HIST103 Study Guide

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Unit 1: What is History?

1a. Discuss international or global perspectives on events rather than understanding them solely through national frameworks

• What is an international or global perspective?
• What does it mean to be a global citizen?
• How can understanding events from a global perspective, rather than a national framework, give you a better understanding?
• How can a global perspective help you to analyze the patterns and trends in world events?

An international or global perspective studies history and world events as if they were pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. A national framework examines how events impacted one particular nation or group of people. An international or global perspective evaluates how an event, issue, or time period affected the global community as global citizens, such as how events influenced the culture of different countries and how people relate to one another.

For example, an international or global perspective evaluated how World War I affected Germany, England, the United States, and other nations (including those not directly involved). This framework helps historians find patterns, identify trends among different global places, and study the short and long-term meanings of future events.

To review, see Developing a Global Perspective and Global Citizenship.

1b. Use primary and secondary sources to create arguments about historical causation

• What is the difference between a primary and a secondary source?
• What are some examples of primary and secondary sources?
• How do primary sources help historians to evaluate history authentically?
• What are some limitations of primary and secondary sources?

A primary source is an artifact from the time period that helps historians evaluate an event or period. Primary sources include diaries, newspaper articles and advertisements from the period, paintings, and other artifacts people used or created.

A secondary source is created or written by someone who did not personally or directly witness or live through an event. Examples include biographies, textbooks, history books, political commentary, and opinion pieces.

While research historians value both perspectives, primary sources allow them to engage in historiography or study how historians interpret history. Both types of historical records have limitations. Primary sources often contain biases inherent to the person who created them or the time period. They portray one small piece of the overall picture. We use primary sources to understand the thoughts, perspectives, and views of the people alive during the time being studied. Secondary sources also reflect the biases of the author and the culture of the time period when they were written. Neither perspective tells the entire story. They are pieces of a puzzle.

To review, see Primary Sources and How Historians Use Newspapers.

1c. Weigh evidence for and against to craft narratives that explain why events happened

• How does a historian weigh evidence?
• What is causation?
• How does evaluating the evidence help historians develop a thorough understanding of causation?

Historians study and evaluate causation and why events occur. For example, the causes of World War I were complex. While an assassination triggered the war, historians evaluate the events that followed from every angle to detangle the web and decipher what led to war across the region. They must weigh the supportive and contradictory evidence.

For example, Austrians focus on a Serbian individual who asserted his independence by killing the Archduke of Austria-Hungary. However, today's historians see how a tangle of European alliances drew many nations, including the United States, into conflict. Historians evaluate both perspectives when analyzing the confluence of events and how actions led to certain responses.

To review, see What Is History? and Causation and Interpretation in History.

Unit 1 Vocabulary

• artifact
• bias
• causation
• contradictory evidence
• global citizen
• global perspective
• historiography
• international perspective
• national framework
• primary source
• secondary source
• supportive evidence

Unit 2: Trade in East Asia and the Indian Ocean

2a. Explain the significance of the Mughal Empire and its interactions with different European states

• How did the Mughal Empire interact with Europe?
• How was the Mughal Empire similar to and different from Europe?
• What role did Babar and Akbar play in creating the Mughal Empire?

The Mughal Empire (1526-1858) was one of the most significant ruling dynasties in Indian history. It was a time of cultural and economic success and united most of the Indian subcontinent through extensive land and maritime trade networks. Babur (1483–1530), a direct descendant of Chinggis Khan and a master of warfare, founded the empire. His grandson, Akbar the Great (1542–1605), is famous for using guns and war elephants to expand the Empire into the subcontinent. He was also known for his religious tolerance. The Hindustani language, a mixture of Persian and Hindi, symbolized the melding of Islamic and Hindu cultures. Akbar's grandson, Shah Jahan, built the Taj Mahal between 1632 and 1638. Initially, international trade with Europe was facilitated by Muslim trading networks. The city of Gujarat was a center of international trade and developed into a multicultural, cosmopolitan trading city.

The Mughal Empire's commercial success brought the attention of rivals, such as the Maratha Empire (1674–1818), founded by Shivaji Maharaj (1630–1680). By uniting the Maratha chieftains, the Empire spread across the Indian subcontinent from Tamil Nadu in southern India to Peshawar (a city in today's Pakistan) in the north. It emphasized a break from Islamic influence and a return to Hindu hegemony.

Meanwhile, Bartolomeu Dias (1450–1500) was the first Portuguese explorer to round the Cape of Good Hope in 1488, and Vasco de Gama (1469–1524) was the first to arrive in India by sea in 1498. The Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) divided the newly discovered lands in Africa and the Americas between Portugal and Spain.

To review, see India and International Connections and The Mughal Empire.

2b. Describe why European states were interested in trade in East Asia, what they sought, and what they acquired

• Why did European states want to trade with East Asia?
• What goods did Europeans seek and acquire?
• What were the short and long-term political, social, cultural, and economic consequences of European trade with East Asia?

Asia was the center of global trade and commerce for most of modern history. Europe remained on the fringes of the Silk Road, a vast trade network of land and sea routes that linked East Asia, India, and the Middle East. However, trade with East Asia became a driving force for European exploration, expansion, and domination as they bought spices from East Asia to preserve food and make it palatable, in addition to tea and silks. 

The Europeans focused on overland trade until the Ottoman Empire restricted access to the Silk Road when it assumed power in 1299. Portugal and other European states created their own ocean trading routes. The Dutch and English established major trading companies to gain footholds in India and Asia. In 1857–1858, the British East India Company obliterated the 300-year Mughal Empire when it took control of India. 

To review, see The Portuguese Empire and The British Empire.

2c. Explain the importance of the Malacca Sultanate to global trade patterns

• Where was the location of the Malacca Sultanate important to global trade?
• How did global trade impact cultural diffusion in the Malacca Sultanate?
• How did maritime trade networks influence global trade during the Malacca Sultanate?

The maritime trade routes connecting China, India, and Africa were as busy as any along the Silk Road. The Malacca Sultanate controlled the trade that bustled through the Malacca Strait in modern-day Malaysia until Albuquerque of Portugal conquered it in 1511. Ships from India, the Middle East, and China passed through the port of Malacca, a trading hub for Indian cloth, Chinese porcelain, spices, tea, and other prized goods.

The Malacca Sultanate was a cosmopolitan place with marine merchant vessels from all over the world. It was highly diverse, with people from all parts of Afro-Eurasia passing through. The Undang-Undang Laut Melaka, a strict legal code the Sultanate enforced, ensured the safety of merchants and made trade fair and accessible to all vessels. When the Portuguese conquered the Malacca Sultanate in 1511, the balance of global power shifted from Asia to Europe.

To review, see The Malacca Sultanate.

2d. Describe how the Chinese and Japanese states functioned during this period and their role in global trade

• When did the Qing Dynasty and Tokugawa Shogunate rule?
• How did they maintain power and centralized authority?
• What was the relationship between the Qing Dynasty and Tokugawa Shogunate?
• How was trade facilitated in each state, and what were the long-term impacts of the policies?

Throughout most of history, China was the commercial center of Afro-Eurasia. China's leaders believed they ruled the center of the world according to the concept of tianxia ("all under heaven"). China was an imperial and commercial powerhouse during the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). The Ming influenced Korea and Japan and took territory in southeast Asia as far as Vietnam. In China, the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911) saw the rise of the Manchu Leaders, the ruling class that perfected the Civil Service Exam to maintain a bureaucratic meritocracy.

In Japan, the Tokugawa Shogunate (1603–1868) ruled as a military dictatorship. Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543–1616), a Japanese daimyo (feudal lord), seized power in 1603. He established himself as the shogun, or head general of Japan, and established a strict military-based government that required citizens to obtain permission from the bakufu or shogunate to travel between regions. The samurai were Japan's noble class. Tokugawa established a feudal system that required each daimyo to spend every second year in Edo, the capital city, to establish and maintain power.

