Home › Books & Reviews › Capsule Reviews › The Primacy of Politics: Social Democracy and the Making of Europe's Twentieth Century

The Primacy of Politics: Social Democracy and the Making of Europe's Twentieth Century

Sheri Berman
Reviewed by By Stanley Hoffmann
January/February 2007
Print Email
Login or Register to leave a comment.

Sign-up for free weekly updates from ForeignAffairs.com.
Sheri Berman
Cambridge University Press
2006
238 pp.
0521521106
$65.00

This ambitious and provocative book by a Barnard political scientist argues that social democracy "must be recognized as the most successful ideology and movement of the twentieth century" -- one that has reconciled "a well-functioning capitalist system, democracy, and social stability." The bulk of the book is a history of social democracy, and readers who need or want a clear, well-written narrative of that important movement will find it here. But overall, there is an imbalance between the pre-1945 material and the very short section on the postwar era, when the differences between the social democratic parties of the major European countries stood out more than did their similarities. A common critique of capitalism and an awareness of Marxism's flaws could never produce a unified movement; after 1945, the "triumph" of social democracy was more a matter of political coalitions and ideological dilution. Turning to the present, Berman's attempt to "save" social democracy's critique of the market from the temptations of Tony Blair's "Third Way" and the seemingly inexorable march of globalization remains vague. Nonetheless, this is a strong, useful defense of a political ideology and a political movement that have done much good and fought evil with courage and lucidity.

Related

Review Essay, Jan/Feb 1997
Back to Euro-Pessimism? A Jeremiad Too Fond of Gloom and Doom
Stanley Hoffmann

Tony Judt is right to have doubts about the future of European union, but his jeremiad lacks an eye for detail.

Read
Essay, Winter 1981
Nuclear Weapons in the 1980s: NATO and Nuclear Weapons: Reasons and Unreason
Stanley Hoffmann

The history of the Atlantic Alliance is a history of crises. But we must distinguish between the routine difficulties engendered by Western Europe's dependence on the United States for its security, as well as by the economic interdependence of the allies, and major breakdowns or misunderstandings which reveal not simply an inevitable divergence of interests but dramatically different views of the world and priorities. At the present time, complaints from West European leaders about the effects of high American interest rates on their economies, or about President Reagan's skeptical approach to North-South economic issues, belong in the first category. The current controversy in Europe over nuclear weapons belongs in the second, and now confronts the Alliance with one of its most dangerous tests.

Read
Essay, Fall 1989
The European Community and 1992
Stanley Hoffmann

Not much attention was paid in March 1985, when the European Council, whose members include the chiefs of state and government of the 12 member states, decided that it should constitute a single market by 1992. After all, the European Community had been established in 1957 with the goal of a common market, and many people believed that the goal had been reached; tariffs within the Community had been abolished, a common external tariff put in place and a controversial common agricultural policy instituted.

Read