quality:correction, quality:corruption
The post-war period

After World War II, "both Protestant and Catholic political activists helped to restore democracy to war-torn Europe and extend it overseas". Christian resistors were significant in establishing post-war Christian democracy movements in France, Germany, and Italy. The collapse of fascism led to the discrediting of the radical right. In Germany, conservatism was associated with reactionary and anti-democratic attitudes. The Christian democrats could claim to be untainted by fascism and thereby draw together conservative Catholics and bourgeois Protestants. In both Germany and Italy, the Christian democratic parties encompassed former conservatives. The Christian democratic parties dominated the post-war scene. In Italy, the new Christian Democratic Party led the coalition government under Alcide De Gasperi, and in France, the Popular Republican Movement became the largest party in parliament in 1946. In Germany, France, and Italy, the Christian democratic parties helped establish their respective countries' constitutions. Between the 1940s and 1990s, Christian democratic parties were in power across western Europe; "In Germany they were in power for 36 years out of 50, in Italy for 47 years out of 52, in Belgium 47 years out of 53, and in Netherlands for 49 years of 53; even in France they were influential up to 1962".

In the post-war period, Christian democratic parties became more conservative, partially in response to communism and secularism. The Christian democrats also won the women's vote in their respective countries due to the pro-family policies of Christian democrats. Christian democrats pursued decentralization policies during this time, encouraging regionalism in Germany, Italy, and Belgium. This was sought with increased favor as a result of experiencing fascism. Christian democratic parties were also crucial in pushing for codeterminative works councils and workers on boards during this time. Despite this initial power, cracks started to appear; Christian democracy in France declined substantially, as Popular Republican Movement and its successors quickly fell apart. French Christian democrats would ultimately become subsumed into Gaullist parties.

Similarly, minor Christian democratic parties such as the People's Democratic Party (PDP) would rise in post-Franco Spain. However, these movements were too divided and lacked the political necessity of religious cleavages to play a dominant role in Spanish democracy. These Christian democratic parties would fail, and the Christian democrats would join the Spanish Popular Party.

Protestant Christian democracy developed in multifaceted ways in the post-war period. In Germany, it arose amongst the Lutheran ordoliberals. These Lutherans looked to Christian theologians such as Karl Barth and Dietrich Bonhoeffer to path a way that obeyed worldly authority but also challenged the Nazi regime. The core of the ordoliberal ideology was a strong state that enabled market competition. During the war, the ordoliberals worked with Bonhoeffer to develop a political and socio-economic plan for the post-war period, and after the war, they joined with Catholics to form the Christian Democratic Union. The ordoliberals termed their vision a " social market economy ", a vision the Catholics would also come to champion. In Sweden, it arose amongst the Pentecostals, where it coalesced in the Christian Democrats, founded in 1964 as a reaction to secularization. The Finnish Christian Democrats, formed in 1957, and the Danish Christian People's Party, formed in 1970, defended Christian schooling and dissented against secular trends such as atheism and liberal abortion policies. The Nordic Christian democratic parties did not represent the Lutheran state church but non-conformist Christians and lay activists within the Lutheran state church. In the Netherlands, the Protestant Anti-Revolutionary Party and Christian Historical Union joined the Catholic People's Party to form Christian Democratic Appeal.

European Christian democrats were a significant force in the creation of the European Union. At the beginning of the European project, three significant men were Konrad Adenauer, Robert Schuman, and Alcide De Gasperi, all Christian democrats. When the Rome Treaty was signed, Christian democrats were the leading governments in four of the six countries, Germany, Italy, Belgium, and Luxembourg, and were a part of the coalition government in the Netherlands at the time. At least until the mid-1980s, social democrats were hostile to the institutions of the European Communities – even in the 1970s, Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme called the European Commission "conservative", "capitalist", "clerical", and "colonialist". Indeed, the European Union has the ideas of subsidiarity and personalism embedded within it. The influence of Christian democracy on the European Union is such that one academic has called the European Union a "Christian democracy". Alongside the European Union was the development of European Christian democratic parties. This appeared in the 1940s with the Nouvelles Equipes Internationales, which would evolve into the European Union of Christian Democrats in 1965, and, finally, the European People's Party in 1976.