This article discusses the
history of the continent of
Europe.
The origins
Homo erectus and
Neanderthals settled
Europe long before the emergence of modern humans,
Homo sapiens.
The earliest appearance of anatomically modern people in Europe has been dated to the
35,000 BC. Evidence of permanent settlement dates from the
7th millennium BC in
Bulgaria,
Romania and
Greece. The Neolithic reached
Central Europe in the
6th millennium BC and parts of
Northern Europe in the
5th and
4th millennium BC. There is no prehistoric culture that covers the whole of Europe. For short introductions to the various cultures, see Palaeolithic,
Mesolithic,
Neolithic,
Bronze Age and
Iron Age.
The first well-known literate civilization in Europe was that of the Minoans of the island of
Crete and later the Myceneans in the adjacent parts of
Greece, starting at the beginning of the
2nd millennium BC. Around
400 BC, the La Tene culture spread over most of the interior as far as the
Iberian Peninsula (
Spain and
Portugal), and later
Anatolia. The Etruscans inhabited central Italy and Lombardy, where they were displaced by the Celts, who mingled with earlier residents of Iberia to produce a unique
Celtiberian culture. As the Celts did not use a
written language, knowledge of them is piecemeal. The
Romans encountered them and recorded a great deal about them; these records and the archaeological evidence form our primary understanding of this extremely influential culture. The Celts posed a formidable, if disorganized, competition to the Roman state, that later colonized and conquered much of the southern portion of Europe.
The Greeks
At the end of the
Bronze Age the older Greek kingdoms collapsed and a brilliant new civilization grew up in their place. The Hellenic civilization took the form of a collection of city-states (the most important being
Athens and
Sparta), having vastly differing types of government and cultures, including what are more-or-less unprecedented developments in various governmental forms,
philosophy,
science,
politics, sports,
theatre and
music. The Hellenic city-states founded a large number of colonies on the shores of the
Black Sea and the Mediterranean sea, Asia Minor,
Sicily and Southern Italy in
Magna Graecia, but in the
4th century BC their internal wars made them an easy prey for king
Philip II of
Macedonia. The campaigns of his son
Alexander the Great spread Greek culture into
Persia,
Egypt and
India, but also favoured contact with the older learnings of those countries, opening up a new period of development, known as Hellenism.
Rome
Much of Greek learning was assimilated by the nascent Roman state as it expanded outward from
Italy, taking advantage of its enemies' inability to unite: the only real challenge to Roman ascent came from the
Phoenician colony of
Carthage, but its defeat in the end of the
3rd century BC marked the start of Roman
hegemony. First governed by kings, then as a senatorial republic (the
Roman Republic),
Rome finally became an empire at the end of the
1st century BC, under
Augustus and his authoritarian successors. The
Roman Empire had its centre in the
Mediterranean Sea, controlling all the countries on its shores; the northern border was marked by the
Rhine and
Danube rivers; under emperor
Trajan (2nd century AD) the empire reached its maximum expansion, including
Britain,
Romania and parts of
Mesopotamia. The empire brought peace, civilization and an efficient
centralized government to the subject territories, but in the
3rd century a series of
civil wars undermined its economic and social strength. In the
4th century, the emperors
Diocletian and Constantine were able to slow down the process of decline by splitting the empire into a Western and an Eastern part. Whereas Diocletian severely persecuted
Christianity, Constantine declared an official end to state-sponsored
persecution of Christians in 313 with the
Edict of Milan, thus setting the stage for the empire to later become officially Christian in about 380 (which would cause the
Church to become an important institution).
Early Middle Ages
Western Europe emerged as the site of a distinct civilization after the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the
5th century, as
barbarian invasions separated it from the rest of the Mediterranean, where the Eastern Roman Empire (a.k.a.
