European Civil War

The European Civil War is a concept meant to describe a series of 19th and 20th century conflicts in Europe as segments of an overarching civil war within a supposed European society. The timeframes associated to this European Civil War vary among historians. Some descriptions range from 1914 to 1945, thus including World War I, World War II and many lesser conflicts of the interwar period. Others argue that this period started in 1870, with the Franco-Prussian War, or in 1905. Sometimes, the notion also serves to explain or justify the process of European integration and the creation of the European Union as a "solution" to this conflict.

Arguments in favor of this description usually point towards the relative cultural homogeneity of the European continent to the family relation of European monarchs at the beginning of World War I or to the continuity of armed conflicts in Europe between the various time frames.

Arguments against the notion point towards the strong distinctions in religions and political systems that existed between European nations at the beginning of the period, that undermine the idea that Europe formed a united "civil society". Other stress the global, i.e. not strictly European, nature of both World Wars, which the description sometimes fails to account for. Consensus among historians does not support the notion of a European Civil War, and some even describe it as a fringe theory.

The concept of a European Civil War attempts to characterize World War I and World War II, along with the inter-war period and its conflicts, as a protracted civil war taking place in Europe. It is used in referring to the repeated confrontations that occurred during the first half of the 20th century. Unlike traditional approaches to history, this construct re-interprets the past in the light of a present reality (a semi-unified Europe), rather than interpreting past events in the light of the past.

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