6.2 Global Conflicts and their Consequences

Period 6 – Accelerating Global Change and Realignments, c. 1900 CE to present

At the beginning of the 20th century, a European-dominated global political order existed, which also included the United States, Russia, and Japan. Over the course of the century, peoples and states around the world challenged this order in ways that sought to redistribute power within the existing order and to restructure empires, while those peoples and states in power attempted to maintain the status quo. Other peoples and states sought to overturn the political order itself. These challenges to, and the attempts to maintain, the political order manifested themselves in an unprecedented level of conflict with high human casualties. In the context of these conflicts, many regimes in both older and newer states struggled with maintaining political stability and were challenged by internal and external factors, including ethnic and religious conflicts, secessionist movements, territorial partitions, economic dependency, and the legacies of colonialism.

Key Concept 6.2.II.D references the Mexican Revolution.

Key Concept 6.2.II.E has been added and addresses that religious movements sought to redefine the relationship between the individual and the state.

Key Concept 6.2.III.A has been clarified to specify India, Pakistan, and Israel.

Key Concept 6.2.IV.E has been added and addresses the ending of the Cold War.

Key Concept 6.2.V.A references Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and

Nelson Mandela.

The older, land-based Ottoman, Russian, and Qing empires collapsed due to a combination of internal and external factors.

Between the two world wars, European imperial states often maintained control over their colonies and in some cases gained additional territories.

After the end of World War II, some colonies negotiated their independence, while other colonies achieved independence through armed struggle.

Illustrative examples, negotiated independence:

• India from the British Empire
• The Gold Coast from the British Empire
• French West Africa

Illustrative examples, independence through armed struggle:

• Algeria and Vietnam from the French Empire
• Angola from the Portuguese Empire
• Kenya from the British Empire
• The Mau Mau rebellion against the British Empire

Nationalist leaders and parties in Asia and Africa sought varying degrees of autonomy within or independence from imperial rule.

Illustrative examples, nationalist leaders and parties:

• Indian National Congress
• Ho Chi Minh in French Indochina (Vietnam)
• Kwame Nkrumah in British Gold Coast (Ghana)

Regional, religious, and ethnic movements challenged both colonial rule and inherited imperial boundaries

Illustrative examples, regional, religious, and ethnic movements:

• The Muslim League in British India
• The Québécois separatist movement in Canada
• The Biafra secessionist movement in Nigeria

Transnational movements sought to unite people across national boundaries.

Illustrative examples, transnational movements:

• Communism
• Pan-Arabism
• Pan-Africanism

The Mexican Revolution arose in opposition to neocolonialism and economic imperialism, and movements to redistribute land and resources developed within states in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, sometimes advocating communism or socialism.

In many parts of the world, religious movements sought to redefine the relationship between the individual and the state.

The redrawing of old colonial boundaries led to conflict as well as population displacement and/or resettlements, such as the partitioning of India and Pakistan and population displacements following the creation of the state of Israel.

The migration of former colonial subjects to imperial metropoles (the former colonizing country, usually in the major cities) maintained cultural and economic ties between the colony and the metropole even after the dissolution of empires.

Illustrative examples, migrations:

• South Asians to Britain
• Algerians to France
• Filipinos to the United States

The rise of extremist groups in power led to the annihilation of specific populations, notably in the Holocaust during World War II, and to other atrocities, acts of genocide, or ethnic violence.

Illustrative examples, genocide or ethnic violence:

• Armenians in Turkey during and after World War I
• Cambodia during the late 1970s
• Tutsi in Rwanda in the 1990s

World War I and World War II were the first total wars. Governments used a variety of strategies, including political propaganda, art, media, and intensified forms of nationalism, to mobilize populations (both in the home countries and the colonies or former colonies) for the purpose of waging war. Governments used ideologies, including fascism and communism, to mobilize all of their state’s resources for war and, in the case of totalitarian states, to direct many aspects of daily life during the course of the conflicts and beyond.

The sources of global conflict in the first half of the century varied and included imperialist expansion by European powers and Japan, competition for resources, the economic crisis engendered by the Great Depression, and the rise of fascist and totalitarian regimes to positions of power.