Byzantine Empire) survived for another millennium. In the
7th century the
Arab expansion brought
Islamic cultures to the southern Mediterranean shores (from
Turkey to
Sicily and
Spain), further enlarging the differences between the various Mediterranean civilizations. Huge amounts of technology and learning were lost, trade languished and people returned to local
agrarian communities. In the same century, Bulgarians created the first
Slavic state in Europe -
Bulgaria.
Feudalism replaced the centralized Roman administration. The only institution surviving the collapse of the Western Roman Empire was the
Roman Catholic Church, which preserved part of the Roman cultural inheritance and remained the primary source of learning in its domain at least until the
13th century; the
bishop of
Rome, known as the
Pope, became the leader of the western church (in the east his supremacy was never accepted).
The
Holy Roman Empire emerged around 800, as
Charlemagne, king of the
Franks, subdued western
Germany, large parts of
Italy and chunks of surrounding countries; he received substantial help from an alliance with the Pope, who wanted to cut the remaining ties with the Byzantine Empire; in this way the domains of the Pope became an independent state in central Italy.
In the late
9th century and
10th century, northern and western Europe felt the burgeoning power and influence of the
Vikings who raided, traded, conquered and settled swiftly and efficiently with their advanced sea-going vessels such as the
longships.
The subsequent period, ending around 1000, saw the further growth of
feudalism, which weakened the Holy Roman Empire.
High Middle Ages
After the
East-West Schism,
Western Christianity was adopted by newly created kingdoms of
Central Europe:
Poland,
Hungary and
Bohemia.
The
Roman Catholic Church developed as a major power, leading to conflicts between the Pope and Emperor.
Later Middle Ages
Europe in 1328.
Early signs of the rebirth of civilization in
western Europe began to appear in the
11th century as trade started again in
Italy, leading to the economic and cultural growth of independent city states such as Venice and Florence; at the same time, nation-states began to take form in places such as
France,
England,
Spain, and
Portugal, although the process of their formation (usually marked by rivalry between the monarchy, the aristocratic feudal lords and the church) actually took several centuries. (See
Reconquista for the latter two countries.) On the other hand, the
Holy Roman Empire, essentially based in
Germany and
Italy, further fragmented into a myriad of feudal principalities or small city states, whose subjection to the emperor was only formal.
One of the largest catastrophes to have hit Europe was the
bubonic plague, also known as the
Black Death. There were numerous outbreaks, but the most severe was in the mid-
1300s and is estimated to have killed a third of Europe's population. Since many
Jews worked as money-lenders (
usury was not allowed for Christians) and were generally more immune to disease (thanks to their kosher laws concerning hygiene), the Jews were often disliked by Europeans, so it was popular to blame them for the epidemic. This led to increased
persecution of the Jews and pogroms in some areas. Thousands of Jews fled to
Poland which, ironically, was spared by the plague.
Beginning in the
14th century, the
Baltic Sea became one of the most important
trade routes. The
Hanseatic League, an alliance of trading cities, facilitated the absorption of vast areas of
Poland,
Lithuania and other
Baltic countries into the
economy of Europe.
The conventional end of the
Middle Ages is usually associated with the fall of the city
Constantinople and of the
Byzantine Empire to the
Ottoman Turks in 1453. The Turks made the city (with the new name of
Istanbul) the capital of their
Ottoman Empire, which lasted until 1919 and also included
Egypt,
Syria and most of the
Balkans.
Europe in the [[1470s]]
In the
15th century, at the end of the
Middle Ages, powerful nation states had appeared, built by the
New Monarchs who had centralized power in
France,
England, and
Spain. Contrariwise, the Church was losing much of its power because of corruption, internal conflicts, and the spread of culture leading to the
artistic,
philosophical,
scientific and
technological improvements of the
Renaissance era.
The new nation states were frequently in a state of political flux and war. In particular, after
Martin Luther started the Reformation in 1517, wars of politics and religion ravaged the continent: the schism of the dominant western church was to have major political, social and cultural implications for Europe. What became the split between
Catholicism and
Protestantism was particularly pronounced in
England (where the king Henry VIII severed ties with Rome and proclaimed himself head of the church), and in
Germany (where
the Reformation united the various Protestant princes against the Catholic Hapsburg emperors).