Both China and Japan restricted trade with foreign powers. The Qing Dynasty (1644–1912) established the Canton System, which confined trade with foreign powers to the Canton region. Similarly, the Sakoku policy in Japan restricted foreign trade to the port city of Nagasaki to Chinese and Dutch ships. While these isolationist policies helped the ruling governments to maintain authority, they also led to their downfall when the British weakened the Qing and the United States forced Japan to trade with U.S. merchants in 1854, leading to the downfall of the Tokugawa Shogunate.

To review, see:

• Exchange in East Asia
• Emperor Qian Long and the Qing Dynasty
• The Tokugawa Shogunate

Unit 2 Vocabulary

• Akbar the Great
• Albuquerque of Portugal
• Babur
• bakufu
• Bartolomeu Dias
• British East India Company
• Canton System
• Cape of Good Hope
• Chinggis Khan
• daimyo
• Edo
• Gujarat
• Hindustani
• Malacca Sultanate
• Manchu leaders
• Maratha Empire
• Ming Dynasty
• Mughal Empire
• Nagasaki
• Ottoman Empire
• Qing Dynasty
• Sakoku policy
• Shah Jahan
• shogun
• shogunate
• Silk Road
• Taj Mahal
• tianxia
• Tokugawa Ieyasu
• Tokugawa Shogunate
• Treaty of Tordesillas
• Undang-Undang Laut Melaka
• Vasco de Gama

Unit 3: Early Modern Africa and the Wider World

3a. Identify features of African societies such as the Mali and Songhai Empires

• Where were the Mali and Songhai Empires?
• What was the economic focus and political structure of each empire?

The Mali (c.1235-1670) and Songhai (1464-1591) Empires were economic powerhouses centered around Islam that brought wealth, power, and prestige to the region via trans-Saharan trade.

The Mali Empire spanned today's Mali, Gambia, Senegal, Mauritania, Guinea, and sections of Burkina Faso and Niger. It traded in gold, ivory, and salt and was a seat of Islamic learning in Timbuktu and other cities. The Mansa ruled the empire as a semi-federal system with administrative and ceremonial power over a collection of city-states.

The Songhai Empire was located in today's Mali, Nigeria, and Niger. The Emperor's centralized authority and a bureaucracy of officials and ministers improved the region's agriculture, infrastructure, and trade networks. The Empire was famous for its strong army and navy. Its military and economic prowess made the Songhai Empire one of the most powerful of its time.

To review, see:

• The Roots of African Trade
• The Mali Empire
• The Songhai Empire
• The Swahili Coast

3b. Examine the effect the spread of Islam had on West Africa and East Africa

• How did Islam impact West and East Africa?
• How was the spread of Islam connected to trade and commerce?
• How did it impact learning and education?
• Why were mosques important to the spread and establishment of Islam in Africa?

Islamic merchants traded extensively with Africa and promoted the spread of Islam. Its converts benefitted from its lucrative trading system, Islamic architecture, art, and education. Centers of learning, such as Timbuktu, drew intellectuals from around the world. Its traditions create unique hybrid cultures with pre-Islamic Africa. For example, the Swahili language combines Arabic with the language of the indigenous Bantu people. Cities like Mombasa, Zanzibar, and Kilwa were shining examples of the impact of Islamic influence, which we can see in the architecture, culture, and social organization of the cities today.

Mosques were built throughout Africa with the spread of Islam. These worship centers served as important meeting places for conducting commerce and offering educational opportunities. They displayed the unique cultural characteristics of the communities where they were built. For example, the Great Mosque of Djenné in Mali is built from adobe bricks. Like mosques throughout Africa, it was an amalgam of Islamic and indigenous traditions and emblematic of the cultural blending key to the spread of Islam in Africa.

To review, see Swahili Mosques.

3c. Discuss the trans-Saharan slave trade in Africa with attention to its unique features

• What was the trans-Saharan slave trade in Africa?
• How was it regulated by Islamic slave traders?
• What was unique about this slave system? How did it end?

The Trans-Saharan slave trade (also called the Islamic Slave Trade) connected Africa and the Middle East via the Saharan Desert from the eighth to 19th centuries. Empires like Kanem-Bornu in central Africa benefited. There was equal demand for men and women, with Arab, Berber, and enslaved Africans from a variety of tribes and cultures. While the system was dehumanizing, enslaved people were not considered chattel or movable property, and racial categories did not define legal rights, such as during the Trans-Atlantic slave trade in the Americas. Enslaved people often remained with their families and could become free during their lifetimes. They were absorbed into society and afforded upward social mobility. Some even became politically active and powerful.

To review, see The Trans-Saharan Slave Trade and Before the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.

Unit 3 Vocabulary

• Bantu people
• Berber
• chattel
• Great Mosque of Djenné
• Islam
• Islamic merchants
• Kanem-Bornu
• Kilwa
• Mali Empire
• Mansa
• Mombasa
• mosque
• Saharan Desert
• semi-federal system
• social mobility
• Songhai Empire
• Swahili
• Timbuktu
• Trans-Saharan slave trade
• Zanzibar

Unit 4: The Islamic World

4a. Explain why Islamic empires were able to expand so rapidly and then maintain their power

• Why were the Islamic empires of Mali, Songhai, and the Ottomans able to expand so rapidly and maintain their power?
• How did key leaders help expand power in each empire?
• What role did trade routes have in maintaining power for each empire?

The Islamic empires of Africa and the Middle East – the Mali (1226–1620), Songhai (1430s–1591), and Ottoman Empires (1299–1922) – were wealthy, powerful, and impactful. While the Mali and Songhai Empires were on the edges of trade routes, the Ottoman Empire was strategically located at the crossroads of trade between Europe and the Middle East. They gained political and economic hegemony over Asia and Europe when they took control of the Silk Road. After 1500, Sufism, a popular mystical form of Islam, brought Islamic empires together with a sense of shared or universal brotherhood. It emphasized community unity or ummah. 

To review, see The Connected Islamic World.

4b. Discuss the history of the Ottoman Empire and its relationship with Europe

• How did the Ottoman Empire establish economic authority over Europe and Asia?
• What role did commerce, the Silk Road and the Devonshire System play in the relationship between Europe and the Ottoman Empire?

The Ottoman Empire was one of the most powerful empires in history. During the Crusades of the 13th century, Catholic Europeans were unable to break Ottoman hegemony. The Ottomans assumed control of the Silk Road trade routes when it defeated the Byzantine Empire (the Asian Roman Empire) in 1453. They ruled more than three million square miles in today's Turkey, Eastern Europe, and Africa. However, its failure during the Siege of Vienna in 1529 prevented it from expanding into parts of Italy.

Christians in the Balkin region of Eastern Europe were forced to surrender their firstborn sons according to the Devonshire system. They were converted to Islam and trained as Janissaries, a legendary fighting group devoted to protecting the sultan. The sultans maintained harems with many wives and concubines. Although most lacked political power, several, such as Hurrem Sultan (also known as Roxelana), became powerful and influential. This era, beginning in the 1520s, was known as the Sultanate of Women.

Ottoman control of the Silk Road led European traders, like the Portuguese, to seek alternative maritime trade routes to Asia. This Era of European Exploration led to colonization that would take over the Americas, Africa, and parts of Asia.

To review, see The Ottoman Empire.

4c. Compare and contrast traits of different Islamic empires in government, science, and the military

• How were the governments of the Islamic Empires similar and different?
• How did each cultivate the sciences?
• What role did the military play in each empire?

The Mughal, Safavid, and Ottoman Empires controlled vast areas of land and key trading routes in the Middle East, Europe, Africa, and India. Elite military units, such as the Janissaries in the Ottoman Empire and the Qizilbash of the Safavid Empire, used modern guns and cannons to create a military juggernaut that quickly vanquished their enemies.

