Period 8: 1945-1980

Period 8 (1945-1980) is shaped by the Cold War at home and abroad: containment, the arms race, the Second Red Scare, and wars in Korea and Vietnam. Postwar prosperity built suburbs and a mass middle-class culture, while critics challenged conformity. The civil rights movement moved from court victories (Brown v. Board) to mass protest and landmark laws in the 1960s, inspiring movements for women, Latinos, American Indians, and the environment. LBJ's Great Society expanded liberalism to its peak, and by the 1970s Vietnam, Watergate, and economic trouble set up the rise of a new conservatism.