Boeing Commemorative Lecture 2014: Choice or accident? The outbreak of the First World War

Wikipedia:

Margaret Olwen MacMillan, OC (born 23 December 1943 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada) is a historian and professor at the University of Oxford, where she is Warden of St Antony's College. She is former provost of Trinity College and professor of history at the University of Toronto and previously at Ryerson University. A leading expert on history and international relations, MacMillan is a frequent commentator in the media.

Her most successful work is Peacemakers: The Paris Peace Conference of 1919 and Its Attempt to End War, also published as Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World. Peacemakers won the Duff Cooper Prize for outstanding literary work in the field of history, biography or politics; the Hessell-Tiltman Prize for History; the prestigious Samuel Johnson Prize for the best work of non-fiction published in the United Kingdom and the 2003 Governor General's Literary Award in Canada. MacMillan has served on the boards of the Canadian Institute for International Affairs, the Atlantic Council of Canada, the Ontario Heritage Foundation, Historica and the Churchill Society for the Advancement of Parliamentary Democracy (Canada). She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, an Honorary Fellow of St Antony's College, Oxford and a Senior Fellow of Massey College, University of Toronto. She has honorary degrees from the University of King's College, the Royal Military College of Canada and Ryerson University, Toronto. She was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in February, 2006.

Video Title: Boeing Commemorative Lecture 2014: Choice or accident? The outbreak of the First World War. Source: AustWarMemorial. Date Publised: March 30, 2014. Description:

Delivered by Professor Margaret MacMillan, Warden of St Antony's College and Professor of International History at the University of Oxford.

Professor Margaret MacMillan discusses the causes of the First World War, based on her new book, The war that ended peace.

There is still no agreement, and may never be, on how the First World War started. Some blame forces such as militarism, nationalism, imperialism, and economic rivalries, while others single out decision-makers such as Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany or Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Minister. In this lecture Margaret MacMillan examines the possible explanations for the catastrophe which overwhelmed Europe.

Skip to the 9:30 mark for the lecture.