The Ottoman Empire had centralized administration with a millet system that promoted religious tolerance as long as communities remained loyal to the sultan. The Mughal Empire was ruled by an absolute monarchy with a divine emperor. The Safavid Empire featured a theocratic government system where the Shah was the religious and political leader.

These Islamic empires were centers of learning and the sciences, built on the knowledge of the Greeks and Romans, which the Europeans lost during the Middle Ages (500 to 1500). The Ottomans focused on geography, astronomy for navigation, cartography, and a time system for their prayer rituals. The Mughals benefited from the advanced and natural sciences that had been cultivated in India and made significant contributions to architecture, astronomy, and medicine. The Safavid Empire was a center of learning in the fields of medicine, astronomy, and philosophy.

To review, see The Ottoman, Safavid, and Mughal Empires.

4d. Summarize the history of the Safavid Empire

• When and where was the Safavid Empire?
• How did it contribute to the spread of Islam?

The Safavid Empire (1501–1736) was based in Persia or modern-day Iran. Shah Ismail I (1487–1524), a descendant of Sheikh Safi al-Din (1252–1334), founded the ruling dynasty. Many historians call this period a golden age of Iranian history, especially in the fields of architecture, learning, the arts, and language. The Safavid Empire spread Persian culture throughout the region as far as Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, and Pakistan.

The Empire reached its height under the rule of Shah Abbas the Great (1588–1629). Military campaigns and improved trade routes enriched his rule. He moved the capital to Isfahan and supported architectural and artistic works, such as the Imperial Mosque. A theocracy, the Safavid Empire adopted the Twelver branch of Shiite Islam as the state religion. Islam experienced a great schism when the Prophet Muhammad died in 632. The Sunni believed they could choose the Caliph outside the Prophet Muhammad's family, but the Shiite believed the leader must be a descendant. The Shah was a political and religious leader, and Islamic law provided the basis for the legal system. The Empire began to decline during the 18th century due to foreign threats and the rise of modern Iranian nationalism.

To review, see The Safavid Empire and More on the Safavid Empire.

Unit 4 Vocabulary

• Byzantine Empire
• Caliph
• Crusades
• Devonshire system
• Era of Exploration
• harem
• Imperial Mosque
• Isfahan
• Janissaries
• Middle Ages
• millet system
• Persia
• Prophet Muhammad
• Qizilbash
• Safavid Empire
• Shah Ismail I
• Sheikh Safi al-Din
• Shiite Islam
• Siege of Vienna
• Sufism
• Sultanate of Women
• Sunni
• Turkmenistan
• Twelver branch
• ummah

Unit 5: Foundations of the Atlantic World

5a. Discuss the reasons for the Protestant Reformation, the political impact that it had in Europe, and the response of the Catholic Church

• What and when was the Protestant Reformation?
• What political impact did it have in Europe?
• What was the response of the Catholic Church?

Several events led to the Protestant Reformation (1517–1648) in Europe, including corruption in the Catholic Church, the humanism of the Renaissance, and three waves of the Bubonic Plague or Black Death beginning in 1347. In 1517, Martin Luther (1483–1545), a German theologian, challenged the Catholic Church by posting his Ninety-five Theses to the Castle Church door. He admonished the selling of indulgences and other corrupt practices. John Calvin (1509–1564), a French pastor and theologian, broke away to create the Presbyterian Church, while King Henry VIII of England (1491–1547) formed the Anglican Church.

Luther questioned church authority by declaring people did not need an intermediary to communicate with God. In 1440, Gutenberg's printing press reduced the need for the clergy by translating the Bible into German, English, and other European languages and spread the ideas of the Reformation. Although the Catholic Church excommunicated Luther, he prompted the Church to enact a series of reforms during the Council of Trent (1545–1563). This led to the Counter-Reformation or Catholic Reformation (1545–1563), which addressed the corruption issues Luther protested. 

The Reformation fractured Europe. The Protestant upstarts vied for power with the monarchies tied to the Catholic Church. This led to the Thirty Years War (1618–1648), the official end of the Reformation. It expanded ideas of self-reliance and independence and led to the Enlightenment (1685–1815), where individuals embraced using science rather than simply following Church commandments.

To review, see:

• The Protestant Reformation
• The Political Impact of the Reformation
• The Protestant Reformation, Science, and Religion
• The Counter-Reformation

5b. Connect technological advancements in trade and travel with the exploration of the Americas

• What technological advancements led to European exploration of the Americas?
• How did Portuguese shipbuilding technology lead to European advancements in trade and travel?
• Why did Europeans want to explore the Americas?

Europe sought its own sea routes when the Ottoman Empire restricted access to Asia via the Silk Road. They needed silver (which they took from the Americas) to buy Chinese goods since its currency was based on silver. Advances in shipbuilding and seafaring technology enabled them to create maritime networks with East Asia and India. Improved navigation helped them determine a ship's course and position, while the printing press allowed them to share their maps, charts, and knowledge.

In Portugal, Prince Henry the Navigator (1394–1460) built the caravel, an agile ship that was equipped for combat and could navigate deep and shallow waters. Inspired by Arab ships, Prince Henry expanded the ship's cargo capacity and added taller masts and triangular lateen sails to sail against the wind. In 1492, Spain traveled to the Americas, and Spain and Portugal divided their newly discovered lands according to the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494. This trade between Europe and the Americas resulted in the Columbian Exchange. 

To review, see:

• Crossing the Atlantic
• Exploration and Global Trade
• The Columbian Exchange

5c. Describe various indigenous societies in the Americas and the consequences of their contact with Europeans

• How many tribes were in the Americas before contact with Europeans? What empires existed?
• What were the social and political dynamics in the Americas before contact with Europeans?
• What were the consequences of their contact with Europeans?

When Christopher Columbus (1451–1506), the Italian explorer, arrived in today's Bahamas, the Americas were home to more than 1,000 different Native American civilizations and more than 60 million people. The communities featured diverse languages, cultures, religions, and political systems.

For example, the Sioux and Navajo had formed tribes, the Inuit were nomadic, and the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) lived in settled communities centered in longhouses. The Olmec Civilization (1600 B.C.E.–350 C.E.), the Mayan Empire (1500 B.C.E.–900 C.E.), and the Aztec Empire (1300–1521 C.E.) were vast complex empires in Central America and Southern Mexico. The empires were organized into great cities renowned for their astronomical knowledge, precise calendars, and advanced mathematical knowledge.

In South America, the Inca established the largest empire in the world from 1200 to 1533 C.E. These empires were as sophisticated as any in Europe or Asia. The Tawantinsuyu road and bridge system rivaled ancient Rome. Extensive trade networks connected North and South America. Importantly, the Aztec Empire had a tax system that sacrificed human beings from the tribes they subjugated. Consequently, the tribes helped Hernán Cortés and his Spanish conquistadors overthrow the Aztec Empire when the Spanish arrived in 1519.

While conquest, genocide, and military oppression defeated the American empires, smallpox and other European diseases killed nearly 90 percent of the Native American population. The Spanish forced the survivors into slavery under the encomienda system and imposed Catholicism via the vast mission system they established. The indigenous population did not fare much better with the French or Dutch traders. Their tenuous trade agreements with the British quickly devolved into hostile confrontations.

To review, see:

• The New World
• The Aztecs of Mexico: A Zero-Waste Society
• Colonialism and Indigenous Response in the Americas

5d. Explain the relationship between the discovery of the Americas and the Atlantic Slave Trade

• Why did Europeans turn to the enslavement of Africans?
• How did the trans-Atlantic slave trade affect Africa?
• Why did so many Africans die on their way to the Americas?
• How did slavery result in modern skin-based racism?

European exploration and colonization led to the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The Europeans created plantations to harvest cash crops such as sugar and tobacco and mined for gold, silver, and other precious minerals. The Spanish initially forced the indigenous Native American population into slavery in the encomienda system. However, they needed a new source of workers when the native workers escaped to areas the Spanish were unfamiliar with or died from European diseases.

