WESTERN SOCIETY AND EASTERN EUROPE IN THE DECADES OF THE COLD WAR: 1945 - 1991

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WESTERN SOCIETY AND EASTERN EUROPE IN THE DECADES
OF THE COLD WAR1945 - 1991
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THE COLD WAR

• The origins of the cold war (1947-1990)
• Unlikely alliance between Britain, USSR, USA held
  up for duration of war
• Not without tensions Soviet resented
  U.S.-British delays in European invasion
• Soviet Union and United States vied for
  nonaligned nations
• Postwar settlement established at Yalta and
  Potsdam
• Each Allied power to occupy and control
  territories liberated by its armed forces
• Stalin agreed to support United States against
  Japan
• Stalin's plans prevailed Poland and east Europe
  became communist allies
• President Truman took hard line at Potsdam,
  widened differences
• Postwar territorial divisions reflected growing
  schism between USA, USSR
• Soviets took east Germany, while United States,
  Britain, and France took west Germany
• Berlin also divided four ways by 1950 division
  seemed permanent
• Churchill spoke of an "iron curtain" across
  Europe, separating east and west
• Similar division in Korea Soviets occupied north
  and United States the south
• Truman doctrine, 1947 USA would support "free
  peoples resisting subjugation"
• Perception of world divided between so-called
  free and enslaved peoples
• Interventionist policy, dedicated to
  "containment" of communism
• The Marshall Plan, 1948 U.S. aid for the
  recovery of Europe
• Idea to rebuild European economies and strengthen
  capitalism

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CAN YOU IDENTIFY THESE ITEMS?
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COLD WAR IN EUROPE

• Postwar Europe
• Divided into competing blocs
• NATO, European Economic Communities
• Warsaw Pact, COMECON
• Neutral European Free Trade Association
  Yugoslavia
• Western Europe
• U.S. allies supported by permanent presence of
  American army
• Parliamentary governments, capitalist economies
• Eastern Europe
• Dominated by Soviet Union, Red Army, secret
  police
• Communist governments modeled after USSR dominate
  countries
• Germany divided east and west in 1949
• Soviets refused to withdraw from eastern Germany
  after World War II
• Allied sectors reunited 1947-1948, Berlin
  remained divided as well
• Berlin blockade and airlift, 1948-1949
• Soviet closed roads, trains, tried to strangle
  West Berlin into submission
• Britain and United States kept city supplied with
  round-the-clock airlift
• Soviets backed down and ended blockade
• The Berlin Wall, 1961

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ECONOMICEUROPEDURINGTHE COLD WAR
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RESURGENCE OF WESTERN EUROPE

• New State Structures
• Liberal Democracy
• West had rejected authoritarianism, embraced
  inclusive democracy
• Embraced both Social Democracy, Christian
  Socialism
• The Welfare State
• European politics shifted left
• Governments run by technocrats experts in their
  fields
• Embraced idea of state support of all elements in
  society
• Included education, health care, state planning,
  social insurance
• Government active in housing
• New Challenges to Political Stability
• Minorities clamored for inclusion, to be heard,
  anti-establishment
• Students, youth, women heavily involved in these
  movements
• Environmental movements in Europe (Green
  Movement)
• Civil Rights, Gay Rights, Womens Rights in the
  US
• Cooperation
• European cooperation critical for future
• Economic cooperation led to European Economic
  Communities
• Began as a Coal and Steel customs union

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WESTERN EUROPE AFTER 1945

• France
• From 4th to 5th Republic
• Immediately after war, France tried to hold on to
  its colonies
• This led to several colonial struggles in
  Vietnam, Algeria, collapse of 4th Republic
• 5th Republic strengthened role of president,
  lessened power of legislature
• Charles de Gaulle wanted Europe free from
  superpower domination
• French government refused to ban nuclear tests in
  1963, tested bomb in 1964
• Increasingly a welfare, graying state with heavy
  problems due to immigration
• United Kingdom
• Slow recovery from the war and decolonization
• Labor Party comes to power and gradually built
  welfare state and mild socialism
• Never fully able to recover from loss of
  colonies, heavy migration to UK by colonials
• Margaret Thatcher 1979 1992 tried to relax
  welfare state
• West Germany
• Under US, French, UK pressure, integrated into
  Europe to avoid future wars
• Strong economic recovery after 1949 called
  Economic Miracle
• Rose to become one of the strongest economic
  nations in the world
• Under Brandt (SDU), initiated Ost-Politik to
  bridge relations with USSR
• Builds a social market economy of mixed
  capitalism, welfare socialism