The global balance of economic and political power shifted after the end of World War II and rapidly evolved into the Cold War. The democracy of the United States and the communist Soviet Union emerged as superpowers, which led to ideological conflict and a power struggle between capitalism and communism across the globe. This conflict extended beyond its basic ideological origins to have profound effects on economic, political, social, and cultural aspects of global events.

The Cold War produced new military alliances, including NATO and the Warsaw Pact, and promoted proxy wars between and within postcolonial states in Latin America, Africa, and Asia.

Expansions in U.S. military spending and technological development, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and economic weakness in communist countries led to the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Groups and individuals challenged the many wars of the century, and some, such as Mohandas Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and Nelson Mandela, promoted the practice of nonviolence as a way to bring about political change.

Groups and individuals, including the Non-Aligned Movement, opposed and promoted alternatives to the existing economic, political, and social orders.

Illustrative examples, groups and individuals opposing or promoting alternatives:

• The Anti-Apartheid Movement in South Africa
• Participants in the global uprisings of 1968
• The Tiananmen Square protesters that promoted democracy in China

Militaries and militarized states often responded to the proliferation of conflicts in ways that further intensified conflict.

Illustrative examples, responses that intensified conflict:

• Military dictatorship in Chile, Spain, and Uganda
• The buildup of the military industrial complex and weapons trading

Some movements used violence against civilians to achieve political aims.

Illustrative examples, movements that used violence:

• IRA
• ETA
• Al-Qaeda

In communist states, such as the Soviet Union and China, governments controlled their national economies, often through repressive policies and with negative repercussions for their populations.

Illustrative examples, communist governments controlling their national economies:

• The Five Year Plans
• The Great Leap Forward

Following World War I and the onset of the Great Depression, governments began to take a more active role in economic life.

Illustrative examples, government intervention in the economy:

• The New Deal
• The fascist corporatist economy
• Popularist governments of Brazil and Mexico

In newly independent states after World War II, governments often took on a strong role in guiding economic life to promote development.

Illustrative examples, governments guiding economic life:

• Nasser’s promotion of economic development in Egypt
• Nehru’s planned economy in India
• Julius Nyere in Tanzania

In a trend accelerated by the end of the Cold War, many governments encouraged free-market economic policies and promoted economic liberalization in the late 20th century.

Illustrative examples, governments encouraging free-market policies:

• The United States beginning with Ronald Reagan
• Britain under Margaret Thatcher
• China under Deng Xiaoping
• Chile under Pinochet
• Pacific Rim nations
• Korea
• Vietnam

In the late 20th century, revolutions in information and communications technology led to the growth of knowledge economies in some regions, while industrial production and manufacturing were increasingly situated in developing economies including the Pacific Rim and Latin America

Illustrative examples, Pacific Rim economies

• Japan w Korea
• Singapore
• China
• Vietnam

New international organizations formed to maintain world peace and to facilitate international cooperation

Illustrative examples, new international organizations:

• The League of Nations
• The United Nations
• The International Criminal Court

Changing economic institutions and regional trade agreements reflected the spread of principles and practices associated with freemarket economics throughout the world.

Illustrative examples, changing economic institutions:

• The International Monetary Fund (IMF)
• The World Bank
• The World Trade Organization (WTO)
• Multinational corporations (MNC)

Illustrative examples, regional trade agreements:

• The European Economic Community (EEC)
• North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
• Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
• Mercosur

Movements throughout the world protested the inequality of the environmental and economic consequences of global integration.

Illustrative examples, protest movements:

• Greenpeace
• The Green Belt Movement in Kenya
• Earth Day

People conceptualized society and culture in new ways; rights-based discourses challenged old assumptions about race, class, gender, and religion. In much of the world, access to education, as well as participation in new political and professional roles, became more inclusive in terms of these factors.

Illustrative examples, challenges to assumptions about race, class, gender, and religion:

• The U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights especially as it sought to protect the rights of children, women, and refugees
• Global feminism movements
• Negritude movement
• Liberation theology in Latin America
• Islamic renewal movements in Egypt and Saudi Arabia