The Portuguese bought Africans from Islamic slave traders and established their own slave networks to sell and work in the West African gold mines. These Africans were kidnapped, sold at auction, and sent to the Americas on ships via the Middle Passage. Historians estimate more than 12 million Africans were forced into slavery, and more than two million died during the Middle Passage. In America, plantation owners, farmers, miners, and other business owners bought and sold enslaved people and forced them to harvest cash crops or dig in mines. The Europeans created the concept of chattel slavery in the Caribbean sugar plantations where the owners stripped the enslaved Africans of their humanity and considered "their" slaves as property, a condition the enslaved and their descendants could never escape due to their skin color.

To review, see:

• The Atlantic Slave Trade
• Barbados, Jamaica, and Slave Rebellions
• The Atlantic Slave Trade
• The Impact of the Slave Trade through a Ghanaian Lens

Unit 5 Vocabulary

• Aztec Empire
• Black Death
• Bubonic Plague
• caravel
• cash crop
• Catholic Reformation
• chattel slavery
• Christopher Columbus
• Columbian Exchange
• conquistador
• Council of Trent
• Counter Reformation
• encomienda system
• Gutenberg's printing press
• Haudenosaunee (Iroquois)
• Hernán Cortés
• Inuit
• John Calvin
• King Henry VIII
• Martin Luther
• Mayan Empire
• Middle Passage
• Navajo
• Ninety-Five Theses
• Prince Henry the Navigator
• Protestant Reformation
• Renaissance
• Sioux
• smallpox
• Thirty Years War
• Trans-Atlantic slave trade

Unit 6: Colonization and Economic Expansion

6a. Discuss the different motivations for colonization of the Americas and how different colonies formed

• Why did Europeans travel west across the Atlantic Ocean? What was their impact on the Americas?
• How did the motivations of the Dutch, French, and English differ from the Spanish and Portuguese?
• How were settlement patterns in New Spain and British North America similar and different?

Each European country adopted a different approach to colonizing the Americas.

The Spanish conquered the existing empires and forced those who survived European diseases to work as slaves in the encomienda system. They created a vast network of Spanish missions, Catholicized the native population, and married Native American women. The French created missions to convert the tribes to Catholicism but preferred to trade rather than enslave the native population.

The Dutch focused on establishing trading footholds, such as commercial outposts for the Dutch East India Company in New Amsterdam (New York). They negotiated, traded, and sometimes married the Native Americans. The tribes imparted their knowledge of the land, hunting, and tracking in exchange for European goods.

The British established colonies with women and children in the northeast and adopted a cautious approach toward the Native Americans. They tended not to intermarry or convert them to Christianity but formed trade alliances that often crumbled and engaged in wars to diminish native control of the land.

To review, see:

• European Colonization in the Americas
• Colonial Rivalries: Dutch and French Colonial Ambitions
• English Settlements in America
• The Americas and Columbus
• The New World
• Settlement Patterns in New Spain, New France, and British North America

6b. Identify the main characteristics of mercantilism and capitalism, as well as critiques of both of these

• What were the benefits and issues related to mercantilism and capitalism?

Mercantilism is an economic system that features a centralized government whose goal is to expand wealth and power by importing cheap raw materials and precious metals from the colonies and exporting manufactured goods sold at a premium to the colonies in return. Native populations were prohibited from trading freely with other nations and forced to buy the more expensive manufactured goods the colonial power produced at home with the raw materials they had extracted. 

For example, although the Qing in China initially maintained a fairly equal trade relationship with European powers, they eventually lost control and their advantage. In India, the British government forced Indians to buy the manufactured goods Britains created in England using the raw materials they had extracted from India. This system destroyed India's once-thriving textile, metalwork, glass, and paper industries.

The colonial settlers were subservient to those living at home. For example, while the American colonists considered themselves British citizens, the British Parliament believed the 13 colonies existed to provide inexpensive raw materials for British factory workers.

A capitalist economy, on the other hand, relies on private individuals and companies to produce and sell goods to others on an open market. Government intervention is discouraged as the Laws of Supply and Demand (Adam Smith's invisible hand) determine the price of goods in a free trade environment. Capitalists focus on producing as many products as people are willing to buy at the highest price people are willing to spend. Societal well-being, the welfare of consumers and the workforce, environmental protections, and other ethical concerns are usually second to generating profits.

To review, see Mercantilism and Exploration and Mercantilism.

6c. Describe how economic systems such as mercantilism fostered conflict

• How did the lopsided power dynamic of mercantilism cause conflict and foment rebellion?

The colonies were a source of cheap natural resources and free slave labor within the principles of the mercantilist economic system. These same colonies were also a market for the manufactured goods the mother country created, such as the cloth made with Indian cotton, which they sold to the Indians for an inflated price.

The colonists were not considered full-fledged citizens. For example, the Navigation Acts (1651) prohibited American colonists from trading with nations other than Great Britain. The Europeans increased their taxes and restrictions when they needed more cash to pay for the Seven Years War (1756–1763) in Europe and the French and Indian War (1754–1763) in North America. These laws fostered great resentment and encouraged the formation of black markets, smuggling, and other types of illegal trade. The protests boiled over and eventually led to the American Revolution (1765–1783) and independence movements, such as in India (1857–1947), when colonists protested the oppressive nature of the mercantile system.

To review, see The Rise of a Global Economy.

6d. Compare the impact of capitalism on the Industrial, Scientific, and Agricultural Revolutions

• What were the Industrial, Scientific, and Agricultural Revolutions?
• Who was Adam Smith, and what did he say in Wealth of the Nations?
• How was capitalism key to the Industrial Revolution?
• How and why did Karl Marx criticize capitalism?

Britain experienced an Agricultural Revolution beginning in the mid-1600s with advances in farming technologies. Unemployed farmers soon moved to the towns and cities in search of work when they were no longer needed at home. Here, inventors and entrepreneurs eventually flourished, creating an Industrial Revolution during the mid-18th century (1760–1840).

Manufacturing, specialization, and economies of scale would eventually create a complex urban factory system. Most workers were paid low wages and endured miserable living conditions. However, a hierarchical class system developed with an expanding merchant and middle class that earned income to spend on clothing, household items, and other manufactured goods. The upper classes bought luxury goods they imported from the colonies, such as chocolate, coffee, tea, and tobacco.

Adam Smith (1723–1790), the Scottish economist, used his concept of an invisible hand to explain how supply and demand drive the market toward economic efficiency. Support for laissez-faire capitalism would transform Europe and the United States into modern countries with large cities and factories while increasingly large-scale commercial farms produced high-demand cash crops. However, Karl Marx (1818–1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) criticized the exploitative nature of industrial capitalism. Smith had ignored the social byproducts of capitalism when he wrote The Wealth of Nations (1776).

In their influential book The Communist Manifesto (1848), Marx and Engels protested the extreme poverty, alienation, and poor living conditions they witnessed in the industrialized cities. They predicted a class struggle would occur over the means of production. The proletariat (working class) would revolt against the bourgeoisie (upper classes and wealthy elite) to demand better working conditions, and capitalism would implode. We return to these ideas in later units because they fueled revolutions in Russia, China, and around the world into the 20th century.

To review, see:

• Adam Smith
• The Wealth of Nations, 1776
• Karl Marx
• Industrial Revolutions
• The Origins of the Industrial Revolution

Unit 6 Vocabulary

• Adam Smith
• Agricultural Revolution
• alienation
• black market
• bourgeoisie
• capitalism
• capitalist economy
• commercial farms
• Dutch East India Company
• economic efficiency
• economies of scale
• Encomienda system
• Friedrich Engels
• hierarchical class system
• invisible hand
• Karl Marx
• laissez-faire capitalism
• Laws of Supply and Demand
• manufacturing
• merchant class
• means of production
• Mercantilism
• middle class
• mother country
• Navigation Acts
• proletariat
• Qing
• Seven Years War
• smuggling
• Spanish Mission
• specialization
• The Communist Manifesto

Unit 7: Revolutions in Europe and North America

7a. Analyze connections between the Scientific Revolution and the politics of the Enlightenment

• Describe the ideals of the Scientific Revolution and how they influenced the Enlightenment in Europe?
• How did the beliefs during these periods change the political landscape of Europe?

