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    The World Between Wars Slides

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    Lauren Livingston
    After World War 1, the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh reparations on Germany that led to economic instability. Germany faced hyperinflation in the 1920s, while the Great Depression in the early 1930s caused widespread unemployment across Europe. As democratic governments struggled to respond, many citizens turned to dictators like Mussolini in Italy and Stalin in the Soviet Union who consolidated power. Stalin fully collectivized agriculture and rapidly industrialized the Soviet Union, but living standards declined severely. Between wars, totalitarian regimes rose across Europe as people sought solutions to economic crises.

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    The World Between Wars Slides

    Uploaded by

    Lauren Livingston
    28 views14 pages
    After World War 1, the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh reparations on Germany that led to economic instability. Germany faced hyperinflation in the 1920s, while the Great Depression in the early 1930s caused widespread unemployment across Europe. As democratic governments struggled to respond, many citizens turned to dictators like Mussolini in Italy and Stalin in the Soviet Union who consolidated power. Stalin fully collectivized agriculture and rapidly industrialized the Soviet Union, but living standards declined severely. Between wars, totalitarian regimes rose across Europe as people sought solutions to economic crises.

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    After World War 1, the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh reparations on Germany that led to economic instability. Germany faced hyperinflation in the 1920s, while the Great Depression in the early 1930s caused widespread unemployment across Europe. As democratic governments struggled to respond, many citizens turned to dictators like Mussolini in Italy and Stalin in the Soviet Union who consolidated power. Stalin fully collectivized agriculture and rapidly industrialized the Soviet Union, but living standards declined severely. Between wars, totalitarian regimes rose across Europe as people sought solutions to economic crises.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    28 views14 pages

    The World Between Wars Slides

    Uploaded by

    Lauren Livingston
    After World War 1, the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh reparations on Germany that led to economic instability. Germany faced hyperinflation in the 1920s, while the Great Depression in the early 1930s caused widespread unemployment across Europe. As democratic governments struggled to respond, many citizens turned to dictators like Mussolini in Italy and Stalin in the Soviet Union who consolidated power. Stalin fully collectivized agriculture and rapidly industrialized the Soviet Union, but living standards declined severely. Between wars, totalitarian regimes rose across Europe as people sought solutions to economic crises.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    of 14