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A NEW EUROPE?
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USA, AUSTRALIA, NEW ZEALAND, CANADA

• Changes in Europe paralleled abroad
• All avoided destruction of World War II
• Innovation consequently was less severe
• Former Dominions
• All became liberal democracies, welfare states
• All aligned to the USA
• UK declined as great power, increasingly
  Euro-centric
• Australia and New Zealand because of WW II
• Canada because of decline of UK, rise of US
  markets
• Canada
• Joined US, Mexico in NAFTA
• Internal issues with Catholic Quebec, Inuit
  devolution
• Australia
• A strong US ally
• Internally adopted a whites-only immigration
  policy
• The US Century
• From 1914 onward, US dominated world stage
• US military second to none US expenditures on
  defense high
• Economic, military, political, cultural influence
  predominant

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CULTURE AND SOCIETY IN THE WEST

• Social Structures
• Expansion of consumer culture, society
• Increasing prosperity to all classes
• Social conflicts eased
• Social lines blurred, increased social mobility
• Increased participation in political process
• Society not without troubles but
• Dramatic changes in gender relations
• After WW II, women had vote AND entered politics
• WWII saw women enter all aspects of society
• Working women increased reaches 44 in 1970s
  womens access to education increased
• But women paid less, much discrimination
• Gender equality lacking but women acquired legal
  rights
• Family life transformed by work, technology
• Women delayed marriage, children to work
• Birth control, abortion increase, divorce
  increased
• New Feminism
• 2nd Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
• Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan

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EASTERN EUROPE AFTER 1945

• USSR as Superpower
• Emerged from WWII with largest army in world
• One of the two great victors of WW II along with
  US
• Enormous industrial foundation based on armaments
• Had expanded its borders
• Actively involved in diplomacy, UN
• Had active communist states, alliances around
  world
• New Soviet Empire in Eastern Europe
• After WWII, failed to hold open elections,
  withdraw
• Decided to create a buffer zone between USSR,
  West
• All states in region forcibly brought under USSR
  influence
• Soviet Satellite Regimes
• Communists placed in power by rigged elections
• Any rivals for power eliminated, controlled by
  Red Army, Secret Police
• Agriculture collectivized, industry nationalized
• Tensions as elements resisted Soviet control
• Hungary 1956
• East Germany 1960s Berlin Wall
• Czechoslovakia, 1968

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SOVIET CULTURE, ECONOMY, SOCIETY

• Rapid Industrialization
• State fostered, controlled from top down
• Gosplan, 5 Year Plans common
• Significant Social Change
• Secularization of society, purging of religion
• Persecution of ethnic, religious minorities
• Tension increased with Western Culture
• Arts monitored to reflect Soviet culture
• Schools goal was to foster loyalty to state,
  science
• Attacked western styles of art, literature heavy
  censorship
• Sovietized, Russified many aspects of culture
• Counter-Culture Arose
• Solzhenitysns Gulag Archipelago criticized
  Stalin, Stalinism
• Science, social studies, mathematics heavily
  favored
• Economy and Society
• Fully industrialized society by 1950s
• State control of virtually all aspects of
  economic sectors
• No individualized economic aspects allowed
  although a Black Market flourished
• Lagged in production of consumer goods, poorly
  funded

