The second (and last) of your longer essays is your last chance to demonstrate what you have learned this semester. This essay, like the previous longer essay, should be between three and five pages in length and should draw heavily from the primary source documents we have used this semester. Although you need to rely mostly on these documents for your evidence, I want to remind you that your textbook will provide you with crucial background material for your topic and so you should make full use of the text. However, any paper that is written primarily from the textbook, rather than from the documents, will be graded harshly. Remember, good historical writing is based on evidence from the past, much more than on what other historians have written about that evidence.

For this essay, you have three possible topics, all of which require you to think broadly about the material we have covered this semester. I urge you not to lock in on one or two documents and then write your paper from those sources. Instead, think carefully about everything we have worked on and then choose the evidence that best supports the argument you want to make.

Finally, remember, your paper must have a thesis.   If it does not have a thesis, it is not going to be very good.

1. In a thoughtful essay, discuss the changing status of the individual in modern European society. Be sure to discuss change over time, making reference to specific reasons why the changes you see as important occurred when they did and why things turned out the way they did.

2. Recently, the historian Gale Stokes described the collapse of communism as being the victory of "pluralism" (democracy, capitalism) over "hyper-rationalism" (socialism).  Analyze the strengths and weaknesses of both approaches–pluralist and hyper-rationalist–to government and the economy and discuss the intellectual origins of these approaches in earlier centuries. Be sure that your essay is analytical–in other words, it should not merely be an extended discourse along the lines of "capitalism good, socialism bad."

3. One of the characteristics of modern European history is that it has been filled with conflict–military, social, political, gender, etc. Analyze the underlying reasons why European society would be so conflict-ridden. You can emphasize one field of conflict over others, but should not limit yourself to just one. In other words, an essay that is only about political conflict will not be viewed as complete.

Good luck on the paper. Be sure to talk to me any time you have questions about what you are working on. It is always better to seek help than not.