WorldViews. The World in Textbooks

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Bibliographic data

Morazé, Charles; Wolff, Pierre: Nouveau course d’histoire, L’Epoque contemporaine: 1852-1948. Paris: Armand Colin, 1948, 3–5.

The World in 1848 and in 1948

In this introductory chapter the author outlines the biggest changes that took place between 1848 and 1948. In doing so, he draws upon two of the maps displayed on the title page, which comparatively demonstrate the development of the “world structure” and which indirectly illustrate the change in Europe’s significance in the world. Completely keeping with the spirit of the Annales School, of which he was a prominent, the author, Charles Morazé, draws on an “observation” supported balance. This leads him to formulate a set of questions he wishes to cover over the course of the textbook. The textbook becomes a bearer of constructions, whose framework the author erects immediately from the first pages: How could Europe, which was so powerful in the 19th century, lose preeminence in the world to the benefit of the “new” countries in the middle of the 20th century?

Morazé, Charles

Wolff, Pierre

The history textbook Nouveau course d’histoire. L’Epoque contemporaine: 1852-1948 was designed for the use at the upper secondary level in France.

Armand Colin

[p. 3]

1948

[View on the northern hemisphere of the earth with marker of political blocks.]

1848

[View on the northern hemisphere of the earth with marker of political blocks.]

[p. 4]

FIRST CHAPTER

THE WORLD AFTER 1848

I. — WE COMPARE THE WORLD OF 1848 AND OF 1948

1. TWO MAPS. - Today’s world is dominated by three Great Powers, whose leaders are generally referred to as the “The Big Three” and who have regularly met since 1943 in order to organize victory and to prepare for peace. In 1948 these powers appeared to be split into two blocks: in the west, the Atlantic countries, with the United States, England and their Dominions; in the East, the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics, which includes European and Asian Russia. Between these two blocks, Europe is fragmented into a multitude of Nations, which are undecided over their economic life and political status.

Now let’s go back to the year 1848, and draft a map of the lands, which attracted worldwide attention throughout the course of revolutionary events. We see that these countries take up continental Europe from the ocean in the west to the Russian border. Furthermore, we could observe that in 1848 England was not unsettled by revolutionary events and that Spain, then as today, plays a marginal role at the edge of continental Europe.

Isn’t it astonishing to discover that the map of lands unsettled in 1848 appears as the negative of the map of the “Great Three” in 1948?

All of these observations must remain in place in our minds as we read this work. They allow us to recognize the far reaching change to the world structure that occurred within a century, in that they bring us, so to speak, from one model map to its opposite.

Translation:
Tarquini, Liesel
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