Before the Protestant Reformation (1517–1648) and the Scientific Revolution (1543-1687) in Europe, the Catholic Church held tremendous political and social power. The Reformation fractured this control. The printing press promoted literacy and individual access to the Bible. The Scientific Revolution encouraged individuals to question common beliefs and test hypotheses using observable facts, logic, and the scientific method.

During the Enlightenment (1685–1815), European philosophers applied this new scientific framework to the political sphere. John Locke (1632–1704), Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778), and Voltaire (1694–1778) questioned authority, examined the role and purpose of government, and encouraged citizens to hold their leaders accountable. Concepts such as individual rights, personal liberty, the social contract, and popular sovereignty ignited revolutions across the globe. People no longer existed to aggrandize the state, which should serve and protect the people.

To review, see:

• The Origins of the Enlightenment
• The Enlightenment
• Scientific Revolution Enlightenment
• Scientific and Political Revolutions in the 17th and 18th Centuries

7b. Explain the beliefs and positions of key Enlightenment thinkers such as Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau

• Describe the main beliefs and positions of the Enlightenment philosophers Thomas Hobbes, Jean Locke, and Jean Jacques Rousseau.

In The Leviathan (1651), Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) argued that human nature is inherently egotistical, power-hungry, and warlike. He said a strong central authority is needed to prevent civil discord and maintain peace. In Hobbes's version of a "social contract", citizens agree to give up certain freedoms in exchange for government protection from other human beings in favor of peace.

John Locke advocated for a limited government and the idea that all men (including monarchs) are equal in the eyes of God. In his book Two Treatises of Government (1689), Locke argued that people prefer to exist in a stable system that respects the individual liberties and rights of all men. He supported the rule of law and Montesquieu's (1689–1755) idea of the need for a separation of powers. No one (including the monarchy) is above the law. Power and authority are reciprocal – the state derives its authority from the people it governs. Its main function is to protect the rights of individuals, including the right to own property. Locke encouraged citizens to protest and overthrow corrupt, abusive, authoritarian governments. The writers of the American Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution adopted many of Locke's ideas about society, justice, and politics. 

Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed humans are naturally peaceful. According to the Romanticist philosophical movement, the government should preserve the innate goodness and purity of people. In The Social Contract (1762), Rousseau argued every citizen should help create the laws and govern society. He supported direct democracy.

To review, see:

• The Exchange of Ideas in the Public Sphere
• Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679)
• John Locke (1632–1704)
• Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78)

7c. Explain the political consequences of Enlightenment beliefs and how they played out in different countries

• What were the political consequences of the Enlightenment?
• How did the Enlightenment lead to revolutions in the Americas, the Caribbean, and France?
• How did the revolutions compare to one another?

The Enlightenment philosophers argued that the state derives its power from the consent of the governed. This radical idea led to revolutions around the globe. Thomas Jefferson borrowed heavily from John Locke's Two Treatises of Government when he wrote the Declaration of Independence (1776). The U.S. Constitution (1787) reflects the Enlightenment ideals of a social contract, popular sovereignty, consent of the governed, and individual rights and liberties.

The Enlightenment also inspired The French Revolution (1789–1799), which led to a different result. France was divided into three social castes according to the Estate System – the clergy, the nobility and monarchs, and the commoners. In 1789, the Third Estate rebelled against the disproportionate tax burden they shouldered and the lack of human rights. The National Constituent Assembly wrote The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789). Olympe de Gouges, a French activist, wrote The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen.

However, the revolution soon devolved into mayhem. More than 17,000 people were executed during the Reign of Terror (1793–1794). By 1799, French citizens gave Napoleon Bonaparte (1769–1821) dictatorial powers to end the chaos and violence. Bonaparte declared himself emperor in 1804. However, the new government was a constitutional monarchy (not absolute) when France restored King Louis XIII to power in 1814 after the Napoleonic Wars (1800–1815). Many of the Enlightenment ideals survived and were featured in the many administrative reforms Napoleon implemented.

The American and French revolutions inspired the Haitian Revolution (1791–1804), where the enslaved people of Saint-Domingue overthrew their masters and French rule. In 1801, Toussaint Louverture wrote a Constitution for the Haitian Republic that created a semi-presidential system and recognized the rights of citizenship for all male citizens. However, nations like the United States refused to grant diplomatic ties or trade relationships with Haiti, which led to widespread poverty that continues to this day.

When the Napoleonic Wars unfolded in Europe, Spain and Portugal lost control of their South American domains. The inefficiency of their governments, the Bourbon Reforms the Spanish Crown imposed during the 1700s, and unique social dynamics encouraged most of the Spanish-American colonies to revolt. By the 1820s, almost all of Central and South America were independent. Starting with Mexico in 1821, revolution spread through Central and South America, and many incorporated the ideals of the Enlightenment into their new constitutions.

To review, see:

• Revolutions in America, France, and Haiti
• The American Revolution
• More on the American Revolution
• Common Sense
• The French Revolution
• More on the French Revolution
• Rights of Man
• The Haitian Revolution
• Dessalines, the Flag, and Independence

7d. Discuss the political context and alignment of Europe after the fall of Napoleon Bonaparte

• How did Napoleon's conquest impact Europe?
• Explain the importance of the Congress of Vienna and how it led to the rise in nationalism and World War I.

When Napoleon was defeated in 1815, diplomats from France, the United Kingdom, Austria, Russia, and Prussia met during the Congress of Vienna (1814–1815) to rearrange the boundaries of Europe's independent states. They adopted a balance-of-power approach to reestablish stability and peace, rejecting many of the Enlightenment's ideas of individual rights and self-determination. However, in 1848, liberal nationalistic movements in Sicily, France, the Germanic and Italian states, and the Austrian Empire protested in a Year of Revolution.

In 1914 a series of entangling alliances the European powers created to maintain the peace would force their hands as they each stumbled into World War I when Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian nationalist, assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne.

To review, see:

• The Napoleonic Wars
• Nationalism, Liberalism, Conservatism, and the Political Order
• The Congress of Vienna and Growth of Nationalism
• Why No Revolution in 1848 in Britain?

7e. Connect the revolutions in South America to the Enlightenment and political events in Europe

• How did the Napoleonic Wars and the Congress of Vienna contribute to the revolutions in South America?
• Who was Simón Bolívar?
• How did Brazil gain its independence?

In the mid-18th century, Philip V and Ferdinand VI of Spain issued the Bourbon Reforms to increase efficiencies and Spanish control in their American colonies. However, it stoked resentment while Napoleon's invasions in Europe weakened their focus on the Americas. The Mexican War for Independence (1810–1820) overthrew the Spanish colonial system in Mexico. Agustín de Iturbide's Plan de Iguala (1821) was a revolutionary proclamation based on the "three guarantees" of independence, religion, and equality.

Simón Bolívar (1783–1830) borrowed from the philosophies of Rousseau and Montesquieu as he led independence movements across the Viceroyalty of New Granada, which spanned today's Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. Bolivar served as president of Gran Colombia from 1819–1830 and as dictator of Peru from 1820–1823.

When Napoleon invaded Portugal in 1807, Prince Regent Dom João fled to Rio de Janeiro, declaring it the capital of the Portuguese empire and crowning himself King João VI. When revolution erupted in Brazil in 1820, King João VI returned to Portugal and left his son Dom Pedro to rule in his place. Dom Pedro declared Brazil an independent nation in 1822 and crowned himself emperor. He established a constitutional monarchy with separate branches of government based on the ideals of Montesquieu.

In Argentina, Manuel Belgrano, Juan José Castelli, and José de San Martín led similar rebellions against Spanish rule from 1810–1818. The establishment of these new South American nations went virtually unchallenged when Napoleon was defeated in Europe in 1815.