Unlike
Western Europe, the countries of
Central Europe, the
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and
Hungary, resolved religious questions by adopting
religious tolerance. Central Europe was already split between Eastern and Western Christianity. Now it became divided between Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox and Jews.
Colonial expansion
The numerous wars did not prevent the new states from exploring and conquering wide portions of the world, particularly in
Asia (
Siberia) and in the newly-discovered America. In the
15th century,
Portugal led the way in geographical exploration, followed by
Spain in early
16th century, were the first states to set up colonies in
South America and trade stations on the shores of
Africa and Asia, but they were soon followed by
France,
England and the
Netherlands.
Colonial expansion proceeded in the following centuries (with some setbacks, such as the
American Revolution and the wars of independence in many South American colonies). Spain had control of a great deal of
South America, the
Caribbean and the
Philippines; Britain took the whole of
Australia and
New Zealand, most of
India, and large parts of
Africa and
North America; France held parts of
Canada and India (nearly all of which was lost to Britain in 1763),
Indochina and large parts of
Africa; the Netherlands gained the
East Indies (now
Indonesia) and islands in the
Caribbean; Portugal obtained
Brazil and several territories in Africa and Asia; and later, powers such as
Germany,
Belgium,
Italy and
Russia acquired further colonies.
The Reformation had profound effects on the unity of Europe. Not only were nations divided one from another by their religious orientation, but some states were torn apart internally by religious strife, avidly fostered by their external enemies.
France suffered this fate in the
16th century in the series of conflicts known as the
French Wars of Religion, which ended in the triumph of the
Bourbon Dynasty. England avoided this fate for a while and settled down under
Elizabeth to a moderate
Anglicanism.
Germany, divided into numerous small states under the theoretical framework of the
Holy Roman Empire, was also divided along internally drawn sectarian lines, until the
Thirty Years' War seemed to see religion replaced by
nationalism as the motor of European conflict.
Throughout the early part of this period,
capitalism was replacing
feudalism as the principal form of economic organization, at least in the western half of Europe. The expanding colonial frontiers resulted in a
Commercial Revolution. The period is noted for the rise of modern
science and the application of its findings to technological improvements, which culminated in the
Industrial Revolution. New forms of trade and expanding horizons made new developments in
international law necessary.
After the Treaty of Westphalia which ended the
Thirty Years War,
Absolutism became the norm of the continent, while parts of Europe experimented with constitutions foreshadowed by the
English Civil War and particularly the
Glorious Revolution. European military conflict did not cease, but had less disruptive effects on the lives of Europeans. In the advanced north-west, the Enlightenment gave a philosophical underpinning to the new outlook, and the continued spread of
literacy, made possible by the
printing press, created new secular forces in thought.
Eastern Europe was an arena of conflict for domination between
Sweden, the
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the
Ottoman Empire. This period saw a gradual decline of these three powers which were eventually replaced by new enlightened absolutist monarchies,
Russia,
Prussia and
Austria. By the turn of the
19th century they became new powers, having
divided Poland between them, with Sweden and Turkey having experienced substantial territorial losses to Russia and Austria respectively. Numerous Polish Jews emigrated to Western Europe, founding Jewish communities in places where they had been expelled from during the Middle Ages.
The English Civil War
Main article: English Civil War
The English Civil War was a battle between
King Charles I and
Parliament. Under
Elizabeth I and
James I England had become a relatively prosperous state. However, the acession of
Charles I would see great changes.
The first and foremost cause of the English Civil War was
religion. Elizabeth had established the
Anglican Church in 1559 and had deliberately avoided controversial issues, such as
Catholic-style
relics in churches and ceremonial vestments in order to keep the peace. James had allowed the Elizabethan Church to continue. However, when Charles became King in 1625 he allowed an Arminian style of Anglicanism, which seemed like a slide back toward Catholicism and
popery. Charles' marriage to the
French Catholic
princess Henrietta Maria seemed to confirm this slide.
