ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how Karl Marx and Baron de La Brede et de Montesquieu were adjusting their outlook on Western world order at the beginning of the twentieth century before the First World War. It considers the impact made on the outlook of some historians and other representative writers by that great conflict. In particular, the chapter focuses on the full acceptance in the West, especially the now so-called English-speaking West, of the idea of an Atlantic community, including the United States of America, and the demise of a previously widely accepted cultural concept, that of a ‘Teutonic’ group of nations including the United Kingdom and the United States along with Germany. The First World War had indeed shaken the foundations of European civilisation, including those of the offshore islands, while promoting a shift in the centre of gravity of the wider Atlantic community.