To review, see:

• Spanish America: Revolution for Whom?
• Spanish North America
• Revolution in Latin America and South America
• Spanish South America
• Simón Bolívar
• Portuguese South America

Unit 7 Vocabulary

• Agustín de Iturbide's Plan de Iguala
• American Declaration of Independence
• American Revolution
• Archduke Franz Ferdinand
• balance of power
• Bourbon Reforms
• Catholic Church
• Congress of Vienna
• consent of the governed
• constitutional monarchy
• direct democracy
• Dom Pedro
• Enlightenment
• Estate System
• French Revolution
• Gavrilo Princip
• Gran Colombia
• Haitian Revolution
• Jean Jacques Rousseau
• John Locke
• José de San Martín
• Juan José Castelli
• Manuel Belgrano
• Montesquieu
• Napoleon Bonaparte
• Napoleonic Wars
• National Constituent Assembly
• Reign of Terror
• Rio de Janeiro
• Romanticist
• Saint-Domingue
• Scientific Revolution
• Simón Bolívar
• The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen
• The Social Contract

Unit 8: Expansion in the Industrial Age

8a. Explain what the Second Industrial Revolution was and where it took place

• What is the significance of the Second Industrial Revolution?

The Second Industrial Revolution (1870–1914), also called the Technological Revolution, transformed societies based on agricultural production and industrial manufacturing. The invention of steam power during the first Industrial Revolution (1760–1840) led to the expansion of the railroads and steamboats. It also ushered in mechanized textile production, the telegraph, and large-scale manufactured goods. The Second Industrial Revolution featured advancements in the steel, electrical, and oil industries. The internal combustion engine was innovated in addition to the Bessemer process for steel production.

Inventors such as Alexander Graham Bell (telephone, 1876) and Thomas Edison (light bulb, 1879), revolutionized communication and enabled factory production into the night. This led to an explosion of cheap consumer goods and advancements in medicine and military technology.

To review, see The Second Industrial Revolution.

8b. Analyze the different reasons for European imperialism, including criticisms

• Why did Europeans imperialize the world?
• How did advanced technology help Europe imperialize the world?

A new era of European imperialism began in the 1850s. Industrial technologies, guns, and weaponry allowed Europeans to conquer more countries, exploit the raw materials, and install new colonial outposts. Inventions like the machine gun in 1844 by Hiram Maxim and the airplane in 1903 by Wilbur and Orville Wright led to new forms of warfare. J.A. Hobson (1858–1940), the British economist, attributed this new imperialism to the quest for profit spurred by middle-class demand for foreign goods like coffee, tea, sugar, cotton textiles, and ivory. Many promoted the European mission to civilize the world, which Rudyard Kipling professed in his 1899 pro-imperialist poem, The White Man's Burden.

To review, see:

• The Motives and Means of Imperialism
• Imposition of European Ideas and Values
• Facilitating Imperialism through Advanced Technologies
• Imperialism: A Study

8c. Identify the structure of different European empires, including which territories they controlled

• What were the various European empires?
• What territory did each control?
• How was the structure of European empires different?

During the 19th century, newly unified Germany and Italy joined England, Belgium, and France in their quest to control Africa. The British Empire was the largest, most extensive colonial power during the 16th–20th centuries. At its height, it controlled one-quarter of the earth, promoting the claim that the sun never sets on the British Empire.

The Opium Wars and the Russo-Japanese War determined which colonial powers would control Asia. The first Opium War (1839–42) was fought between China and Britain, and the second Opium War (1856–60), also known as the Anglo-French War in China, was fought by Britain and France against China. During the Russo-Japanese War (1904–05), the newly industrialized Empire of Japan forced Russia to abandon its expansionist policy in East Asia. By the early 20th century, Great Britain controlled large parts of China, France controlled Indochina, and Japan controlled Korea. 

To review, see Colonial Empires.

8d. Describe how people in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere resisted European rule

As we saw in the Americas, European colonialism often saw resistance which turned into rebellion. South Africans resisted British rule in the First Boer War or Transvaal War (1880–1881) and the Second Boer War (1899–1902). Meanwhile, Chinese fighters, led by the Righteous Harmony Society, were unable to resist the encroaching influence of the British Empire and the Empire of Japan during the Boxer Rebellion (1899–1901).

India resisted British colonialism during two separate independence movements. The first was the Indian Rebellion (1857), also known as the First War of Independence. This rebellion was a violent, extensive mutiny against the British East India Company's rule, which ultimately failed and prompted the British to tighten their authority over India. During this movement, Bal Gangadhar Tilak (1856–1920) pushed for independence but was ultimately defeated. We will see that many of these resistance movements proved successful in the aftermath of World War I.

To review, see Exploitation and Resistance and The Boxer Rebellion.

Unit 8 Vocabulary

• Alexander Graham Bell
• Bal Gangadhar Tilak
• Boxer Rebellion
• British Empire
• First Boer War
• First War of Independence
• Germany
• Hiram Maxim
• Indian Rebellion
• Italy
• J.A. Hobson
• Opium Wars
• Rudyard Kipling
• Russo-Japanese War
• Second Boer War
• Second Industrial Revolution (technological revolution)
• steam power
• telegraph
• The Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen
• The Leviathan
• Third Estate
• Thomas Edison
• Thomas Hobbes
• Toussaint Louverture
• Transvaal War
• Two Treatises of Government
• U.S. Constitution
• Viceroyalty of New Granada
• Voltaire
• White Man's Burden
• Wilbur and Orville Wright
• World War I
• Year of Revolution

Unit 9: Life and Labor in the Industrial World

9a. Describe the importance of certain inventions that came about during the Second Industrial Revolution

• What important inventions came about during the Second Industrial Revolution?
• How did automation help drive innovation?
• What inventors and innovators helped spur the Second Industrial Revolution?

As discussed in Unit 8, the Second Industrial Revolution (1870–1914) featured advancements in the steel, electrical, and oil industries. Since it was first developed in Turkey during the mid-13th century, steel production was slow and laborious. In 1856, Henry Bessemer (1813–1898) invented the Bessemer Process, which afforded mass production of steel from pig iron. Beginning in 1900, Andrew Carnegie (1835–1919), an American industrialist, offered an innovative business model at Carnegie Steel by cutting labor costs and materials and speeding up the production process. His employees worked 12-hour days, seven days a week. Steel was used to improve rail lines and build the skyscrapers that would support vertical construction in American cities.

To review, see:

• Inventions, Innovations, and Mechanization
• The Philosophy of Manufacturers
• Steel: Carnegie and Creative Destruction

9b. Explain what life was like in industrial cities and how the growth of industrialization affected cities

• What was life like in an industrial city?
• How was life different depending on socio-economic status?
• How did the conditions of industrial cities lead to modern reforms?

Life for the working class in industrial cities was dirty, cramped, and dangerous. Many families lived in small tenement apartments built of wood and prone to fires, with few windows and poor ventilation. Spoiled and rotten food was normal. Jacob Riis published photographs of the unsafe, unsanitary living conditions in his book How the Other Half Lives (1890). New York installed a sewer system after a massive cholera outbreak in the 1840s. Reformers like Jane Addams, who founded Chicago's Hull House in 1889 and other settlement houses, worked to improve living conditions and educated the poor on maintaining sanitary living conditions. 

Meanwhile, wealthy neighborhoods featured large houses, gas lamps, running water, flushing toilets, and electrified street cars. Beginning in the 1850s, sewage systems removed waste. Opportunities for leisure and recreation included libraries, amusement parks, books, newspapers, music halls, and theaters.

To review, see:

• Life in the Industrial City
• Urbanization and Its Challenges
• The Subjective Necessity for Social Settlements

9c. Discuss the movement of people globally and what effect this had on the places that they went

• Why do people move from one place to another?
• What is a diaspora, and what are some important ones in history?
• What is a settler colony, and how did they impact the development of the modern world?