Charles could never seem to get along with Parliaments, and unproductive sessions in 1625, 1626, 1628 and 1629 resulted in Charles's closure of Parliament for 11 years — called by his opponents the 11 Years Tyranny. Neither King or Parliament could agree over his (really his favourite minister
the 1st Duke of Buckingham's) very expensive wars against Spain and France. Therefore, as Charles relied on Parliament for money, he spent carefully and ruthlessly enforced prerogative taxation, the most contentious of which was
Ship Money.
Buckingham was murdered in 1628 and Charles's new ministers were Thomas Wentworth, 1st
Earl of Strafford and
William Laud,
Archbishop of Canterbury. Wentworth became Lord Deputy of
Ireland in 1633 to ensure the colony became more profitable. Laud however started the
Bishops Wars when in 1637 he tried to introduce the English Prayer Book in Scotland, and so the Scots invaded England in 1640.
Charles was forced to call Parliament to raise money for an army. However Parliament wanted its grievances addressed and was furious at not being referred to for 11 years. The
Petition of Right, pushed through Parliament by the main opposition leader,
John Pym, forced Charles to agree that the English people had rights and liberties and that he had been undermining them. Strafford was executed on 12 May 1641, and Laud was to follow him to the scaffold in 1645. Charles attempted to arrest Pym and five other members in
February 1642 after they attempted to impeach the
Queen, claiming that Henrietta had been attempting to control Charles and impose a French style tyranny on them.
The King and his family left
London in
May 1642 and the Queen and her children sailed for
France. The raising of the royal standard at
Nottingham started war. Charles's side were called the
Cavaliers; Parliament's side were the Roundheads. In spite of initial successes, Charles's defeat was assured by 1644, when Pym signed an agreement with the Scots. Charles was defeated and captured at
Marston Moor in 1647, but he fled to the
Isle of Wight and enlisted the help of the Scots, as Parliament had reneged on their agreement. However, his hopes came to naught when the Roundheads defeated them at
Naseby.
Pym had since died and the
Grandees in the
New Model Army and Parliament including
Oliver Cromwell, faced with Charles's perceived duplicity, reluctantly came to the conclusion that they would have to kill him. Charles was brought to trial by a special court in
January 1649, he was found guilty by
fifty nine Commissioners (Judges) of high treason and executed the same month. With the abolition of the
Monarchy Britain entered a period known as the English Commonwealth, Government by a
Council of State with a
Rump Parliament as the legislator. Real power rested with the Grandees of the New Model Army and in 1653 Oliver Cromwell became
Lord Protector of
the Protectorate. After Cromwell died in 1658 his son
Richard Cromwell inherited the title of Lord Protector but not the power. After a short return of the Commonwealth, the
English Interregnum came to an end with the
English Restoration of the Monarchy under the son of Charles I, King
Charles II of England.
The French Revolution
Main article: French Revolution
By 1789
France was on the verge of crisis, but
revolution was not obvious before this time. Its causes were royal absolutism, ideas of the
Enlightenment (embodied particularly in the person of
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a French
philosopher), and the American war of independence.
