Unit 8

• Unit 8 is called the Cold War and Decolonization
• The guiding question is how do the Cold War tensions, the tensions of the conflict between the US and Soviet Union, impact the development of existing states and newly independent states
• The three tiers of the world during the Cold War

  • First World (US and allies)
  • Second World (Soviet Union and sphere of influence)
  • Third World (everywhere else)
• Many Third World states tried to be non-aligned, not allies of the US or Soviet Union
• Other Third World states became the "playground" for the US and Soviet Union, leading to proxy wars
• Competing ideologies of the Cold War

  Capitalism (US) vs. Communism (Soviet Union)
• The real motivation was economic control - the US promoting capitalism and free trade, the Soviet Union promoting communism
• Proxy wars

  Wars where the US and Soviet Union supported opposing sides, without direct fighting between them
• The Cold War was also fought through intimidation and influence, like the nuclear arms race and the space race
• Both sides engaged in propaganda campaigns to convince the world their ideology was superior
• World War II leads to the collapse of traditional big land-based or maritime empires, and colonies start fighting for independence
• Ways that new states became independent

  1. Negotiation (e.g. India and Pakistan)

  2. Wars of independence (e.g. Algeria)

  3. Religious and ethnic nationalist movements (e.g. Pakistan, Quebec)

  4. Redrawn borders (e.g. Israel)
• New states had to navigate the bipolar Cold War world, either aligning with the West or the East
• Strategies used by new states

  • Heavily government-controlled economies (e.g. India, Egypt, Tanzania)
  • Migrations of people seeking opportunities (e.g. Algerians to France, South and Southeast Asians to Britain, Filipinos to US)
  • Rise of state dictatorships (e.g. in South America)
  • Violent movements seeking to influence independence (e.g. Al-Qaeda, Shining Path)
• The end of the Cold War in the early 1990s created a power vacuum, leading to a world with one superpower (the US), the triumph of free market capitalism, and the triumph of national self-determination and democracy
• This new world order after the Cold War could lead to either total freedom or total chaos
• Recovering from the war

  • Factor resilience of an industrial society
  • Ability of Western powers to integrate their economies
  • OEEC reduced tariffs, common trade policies, now the EU common currency, the euro
• US becoming a global power

  • NATO - US defense against Soviet Union + Germany to protect Europe
  • Democratic constitution imposed on Japan made them dependent on the US for military protection
  • Convict labor force in Soviet Union
• Communism Chinese Style


  Mao Zedong
• Marshall Plan


  Post-WW2 initiative to aid economic recovery
• Communism emerged in a different environment than it did in Russia
• Building Modern Society


  1. Peaceful collectivization of agriculture

  2. Modeled the Soviet experience

  3. Cultural Revolution - campaign to combat capitalist tendencies

  4. Great Leap Forward - effort to mobilize the population, rapid industrialization

  5. Collective living, caused famine (as failure)

  6. Called for a rebellion against the communist party

  7. Red Guards attacked those deemed to be the enemy, contributed to communist collapse
• East-West Global Divide


  Cold War - Geopolitical and ideological conflict between communist powers and capitalist nations, characterized by the avoidance of direct military conflict between the USSR and the US
• Military Conflict and the Cold War

  1. Two rival alliances - NATO (US, W. Europe) vs Warsaw Pact (USSR, E. Europe)

  2. US sphere of influence on Western Europe, Soviet sphere of influence on Eastern Europe

  3. Extension of communism into Asia, prompted American + Chinese involvement

  4. Division of Korea

  5. Iron Curtain - border between Eastern and Western Europe
• Marxist party in Afghanistan, opposition movement
• Communism in Cuba brought the threat of a nuclear war between the US and USSR (Cuban Missile Crisis resolved in compromise)
• Both sides aided countries coming out of colonial rule
• Toward Freedoms - Struggles for Independence

  1. Decolonization process where African and Asian states won independence from colonial rule

  2. Decline in the legitimacy of empire, moral and political life
• The End of Empire

  Globally accepted, toward dependence
• Muslim League - political group, response to Western colonial rule
• Decolonized countries' beliefs contradicted the ideas surrounding nation-building, led to its own downfall
• Conjunction of post-WW2 and colonization led to the independence of many states, showed empires as weak/not superior
• Planning of decolonization by colonial powers
• Indian National Congress


  Political party led by Gandhi, brought India independence from Britain
• Independence occurred differently in different places, groups were divided internally
• After Freedom


  • Former colonies already independent ones known as the third world, developing countries, on the Global South
  • Constant political shifts
  • Euro states tried to implant democracy, but it didn't stick in many places
• Factors affecting democracy in post-colonial states

  • Disconnection of democracy and human rights from Western origins
  • Failure of autocratic governments, turned authoritarian in office, corrupt elections
• The End of the Communist Era

  • Globalization of democracy - political shift, brought multi-party elections, new constitutions to new countries, end of military dictatorships
  • Death of Mao, CCP abandoned Marxist-Leninist autocratic rule
  • Attempts to revive Soviet socialism led to political collapse of the USSR
  • Economic and moral failures
• Deng Xiaoping


  Leader whose reforms gut the Chinese economy of communists
• Mikhail Gorbachev


  Leader whose policies led to the collapse of the USSR