The European socialist delusion of a “Social Europe”, and its historical roots
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3989/hispania.2025.1338Keywords:
Social Europe, European socialism, neoliberalism, capitalism, European integration, social democracyAbstract
During the “long 1970s”, Western European socialists, who had so far been marginal in shaping postwar European integration processes, started to coordinate at the European level, and developed a “Social Europe” project. The aim of this initiative was to change the nature of European integration in order to serve social progress and workers’ interests. This article first explores the progressive convergence of European socialists in the 1960s and early 1970s on a new “European reformism” that challenged “business Europe”. It goes on to show how the crisis of the 1970s led to the radicalization of their emerging project for a social Europe. Finally, it examines how, in the 1980s, European socialists gradually abandoned their radical European project, and rallied to a vision of “Social Europe” compatible with the neoliberal Europe then emerging.
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H2020 European Research Council
Grant numbers 716849
