This widely-shared understanding of Europe’s recent past blended the memory of Depression, the struggle between Democracy and Fascism, the moral legitimacy of the welfare state, and—for many on both sides of the Iron Curtain—the expectation of social progress. It was the Master Narrative of the twentieth century; and when its core assumptions began to erode and crumble, they took with them not just a handful of public-sector companies but a whole political culture and much else besides.