King Louis XVI's absolute refusal to give up power resulted in the
storming of the Bastille in
Paris on 14 July 1789. Louis was forced to call the
Estates-General, the
French Parliament, which had last been called in 1614. This comprised of the three estates -- the
clergy (
First Estate), the nobility (
Second Estate) and the commons (
Third Estate). The parliament issued the Declaration of the Rights of Man, demanding an end to the feudal system. The
Tennis Court Oath of 1790 led to the drafting of a
constitution by the Third Estate for a
constitutional monarchy, which the King ignored. As the famine which had plagued France deepened, hundreds of Parisians marched on the royal chateau at
Versailles, demanding bread. Louis was hunting at this time, and his hated Austrian wife,
Marie-Antoinette, fled. Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité (Liberty, Equality and Fraternity) became the catchcry of the revolution. Word has it that when Louis saw this march on Versailles, he asked one of his ministers, "Is it a revolt?". This minister replied, "No Sire, it is a revolution." Louis failed to respond and increased violence led the King and
Queen, with the royal children, attempting to flee to
Austria. They got as far as
Varennes, in northern France, before they were discovered and were forced to return to
Paris. (The King's side portrait was on all currency. Due to his prominent nose, he was recognized by a commoner.) The Duke of Brunswick, the brother of Marie-Antoinette, issued the
Brunswick Manifesto, threatening war against the French revolutionaries if the Queen and the royal family were injured in any way. In 1791 the
Committee of Public Safety, led by the sans-culotte formed the French Republic, headed by the lawyer
Maximilien Robespierre. Over 40 000 Parisians were executed by the newly invented
guillotine, in an effort to rid France of all
aristocrats. Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette were to share their fate in 1793, or Year II of the Republic. Robespierre was eventually conspired against and guillotined in 1794.
Austria and France went to war after the deaths of Louis and Marie-Antoinette, but the Austrians were defeated. It is important to note that the French Revolution was also a revolt against the Catholic Church. Church property was seized, many clergy were killed and Papal authority was challenged. Never again would the Catholic Church have as much influence on France.
Napoleonic Wars
The revolutionary period ended when General Napoleon Bonaparte seized control of the government in 1799. Although he began as a defender of the Revolution against aggression from Austria and Britain, he conquered half Europe before finally being defeated and deposed by the powers allied against him.
Congress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna was a conference between ambassadors from the major powers in Europe. It was held in Vienna from 1 October 1814, to 9 June 1815. The discussions continued despite Napoleon's return and the Congress's Final Act was signed nine days before his final defeat at Waterloo. The Congress was concerned with determining the entire shape of Europe after the Napoleonic wars, with the exception of the terms of peace with France, which had already been decided by the
Treaty of Paris in May 1814.
The Congress's principal results, apart from its confirmation of France's loss of the territories annexed in 1795 - 1810, were the enlargement of Russia, (which gained most of the
Duchy of Warsaw) and Prussia, which acquired
Westphalia and the northern
Rhineland. Germany was consolidated from the ~300 states of the
Holy Roman Empire (dissolved in 1806) into 39 states. These states were formed into a loose German Confederation under the leadership of Prussia and Austria.
Representatives at the Congress agreed to numerous other territorial changes. Norway was transferred from Denmark to Sweden. Austria gained Lombardy-Venetia in Northern Italy, while much of the rest of North-Central Italy went to Habsburg dynasts (The
Grand Duchy of Tuscany, the
Duchy of Modena, and the
Duchy of Parma). The Pope was restored to the Papal States. The Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia was restored to its mainland possessions, and also gained control of the Republic of Genoa. In Southern Italy the Bourbon
Ferdinand IV was restored to the throne.
A large United Kingdom of the Netherlands was created for the Prince of Orange, including both the old
United Provinces and the formerly Austrian-ruled territories in the Southern Netherlands.
There were other, less important territorial adjustments, including significant territorial gains for the German Kingdoms of Hanover and Bavaria, and the Portuguese rights to the Territory of Olivenza were recognized.
The countries involved with the Congress also agreed to meet at intervals and this led to the establishment of the "
Congress system". This system was frequently criticized by 19th century historians for ignoring national and liberal impulses associated with the French Revolution. However, in the twentieth century many historians began to admire the work of the statesmen at the Congress of Vienna, whose work appeared to have prevented another large-scale European war for nearly one hundred years (1818-1914).