Europeans moved to Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, New Zealand, South Africa, the United States, and Uruguay to flee poverty and religious persecution during the 19^th century. For example, ten million people left Ireland to settle in the United States, Canada, and Australia during Ireland's Great Potato Famine (1845–1852). Many Japanese emigrated to Peru and Brazil, and many Chinese emigrated to Mexico, Canada, the United States, and other countries in the Americas. 

In the Americas, European and Asian immigrants faced varying forms of racism, nativism (a push against immigrants), and segregation. In 1882, the U.S. Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act. The U.S. government also reneged on its 1894 promise to welcome and guarantee the rights of Japanese immigrants when it convinced Japan to withhold the passports of Japanese emigrants in its Gentleman's Agreement of 1907.

To review, see Communities in Diaspora and Settler Colonies.

9d. Analyze different reform and revolutionary movements to better understand how people criticized the Industrial Era

• What are coerced and semi-coerced labor?
• What were different reform movements during the industrial era?
• What regulations and reforms came as a result of resistance?
• What is socialism, and why did it develop?

The Industrial era featured three forms of labor: free or paid, coerced, and semi-coerced. Paid labor is when workers assume positions of their own free will and receive wages and benefits according to mutually agreed-upon contracts. During the industrial era, work was often semi-coerced because laborers received low pay, worked long hours, and were subject to dangerous working conditions. The employer held great power because it was easy to replace sick, injured, or unwilling workers. Coerced laborers included prisoners and children who earned meager wages (if any) and were forced to obey their "employers" or parents.

As discussed in Unit 6, Karl Marx (1818–1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) protested the extreme poverty, alienation, and poor living conditions they witnessed in the industrialized cities. In The Communist Manifesto (1848), they predicted a class struggle would occur over the means of production. The proletariat (working class) would revolt against the bourgeoisie (upper classes and wealthy elite) to demand better working conditions, and capitalism would implode. These socialist ideas would fuel revolutions in Russia, China, and around the world into the 20th century.

Meanwhile, unionization movements spread throughout the world as workers organized to gain more leverage and negotiate fairer contracts. The British Parliament passed The Factory Acts from 1860–1880 to build on previous laws that regulated businesses. They also expanded national healthcare, regulated workplace safety, limited work hours, and restricted child labor. Historians believe this progressive government response may have discouraged British citizens from engaging in violent protests as occurred in many other European countries during this time. The United States and Germany followed, and several countries passed laws mandating free public education for children. 

To review, see:

• Coerced and Semicoerced Labor
• Regulation, Reform, and Revolutionary Ideologies
• Socialist Economics

Unit 9 Vocabulary

• Andrew Carnegie
• Bessemer Process
• Bourgeoisie
• Chinese Exclusion Act
• coerced labor
• Gentleman's Agreement of 1907
• Great Potato Famine
• Henry Bessemer
• How the Other Half Lives
• Hull House
• Jacob Riis
• Jane Addams
• paid labor
• Proletariat
• semi-coerced labor
• socialism
• The Factory Acts
• unionization movements

Unit 10: World War I

10a. Explain which factors contributed to a general war in 1914 and how they did so

• What political and social conditions led to World War I?
• How did the Congress of Vienna contribute to the start of World War I?
• How did the weakening of the Ottoman Empire lead to World War I?
• Why did World War I become a global conflict?

The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, ended the Long Peace that had maintained the status quo in Europe since the Congress of Vienna in 1815. The war between Serbia and Austria-Hungary dragged Europe and its colonies around the world into the conflict due to a series of entangled alliances. The Central Powers included Austria-Hungary, Germany, and the Ottoman Empire. The Allies included Russia, France, Great Britain, Japan, Italy, and the United States (which joined in April 1917). The war ended in a stalemate in November 1918.

The Ottoman Empire, which controlled today's Turkey, the Middle East, and North Africa, became known as the sick man of Europe and disintegrated at the end of World War I. Great Britain, France, Russia, Italy, and Germany picked up the spoils by establishing new colonial "mandates" in the countries that comprised the former empire.

To review, see:

• Alliances, Expansion, and Conflict
• Planning the First World War
• The Collapse of the Ottomans and the Coming of War

10b. Discuss what the fighting was like for those who went to war in 1914

• What is total war?
• How did the military technology of World War I contribute to brutality and trench warfare?
• How did the conflict end?

World War I caused more than 40 million military and civilian casualties between 1914 and 1918. Technological advances, such as tanks, airplanes, machine guns, flame throwers, and poison gas, led to a war of attrition that outpaced traditional rules of warfare. Both sides adopted a policy of total war without restriction. They engaged in trench warfare separated by a desolate no man's land. Life in the trenches was miserable, and neither side could expand its territory. Battles between German U-boats and U.S. submarines were especially lethal but did little to advance the war. On November 11, 1918, both sides agreed to an armistice. The Central Powers surrendered, but both sides suffered dearly. 

To review, see Total War and New Weapons of War.

10c. Summarize the effects that the war had on global politics and society

• What were the political effects of World War I?
• How did the worldwide depression create power vacuums that fascism filled?
• What role did socialism play in the aftermath of World War I?
• How did Japan's actions contribute to political instability?

Although World War I was primarily fought on the Western Front in Europe, battles occurred throughout Europe's colonial territories in Africa and Asia as the powers vied for hegemony. Theaters of war erupted in Mesopotamia, Africa, and the Mediterranean. Global trade and communication were disrupted since Britain controlled most of the sea routes, and several countries sent colonial troops to fight in the European trenches.

Prior to World War I, the Empire of Japan had defeated Russia during the Russo-Japanese War in 1905 and annexed Korea in 1910. While Japan fought with the Allies during World War I, government support for fascism and a social philosophy of exceptionalism prompted it to side with Germany and Italy during World War II.

The Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916) was a secret agreement between Britain and France to divide the former Ottoman territories in the Middle East. France would control Syria and Lebanon, and the British would take the Fertile Crescent (today's Iraq). The Balfour Declaration (1917) was Britain's announcement that it supported the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine.

On April 24, 1916, Irish nationalists announced the establishment of the Irish Republic during the Easter Rising. Although the British prevailed, several days of clashes with the British military resulted in thousands of casualties, including many civilians.

Meanwhile, women in Europe and the United States took jobs in factories and munitions plants to support the war effort. They also filled traditional male-oriented occupations, such as farmwork, to replace the men fighting on the front. They also helped in the medical field as professional and volunteer nurses. 

To review, see:

• War on the Homefront
• Southeast Asia and World War I
• America and World War I

10d. Analyze the peace process, including potential weaknesses or sources of instability

• How did World War I end?
• Why was it an unequal armistice?
• What were the Fourteen Points, and why did they fail?
• How did World War I impact the Middle East?

On November 11, 1918 (Armistice Day), the leaders of the Allied and Central powers declared a stalemate and stopped fighting. They signed the Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919. Woodrow Wilson, the U.S. president, argued that his Fourteen Points should be the basis for the treaty to promote free trade, reduce militaries, and create the League of Nations to avoid future conflicts. However, these arguments were largely forgotten because Great Britain, France, and members of the U.S. Congress wanted to hold Germany financially and morally responsible for the war. In addition to imposing substantial reparations, Germany lost territory, and its military was greatly reduced.

The fall of the Russian monarchy, which its Tsarist leaders had led since November 1721 during the Bolshevik Revolution (1917-1923), created further instability in Europe, and socialism became a viable global alternative to capitalism for years to come.

World War I spelled the end of the Ottoman Empire, which had supported the Central Powers. Russia, Great Britain, and France divided their territories and imposed new forms of economic and political imperialism on the people of the Middle East. The artificial boundaries they drew represented European interests but failed to represent the diverse ethnic and religious groups in the region. This led to infighting among nationalistic movements that continue to this day.

