American Empire: The Rise of a Global Power, the Democratic Revolution at Home, 1945-2000 (The Penguin History of the United States)

A landmark history of postwar America and the second volume in the Penguin History of the United States series, edited by Eric Foner

In this momentous work, acclaimed labor historian Joshua B. Freeman presents an epic portrait of the United States in the latter half of the twentieth century, revealing a nation galvanized by change even as conflict seethed within its borders. Beginning in 1945, he charts the astounding rise of the labor movement and its pitched struggle with the bastions of American capitalism in the 1940s and '50s, untangling the complicated threads between the workers’ agenda and that of the civil rights and women’s movements. Through the lens of civil rights, the Cold War struggle, and the labor movement, American Empire teaches us something profound about our past while illuminating the issues that continue to animate American political discourse today.

Joshua B. Freeman is a professor of history at Queens College and the Graduate Center of CUNY. He is the author of Working-Class New York. He lives in New York City.