After the defeat of revolutionary
France, the other great powers tried to restore the situation which existed before 1789. However, their efforts were unable to stop the spread of revolutionary movements: the
middle classes had been deeply influenced by the ideals of democracy of the French revolution, the
Industrial Revolution brought important economical and social changes, the lower classes started to be influenced by Socialist, Communist and Anarchistic ideas (especially those summarized by
Karl Marx in the Manifesto of the Communist Party), and the preference of the new capitalists became
Liberalism (a term which then, politically, meant something different from the modern usage). Further instability came from the formation of several
nationalist movements (in
Germany,
Italy,
Poland etc.), seeking national unification and/or liberation from foreign rule. As a result, the period between 1815 and 1871 saw a large number of revolutionary attempts and independence wars. Even though the revolutionaries were often defeated, most European states had become
constitutional (rather than absolute) monarchies by 1871, and Germany and Italy had developed into nation states.
The political dynamics of Europe changed three times over the
19th century - once after the
Congress of Vienna, and again after the
Crimean War. In 1815 at the Congress of Vienna, the major powers of Europe managed to produce a peaceful
balance of power among the empires after the
Napoleonic wars (despite the occurrence of internal revolutionary movements). But the peace would only last until the
Ottoman Empire had declined enough to become a target for the others. (See history of the Balkans#Rise of Independence.) This instigated the Crimean War in 1854 and began a tenser period of minor clashes among the globe-spanning empires of Europe that set the stage for the
first World War. It changed a third time with the end of the various wars that turned the
Kingdom of Sardinia and the
Kingdom of Prussia into the Italian and German nation-states, significantly changing the balance of power in Europe.
After the relative peace of most of the
19th Century, the rivalry between European powers exploded in 1914, when
World War I started. On one side were
Germany,
Austria-Hungary,
Italy and
Turkey (the
Central Powers/
Triple Alliance), while on the other side stood
Serbia and the
Triple Entente - the loose coalition of
France,
Britain and
Russia, which were joined by
Italy in 1915 and by the
United States in 1917. Despite the defeat of Russia in 1917 (the war was one of the major causes of the
Russian Revolution, leading to the formation of the communist
Soviet Union), the
Entente finally prevailed in the autumn of 1918.
In the
Treaty of Versailles (1919) the winners imposed hard conditions on Germany and recognized the new states (such as
Poland,
Czechoslovakia and
Yugoslavia) created in
central Europe out of the defunct German, Austro-Hungarian and Russian empires, supposedly on the basis of national self-determination. In the following decades, fear of
Communism and the economic
Depression of 1929-1933 led to the rise of extreme governments - Fascist or National Socialist - in Italy (1922), Germany (1933), Spain (after a civil war ending in 1939) and other countries such as
Hungary.
After allying with Mussolini's Italy in the "
Pact of Steel" and signing a
non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union, the German dictator Adolf Hitler started
World War II in September 1939 following a military build-up throughout the late
1930s. After initial successes (mainly the conquest of western Poland, much of
Scandinavia, France and the
Balkans before 1941) the
Axis powers began to over-extend themselves in 1941. Hitler's ideological foes were the Communists in Russia but because of the German failure to defeat Britain and the Italian failures in North Africa and the Mediterranean the Axis forces were split between garrisoning western Europe and Scandinavia and also attacking Africa. Thus, the attack on the Soviet Union which had partitioned central Europe together with Germany in 1939-1940, was not pressed with sufficient strength. Despite initial successes, the German army was stopped close to
Moscow in December 1941. Over the next year the tide was turned and the Germans started to suffer a series of defeats, for example in the siege of
Stalingrad and at
Kursk. Meanwhile,
Japan (allied to Germany and Italy since September 1940) attacked the British in
south-east Asia and the United States in Hawaii on
December 7, 1941; Germany then completed its over-extension by declaring war on the United States. War raged between the Axis Powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) and the Allied Forces (
British Empire, Soviet Union, and the United States). Allied Forces won in
North Africa, invaded Italy in 1943, and invaded occupied France in 1944. In the spring of 1945 Germany itself was invaded from the east by Russia and from the west by the other Allies respectively; Hitler committed suicide and Germany surrendered in early May ending the war in Europe.