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DESTALINIZATION

• Stalin died in 1953
• Rivals opposed his one man rule, cult of
  personality
• His reign had taught politicians to cooperate,
  avoid infighting
• His reign had also discouraged innovation,
  resistance
• Khrushchevs Rise
• Rivals removed Stalins supporters, executed
  Beria (KGB)
• New Chairman attacked Stalinism for its excesses
• Khrushchev as Chairman of the USSR
• Opened up society to innovation, some
  decentralization
• Regime less likely to execute opposition
• Released many prisoners from state camps, closed
  gulags
• Khrushchev pushes own industrial base to outdo
  west
• Soviet Space Program and Sputnik catches west by
  surprise
• Avoids Adventurism in Foreign Policy
• Enforces Soviet control in 1956 Hungary
  De-Stalinization went to far
• But allows more independent roads to socialism by
  USSR Allies
• Cuba nuclear flashpoint
• Fidel Castro establishes guerrilla force in
  mountains, 1953
• Overthrew dictator Batista in 1959

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EASTERN EUROPE SINCE 1945

• Warsaw Pact and COMECON
• 1955 USSR creates a military alliance to counter
  NATO Warsaw Pact
• COMECON was attempt to rival EEC, EC
• States were originally satellites of USSR
• After 1964, increasing allowance for independent
  roads to socialism
• Yugoslavia, Albania independent communist states
  
• Marshall Tito (Josip Broz) resisted Soviet
  control of Yugoslavia
• Stalin expelled Yugoslavia from Soviet bloc,
  1948
• Remained nonaligned throughout cold war
• Albania drawn into Chinese influence, denounces
  USSR
• Hungarian challenge, 1956
• De-Stalinization led to pro-democracy movement in
  Hungary
• New government announced neutrality, withdrew
  from Warsaw Pact
• Soviet tanks crushed Hungarian uprising, 1956
• Goulash Communism a liberalization of communism
  in Hungary
• Prague Spring, Czechoslovakia, 1968
• Liberal movement led by Dubcek sought "socialism
  with a human face"
• Soviet and east European forces crushed Prague
  liberal communism
• Brezhnev justified invasion by Doctrine of
  Limited Sovereignty

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DÉTENTE DECLINE OF BIPOLAR WORLD

• Era of cooperation
• Leaders of both superpowers agreed on policy of
  détente, late 1960s
• Exchanged visits and signed agreements calling
  for cooperation, 1972, 1974
• Concluded Strategic Arms Limitations Talks
  (SALT), 1972, again 1979
• Demise of détente
• Full U.S.-China diplomatic relations in 1979
  created U.S.-USSR strain
• U.S. weapons sale to China in 1981 undermined
  U.S.-Soviet cooperation
• 1980 Soviet intervention in Afghanistan prompted
  U.S. economic sanctions
• U.S. defeat in Vietnam
• 1950s, USA committed to support noncommunist
  South Vietnam
• U.S. involvement escalated through 1960s
• U.S., allies unable to defeat North, South
  Vietnamese communists
• President Nixon pledged in 1968 to end war with
  Vietnam
• U.S. troops gradually withdrew U.S. phase of war
  ended in 1973
• North Vietnam continued war effort, unified the
  nation in 1976
• Soviet setbacks in Afghanistan
• Afghanistan had been a nonaligned nation until
  1978, pro-Soviet coup
• Radical reforms in 1978 prompted backlash
• Islamic leaders objected to radical social
  change, led armed resistance

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END OF COLD WAR

• Revolution in east and central Europe
• Moscow's legacies
• Communism unable to satisfy nationalism in
  eastern and central Europe
• Soviet-backed governments lacked support,
  economies stagnant
• Soviet interventions in 1956 and 1968 dashed
  hopes of a humane socialism
• Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet leader 1985-1991
• 1989, Gorbachev announced restructuring of USSR,
  withdrawal from cold war
• Satellites states informed that each was on its
  own, without Soviet support
• Rapid collapse of communist regimes across
  eastern and central Europe, 1989
• In Poland, Solidarity leader Lech Walesa won
  election of 1990
• Communism overthrown peacefully in Bulgaria and
  Hungary
• Czechoslovakia's "velvet revolution" in 1990,
  divided into Czech Republic, Slovakia
• Only violent revolution in Romania ended with
  death of communist dictator
• East Germany opened Berlin Wall in 1989 two
  Germanys united in 1990
• The collapse of the Soviet Union
• Gorbachev's reforms
• Hoped for economic liberalization within
  political communist system
• Centralized economy inefficient, military
  spending excessive
• Declining standard of living, food shortages,
  shoddy goods