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A Global Struggle in a Local Context

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Challenging Global Capitalism

Part of the book series: Palgrave Macmillan Transnational History Series ((PMSTH))

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Abstract

“There have only been two world revolutions. One took place in 1848. The second took place in 1968. Both were historic failures. Both transformed the world,” remarked Arrighi, Hopkins, and Wallerstein in their short essay Antisystemic Movements.1 Forty years later, historians continue to view the end of the 1960s as a moment of simultaneous upheaval in several Western countries as well as in Eastern Europe, Mexico, and Japan—a global explosion that few had anticipated. The student revolt of 1968 assumed a different guise in each national context: in all of them, protest against national power hierarchies figured prominently, but historians usually acknowledge that students’ call for fundamental socioeconomic changes was transnational in scope. Student unrest has so far generated the largest collection of “g lobal” or “transnational” studies. Indeed, a consensus is emerging that the 1968 youth revolts can hardly be understood without reference to each other.2 However, transnational accounts have neglected contemporary workers’ protests—themselves linked to other s oixante-huitard social movements. Historians have tended to define workers’ revolts in narrowly national terms, as if they had been unaffected by cultural influences and organizational links transcending state boundaries.3

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Notes

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Pizzolato, N. (2013). A Global Struggle in a Local Context. In: Challenging Global Capitalism. Palgrave Macmillan Transnational History Series. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137311702_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137311702_5

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