : liberalisms, conservatism, communism, fascism, 1914-1991

This is a history of political ideologies during the period famously described by Eric Hobsbawn as ‘The Age of Extremes’ - from the First World War to the collapse of the Soviet Union.__Ideologies in the Age of Extremes__ introduces the key ideologies of the age; liberalism, conservatism, communism and fascism. Willie Thompson identifies the political influence of mass movements as a key feature. He uses a powerful approach that considers the different ideologies in relation to each other. This allows him to shows that they often emerged from a common root or merged into a common future, stealing each other’s clothes and reinventing themselves as the stark opposite of a competing ideology.This sophisticated yet accessible analysis will be of great interest to students of 20th century history and political theory. This is a history of political ideologies during the period famously described by Eric Hobsbawn as ‘The Age of Extremes’ - from the First World War to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Ideologies in the Age of Extremes introduces the key ideologies of the age; liberalism, conservatism, communism and fascism. Willie Thompson identifies the political influence of mass movements as a key feature. He uses a powerful approach that considers the different ideologies in relation to each other. This allows him to shows that they often emerged from a common root or merged into a common future, stealing each other’s clothes and reinventing themselves as the stark opposite of a competing ideology. This sophisticated yet accessible analysis will be of great interest to students of 20th century history and political theory. Thompson (formerly, contemporary history, Glasgow Caledonian Univ., UK) views the conflicts of the 20th century through the lens of "ideology.. Destutt de Tracy coined the term denoting his "science" of ideas for understanding human society without reference to religion or tradition. "Ideology" morphed into a generic term acquiring various meanings, positive and negative, familiar to readers today. Thompson favors defining ideology as a set of ideas driven by a "will to power.. He broadly traces the political careers of the four "ideologies," each purporting to show the way to a resolution of the struggles tormenting modern life. He examines their interactions from the catastrophic world wars, through Cold War, to the Soviet collapse This is a history of political ideologies during the period from the First World War to the collapse of the Soviet Union, famously described by Eric Hobsbawm as'The Age of Extremes'. By introducing the key ideologies of the twentieth-century: liberalism, conservatism, communism and fascism, and considering them in in relation to each other, Willie Thompson shows how these philosophies often emerged from a common root or merged into a common future, stealing each other's clothes and reinventing themselves as the stark opposite of a competing ideology. This sophisticated yet accessible analysis will be of great interest to students of 20th century history and political theory. Introduces the key ideologies of the twentieth century - liberalism, conservatism, communism and fascism - and analyses how they affected each other. Willie Thompson. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.