Nostalgia and Hope: Narrative Master Frames Across Contemporary Europe

After the fall of the Berlin wall and the end of the Cold War, a certain sense of optimism swept across Europe. Some 25 years later, everything seems radically different. With the considerable inroads made into mainstream politics by right-wing populist parties across the continent, there is no shortage of gloom and worry. Nevertheless, despite numerous examples of retrogressive forms of mobilization, there are also many cases of progressive mobilization. To capture this dynamic complexity, we posit politics as a site of struggle that constitutes an arena for the conflicting demands of the two master frames of nostalgia and hope. Following this logic of a polarized political terrain, the volume is divided into three parts that address both right-wing populist politics across Europe (Part I) and politics beyond party politics through either retrogressive mobilization (Part II) or emancipatory initiatives (Part III).