    THE WORLD

    BETWEEN WARS
    1919-1939
    The Global Depression and Rise of Dictatorial
    Regimes
    Instability After World War I
    ● Nations were unhappy with the peace settlement at the end of WWI
    ● Woodrow Wilson’s settlement had many pieces that could lead to new
    conflict
    ● The French government demanded strict enforcement of the Treaty of
    Versailles
    ○ By April 1921, the Allied Reparations Commission determined that
    Germany owed 132 billion German marks, that could be paid in
    installments
    ● The German republic made its first payment in 1921 – a year later, the
    German government faced a financial crisis and could not pay any
    more reparations
    ○ France sent troops to Germany to attempt to collect reparations
    Inflation in Germany
    ● In response to the French presence, German
    workers went on strike
    ● The government mainly paid their salaries by
    printing more paper money
    ○ This added to the inflation (rise in prices)
    that had already begun at the end of the war
    ○ The German mark became worthless
    ○ In 1914, 4.2 marks = 1 U.S. dollar.
    ○ In 1923, 4.2 trillion marks = 1 U.S. dollar
    ● The U.S. revised the German repayment plan,
    and loaned them a $200 million loan for
    German recovery
    The Great Depression
    ● An economic depression: a period of low economic
    activity and rising unemployment
    ● Two factors played a role in starting the Great Depression:
    ○ A series of downturns in economies of individual
    nations in the late 1920s
    ○ An international financial crisis involving the U.S. stock
    market – much of European prosperity between
    1924-1929 was built on U.S. bank loans to Germany
    ■ Investors withdrew funds from Germany and
    European markets and by 1931 trade was
    slowing, production declining, and unemployment
    rising
    Responses to the Depression
    ● During 1932 (worst year of the depression), nearly 1 in every 4 British workers
    was unemployed
    ● About 5.5 million Germans (~roughly 30% of German labor force) had no jobs
    ● Governments did not know how to react, and their actions turned the crisis
    into a global depression…
    ○ They raised tariffs to exclude foreign goods from home markets
    ○ Some governments attempted to slow investments prior to the crash, then did
    nothing after the crash
    ○ This led masses of people to follow political leaders who offered simple solutions in
    return for dictatorial power
    ● In 1919, most European states had democratic governments, but in the 1920s
    maintaining these government was not easy
    The Rise of
    Dictators
    The Rise of Dictators
    ● By 1939 only two major European states – France
    and Great Britain – remained democratic
    ● The World War significantly impacted the political
    systems of Italy, the Soviet Union, and Germany who
    were left to succumb to totalitarian political systems
    ● Totalitarian State: characterized by the government’s
    aims to control the political, economic, social,
    intellectual, and cultural lives of its citizens
    ○ Power of the state was greater than ever before, led
    by a single leader and party
    ○ Regimes wanted more than passive obedience,
    they wanted to conquer the minds and hearts of
    their subjects → mass propaganda techniques and
    modern communications
    Fascism
    A political philosophy that glorifies the state
    above the individual by emphasizing the
    need for a strong, central government led by
    a dictatorial ruler
    The government controls the people and
    stifles any opposition
    Fascism in Italy
    ● In the 1920s, Benito Mussolini set up the first
    European fascist movement in Italy
    ● He began his political career as a Socialist
    ○ Created the League of Combat
    ● Mussolini’s movement grew quickly →
    people were angry about the lack of land
    Italy received after the treaty, and rising
    nationalism was a powerful force
    ● Mussolini became prime minister in 1922, in
    which he used this power to create a Fascist
    dictatorship
    ○ Police were given unrestricted authority to
    arrest and jail anyone for political/non
    political crimes
    Fascism in Italy
    ● Mussolini wanted a totalitarian state…
    ○ Police watched citizens’ political activities
    ○ Exercised control over mass media →
    spread propaganda
    ● Maintained traditional social attitudes
    ○ Family as the pillar of the state
    ○ Women were to be homemakers and
    mothers as it was their mission in life
    ● Mussolini never achieved the degree of
    totalitarian control like Hitler’s or Stalin’s
    ○ His fascist state did not completely destroy
    the country’s old power structure
    Russia and the Rise of USSR
    ● During the civil war in Russia, Lenin followed a policy
    of war communism
    ○ Government controlled industries and seized
    grain from peasants for army supplies
    ○ Drought caused famine between 1920-1922
    where as many as 5 million people died → led to
    industrial collapse
    ○ Russia is exhausted at this point
    ● Lenin’s New Economic policy pulled Russia out from
    the abyss
    ○ NEP was a modified version of the old capitalist
    system → small businesses could be privately
    owned and operated
    Russia and the Rise of USSR
    ● In 1922, Lenin and the Bolsheviks (became
    the Communist Party) created a new state
    called the Union of Soviet Socialist
    Republics (USSR) (Soviet Union for short)
    ● The NEP was only a temporary retreat from
    communist ideals → Lenin then dies in 1924
    and a struggle for power begins
    ● Leon Trotsky vs. Joseph Stalin
    ○ Stalin had been general secretary, and
    used this to gain complete control of the
    Communist party
    ● By 1926, Stalin removed the Bolsheviks of
    the revolutionary era and established a
    dictatorship
    Joseph Stalin
    ● Stalin’s 5-year plan planned for economic goals in
    5-year periods
    ● Stalin wanted to shift Russia from agriculture to
    industry
    ● Between 1928-1937 steel production in Russia
    increased from 4 million to 18 million tons
    ○ Plan also quadrupled the production of heavy
    machinery and doubled oil production
    ● Industrialization increased employment but living
    conditions worsened, wages also decreased
    ● The government owned all of the land and made
    peasants work on it
    ○ Those who resisted were sent to labor camps
    ○ “The Great Purge” → about 8 million arrested and
    sent to labor camps, or executed
    We will discuss Hitler, Nazism, and the
    Rise of Nazi Germany during the next
    Unit…WWII

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