| 1961 | Building of Berlin Wall suggests permanence of the East Bloc |
| 1962–1965 | Second Vatican Council |
| 1963 | Wolf publishes Divided Heaven; Friedan publishes The Feminine Mystique |
| 1964 | Civil Rights Act in the United States |
| 1964–1973 | Peak of U.S. involvement in Vietnam War |
| 1966 | Formation of National Organization for Women (NOW) |
| 1968 | Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia; “May Events” protests in France |
| 1971 | Founding of Greenpeace |
| 1973 | OPEC oil embargo |
| 1975 | Helsinki Accords |
| 1979 | Margaret Thatcher becomes British prime minister; founding of West German Green Party; Soviet invasion of Afghanistan |
| 1985 | Mikhail Gorbachev named Soviet premier |
| 1987 | United States and Soviet Union sign arms reduction treaty |
| 1989 | Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan |
| 1989–1991 | Fall of communism in eastern Europe |
| December 1991 | Dissolution of the Soviet Union |