Emergence+of++a+New+Society

Sara Yogi
 * Explain how Western Society was structured during the Postwar Era.*

Middle Class: - white-collar employees INCREASE -specialized knowledge/higher education necessary for jobs

Lower Class: -farmer workforce decreased -industrial labor force decrease


 * Increased mass leisure for all; mass consumerism for automobiles, growth of mass tourism, popular culture commercialized*

Welfare State: -eliminating poverty, medical service, extending education etc. (improve/make lives meaningful) -affordable health care -family allowance -increase amount of money spent on social services -Women recognized as mothers or individuals? (British/Germany = Women stay home; Communist/France = Women work; traces of Women being mothers/housewives)

Women: -"Baby Boom"; female workforce population decline -decline of family size attributed to birth control practices -increase number of married women in workforce; still gender inequalities in workforce (women own lower salaries)

Feminist Movement: -female participation in WWII helped them attain right to vote -1960s = feminist movement -Simone de Beauvoir's THE SECOND SEX - (women considered "second-class" status) -Betty Friedan's THE FEMININE MYSTIQUE - (analyze problems of middle-class American women; "ideal housewife and mother") -Friedan's National Organization of Women (NOW): bring women into American society, exercise same privileges of men

Permissive Society: -experimentation with drugs, hard-core pornography, sexual freedom (freedom = more sex because of pills/condoms) -Sweden: sex education, "decriminalization" of homosexuality -sexual material released (once-hidden subjects)...Amsterdam -divorce rates increase (premarital/extramarital affairs increase) -Playboy (encourage men for outside sexual gratification) -drug culture includes marijuana, LSD

Education/Student Revolt: -greater equality for higher education (reduce fees...more students from middle and lower classes) -problems (too many students, ignorant professors, authoritarian administrators) leads to outbursts -French student revolt in Nanterre (students want greater voice in administration of university); invite workers on strike to join students...Gaullist gov. repressed actions -West Berlin: university students revolt against Axel Springer (influence by Marcuse's ONE- DIMENSIONAL MAN...students liberate masses from control of capitalist ruling class)