Why do ruling classes fear history?

Abstract

m 1989 was the two-hundredth anniversary of the French Revolution, *and — contrary to the schemes of the governing classes, West and ,* East — developments of that year seemed to provide dramatic living Q proof that the grand ideals of 1789 were not just remembered but still I inspiring and informing action. Across Eurasia and beyond, struggles for HI liberty, equality and democracy asserted themselves. Rebellions claimed ' control of public spaces and toppled rulers and regimes. There were r~ triumphs like the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, and there were tragedies like the Tiananmen Square massacre. But, together, these events . reminded people globally of the popular desire for freedom and the c demand for power to the people! There was reason to celebrate and to 7i believe more was yet to come. HI And yet, within just a few years the hope and sense of possibility engendered by those events and the end of the Cold War have been overtaken by other, darker developments and the spiritual order of the day has become one of despair and cynicism. Emulating the most brutal traditions of this 'age of extremes' (as Eric Hobsbawm has dubbed the twentieth century), the politics of the new world order are apparently dominated by greed, hatred, and mass murder — sadly, I need merely mention Somalia, Bosnia, Rwanda. European life is marked by resurgent nationalisms, fascisms, xenophobia and, most bizarrely, in view of the tragic success of the Nazis to rid the continent of Jews, anti-Semitism. At the same time — and surely contributing in massive proportion to