The Late Cold War Era, Part III: East Asia

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The Late Cold War Era, Part III East Asia
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Competing Political Systems in East Asia

• Two quite different political systems coexisted
  uneasily
• Non-communist Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan
  became industrialized and wealthy nations
• Communist China and North Korea failed to gain
  prosperity because of the centralized planning
  dictated by Marxist theory

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Taiwan South Korea Become Democratic

• Chiang Kai-shek died in 1975 and his son Chiang
  Ching-kuo assumed the presidency.
• He instituted a series of political reforms that
  transformed Taiwans political system into an
  open and democratic one by 1991.
• South Koreas military-dominated government had
  made the transition to a democratic government
  and free elections by 1988.

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China and the Cultural Revolution

• Mao felt threatened his policies of the late
  1950s (Great Leap Forward) had failed his
  reputation in the early 1960s was not as high as
  it once had been he wanted to gain back the
  power he had before the disaster.
• A radical movement (1966-68 / until 1970)
• closed schools
• slowed production
• attacked old customs, old habits, old culture,
  old thinking
• virtually severed Chinas relations with the
  outside world

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China

• Mao died in 1976.
• More pragmatic leaders (such as Deng Xiaoping)
  tried to rejuvenate the economy and began opening
  China to outside contacts.
• This did not lead to political reforms.
• By the late 1980s, students began demonstrating
  against Communist rule and demanded democratic
  reform.
• The government responded with a bloody crackdown
  at Tiananmen Square (Beijing) in 1989.

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Tiananmen Square, 1989

• On April 22, 1989, some 100,000 people gathered
  at Tiananmen Square at the heart of Beijing, in
  silent defiance of the government ban on
  assembling.
• The following month brought an even greater show
  of defiance.
• Television journalists of the world converged on
  China to cover the historic official visit of
  Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

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Tiananmen Square, 1989

• Several hundred students, flanked by thousands of
  their supporters, began a hunger strike at the
  center of the square.
• They demanded the opening up of the political
  system to democratic reform.
• Within days, the strike spread to other cities.
• In Beijing, well over a million people filled the
  city center.
• The students sang and danced to rock songs and
  folk ballads as the world watched.

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Tiananmen Square, 1989

• The regime responded by declaring martial law on
  May 19 and troops began to descend upon the
  capital.
• In a night of terror that began at dusk on June
  3, the Peoples Liberation Army turned their guns
  against the protestors.
• Estimates vary from about 2,000 to 7,000 deaths.
• The Chinese government, unlike its Eastern
  European counterparts, weathered the storm.

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Hong Kong

• Was Great Britains last imperial possession in
  Asia.
• It prospered as a capitalist economy.
• In 1984, Great Britain signed an agreement with
  China to return the colony in 1997.
• China promised Hong Kong a separate
  administration and respect for its economic and
  social systems for 50 years after 1997.
• Despite these promises, emigration from Hong Kong
  accelerated after 1997.

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The Late Cold War Era, Part III Africa

• Chapter 30

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Common Problems Facing African Nations

• Religious, cultural, ethnic, linguistic, and
  regional divisions made it difficult to forge
  national unity.
• (The national boundaries established by Europeans
  did not reflect this)
• High population growth
• Widespread poverty and starvation
• The majority of the continent is semiarid or
  desert
• Droughts and extreme rainfall (soil erosion)
• Government failures (economic crisis) led to
  military coup détat (cycle)

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