World War I and especially
World War II ended the pre-eminent position of
western Europe. The map of Europe was redrawn at the
Yalta Conference and divided as it became the principal zone of contention in the
Cold War between the two power blocs, the
capitalistic Western_countries and the communist
Soviet Union. The U.S. and Western Europe (
Britain,
France,
Italy,
West Germany, etc.) established the
NATO alliance as a protection against a possible Soviet invasion. Later, the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe (
Poland,
Czechoslovakia,
Hungary,
Romania,
Bulgaria,
East Germany) established the
Warsaw Pact as a protection against a possible U.S. invasion.
Meanwhile, Western Europe slowly began a process of political and economic integration, desiring to unite Europe and prevent another war. This process resulted eventually in the development of organizations such as the
European Union and the
Council of Europe.
Soviet leader
Mikhail Gorbachev initiated
perestroika and
glasnost, which weakened Soviet influence in Eastern Europe. Soviet-supported governments collapsed, and West Germany absorbed East Germany by 1990. In 1991 the Soviet Union itself collapsed, splitting into fifteen states, with the Russian Federation taking the Soviet Union's seat on the United Nations Security Council.
The most violent breakup happened in
Yugoslavia, in the Balkans. Four (
Slovenia,
Croatia,
Bosnia and Herzegovina and
Macedonia) out of six Yugoslav republics declared independence and for most of them a violent war ensued, in some parts lasting until 1995. The remaining two republics formed a new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, under the direction of
Slobodan Milosevic. Milosevic presided over the
Kosovo War, and was overthrown after his government was weakened by NATO airstrikes against Yugoslavia. Following the ouster of Milosevic, the country changed its name to
Serbia and Montenegro as a move to placate the frictions between the two federal units and claimed to be instituting a Western-style democracy.
In the post-Cold War era, NATO and the EU have been gradually admitting most of the former members of the Warsaw Pact.
The Treaty of Rome signing ceremony.
Early 21st century: the European Union
The process of
European integration was slow due to the reluctance of most nation states to give up their
sovereignty. However, the process began to accelerate in the early
21st century. Whereas the
European Union started out as a loose economic alliance among European nations, the European Union took further steps to more closely integrate the member states, and make the EU into a more supranational organisation.
At the turn of the century, nations within the European Union had created a
free trade zone and eliminated most travel barriers across their borders. A new common currency for Europe, the
Euro, was established electronically in 1999, officially tying all of the currencies of each participating nation to each other. The new currency was put into circulation in 2002 and most of the old currencies were phased out. However, not all
EU member states have decided to join the Euro project, including the
United Kingdom,
Denmark and
Sweden.
As of 2005, the European Union is in the process of ratifying a new constitution, inducting additional member states (most of them in
central Europe) and to consolidate various treaties. However, the creation of the constitution has been controversial, it is seen by many eurosceptics as a step towards a single EU state. There has been disagreement as member states wrangle over how much voting power each will have in EU, taxes, and the standards to which new member states must be held before they are admitted.
Histories of present-day territories
#
Armenia and Georgia are countries ethnically associated with Europe, but exist in the continentally Asian portion of the Caucasus
#
Greenland is politically European (i.e., belonging to Denmark), but is peopled mostly by Inuit and geographically is part of North America. Greenland left the EEC in 1982.
#
Iceland is culturally and politically European, but geographically isolated on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge junction of the American and European continental plates. Iceland is member of the EFTA, and EEA, not of the EU.
#
Russia's western lands are in Europe, whereas its vast eastern lands are in Asia (see Siberia)
#
Turkey straddles Asia and Europe, with a small portion of its territory -- Thrace -- and Istanbul being situated in Europe, and the remainder geographically part of Asia. Turkey is currently in talks to join the EU.
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