Postwar Europe and the Eurovision Song Contest

Postwar Europe and the Eurovision Song Contest is the definitive history of the Eurovision Song Contest and its political and cultural significance. Drawing on pioneering archival research, Dean Vuletic traces the contest’s evolution, covering its early origins and every annual edition from 1956 to 2025. He reveals how Eurovision has reflected and shaped the political history of postwar Europe and become the world’s biggest election.
Using Eurovision as a unique lens on European societies, Vuletic explores themes ranging from democracy, revolution and war to diversity, prosperity and technology. He shows how debates concerning the contest have mirrored wider struggles over European integration, national identity and political power.
Challenging popular myths and illuminating Eurovision’s global reach, this new edition demonstrates why the contest remains the most politically revealing cultural arena of modern Europe.
This second edition includes:
· updates to the original chapters, incorporating newly discovered archival sources and recent academic publications
· an additional chapter examining developments in Eurovision’s seventh decade, including global expansion, protest movements and participant expulsions
· a new conclusion reflecting on the author’s first-person, live experience of the contest