To review, see:

• The War Ends
• The Fourteen Points
• The Final Treaty
• The Middle East and World War I

10e. Describe the events of the Russian Revolution and what its political goals were

• Why did the Russian Revolution start?
• How did the Central Powers help Lenin during the Russian Revolution?
• What were the major events of the Russian Revolution?
• What were the political goals of it?

The Russian Revolution was one of the most important events in world history. The collapse of the Russian monarchy in March of 1917 led to a brief democratic government that was determined to continue fighting in World War I. However, as the war in France languished and the Russian economy worsened, the Bolshevik Party, a communist organization led by Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924), staged a revolution against the provisional government by October 1917 and seized control of the state. Interestingly, Germany helped Lenin, who was in exile in Switzerland during the war, return to Russia, a strategic move to draw its Russian opponent out of World War I.

The Bolsheviks sought to reorganize Russian society based on the ideas of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, who had argued that socialism (and eventually communism) would create a more equitable society with the rise of the proletariat (the laborers or working class) against the bourgeoisie (the wealthy owners of the means of production).

To review, see:

• Rising Discontent in Russia
• The Romanovs and the Russian Revolution
• The Russian Revolution
• Women and the Russian Revolution
• Declaration of the Rights of the Toiling and Exploited Peoples

Unit 10 Vocabulary

• Allies
• Armistice
• Armistice Day
• Artificial boundaries
• Balfour Declaration
• Bolshevik Revolution
• Central Powers
• Communism
• Easter Rising
• exceptionalism
• fascism
• Fourteen Points
• German U-boat
• no man's land
• Palestine
• Russian Revolution
• Sarajevo
• Sick Man of Europe
• submarine
• Sykes-Picot Agreement
• total war
• Treaty of Versailles
• trench warfare
• Tsarist
• Vladimir Lenin
• war of attrition
• Western Front

Unit 11: The Interwar Period

11a. Analyze how Europe attempted to create a new political order after World War I

• How did economic depression stunt the recovery in Europe?
• What was the League of Nations, and why did it fail?
• How did World War I impact Europe's political landscape?

The physical destruction of World War I transformed Europe. The Austro-Hungarian Empire collapsed into today's Austria, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Poland, and parts of Italy. The Ottoman Empire disintegrated into Eastern Europe's Baltic States and modern-day Turkey.

U.S. President Woodrow Wilson created the League of Nations (1920), the first global organization designed to maintain peace, but it had limited success. It seemed doomed to failure when the U.S. Congress declined to join. Similarly, the Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928), which renounced war as an instrument of national policy, could not prevent World War II. These international efforts were the precursors to the United Nations, which was formed after World War II.

Several European countries granted women suffrage after the war (the USSR in 1917, Germany, Austria, and Poland in 1818, and Britain in 1928). The United States ratified the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920. Although Jim Crow laws continued to plague the southern United States, the American Civil Liberties Union was formed in 1919, and the roots of the future Civil Rights Movement took hold.

Meanwhile, Russia emerged as the communist-controlled Soviet Union (also known as the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or USSR) in December 1922 following a bloody civil war between the communist Red Guard, led by the Bolsheviks, Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, and the White Army, a disorganized mix of forces with disparate goals, including those who wanted to restore the Tsarist regime and support from foreign countries that opposed communism.

To review, see:

• Recovering from World War I
• The European Economy in the Interwar Period
• Internationalism Between the Wars
• The Effects of the First World War
• Post World War I Area: Extreme Nationalism

11b. Discuss the rise of the Soviet Union and its leadership

• How did the Soviet Union come into power?
• How were Lenin's and Stalin's visions different?
• What was Stalin's First Five-Year Plan?
• What were the results of Stalin's reforms?

By the end of the civil war in 1920, the Bolsheviks had to build a new economic infrastructure for the new Soviet Union. In 1921, Lenin introduced his New Economic Policy (NEP), which created some stability and instituted limited free market policies, such as land ownership. However, Joseph Stalin (1878–1953) won the power struggle that followed Lenin's death in 1924.

During the 1930s, Stalin nationalized the Soviet economy and reinstituted the authoritarian policies of war communism to create a command economy. He demanded laborers build the heavy industrial base that would create a modern industrialized economy, forced the peasants into mass collective farms, which led to millions of deaths during the Great Famine (1932–1933), and provoked a mass migration of millions of peasants to the Soviet urban centers (1928–1932). In 1934, Stalin declared the revolution was over.

Researchers estimate that Stalin's forced collectivization efforts killed nearly 10 million people in the Soviet countryside (primarily in Ukraine) during the Great Famine. To eradicate "enemies of the working class", Stalin imprisoned more than a million people in the Gulag prison system and executed at least 700,000 individuals during the Great Purge between 1934 and 1939. 

To review, see The Formation of the Soviet Union and First Five-Year Plan.

11c. Describe the Great Depression and the political effect it had in Europe

• What was the Great Depression?
• What caused it in the U.S. and Europe?
• How did it impact Europe and the U.S.?
• How did it lead to World War II?

The Great Depression followed the crash of the U.S. stock market on October 29, 1929, and led to massive inflation, homelessness, and political destabilization in the United States and Europe. Post-war Europe had grown increasingly dependent on the United States, and their economies suffered when the American economy collapsed. Germany's weakened economy was completely devastated – its currency became worthless, and people famously bought loaves of bread with wheelbarrows full of money.

In addition to the rise of Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) and the German Nazi Party, the economic collapse also prompted the rise of Benito Mussolini's (1883–1945) fascist regime in Italy. Germany embarked on a war of conquest with claims that the Jewish people and others (including homosexuals, the disabled, and Roma gypsies) poisoned the race and did not deserve to live, especially when compared to their belief in the superiority of the "Aryan race".

To review, see The Great Depression and Fascism.

11d. Analyze the postwar demand for greater rights both within foreign colonies and domestically

• What impact did World War I have on civil rights throughout the world?
• How did World War I impact French Indochina and India?

World War I played an essential role in weakening colonialism as independence efforts increased across the globe and proclaimed self-determination and social justice for the traditionally oppressed.

Be sure to review the petition Ho Chi Minh (1890–1969), an independence leader from French Indochina, sent to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson on June 18, 1919, during the negotiations for the Treaty of Versailles, asking the colonial powers to consider the rights, needs, and sovereignty of the people of Indochina. It called upon Enlightenment ideals of equality and freedom. 

In the Middle East, nationalistic movements spread in Iraq. Calls to establish a homeland for Jewish people in British-controlled Palestine also gained momentum. Marcus Garvey (1887–1940), a Jamaican activist, and W.E.B. DuBois (1868–1963), an American sociologist, led the Pan-African movement and hosted the First Pan-African Congress in 1918, demanding world powers embrace self-determination for African colonies to become independent countries. 

Great Britain's control over India also began to weaken. Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948), an Indian lawyer, protested the oppression Indians suffered under British rule. The Indian Independence movement focused on nonviolent resistance to British colonial rule as it continued to gain strength until it achieved victory after World War II. 

To review, see:

• Ho Chi Minh Petition
• Old Empires and New Colonies
• Mahatma: A Great Soul of the 20th Century
• Resistance, Civil Rights, and Democracy

Unit 11 Vocabulary

• 19th Amendment
• Adolf Hitler
• American Civil Liberties Union
• Austro-Hungarian Empire
• Benito Mussolini
• Bolsheviks
• civil rights movement
• collective farm
• collectivization
• command economy
• First Pan-African Congress
• French Indochina
• gulag
• Ho Chi Minh
• Jim Crow laws
• Joseph Stalin
• Kellogg-Briand Pact
• League of Nations
• Mahatma Gandhi
• Marcus Garvey
• Nazi Party
• New Economic Policy (NEP)
• Red Guard
• Soviet Union
• suffrage
• The Great Depression
• The Great Famine
• The Great Purge
• Ukraine
• W.E.B. DuBois
• war communism
• White Army
• Zionism

Unit 12: The Causes and Consequences of World War II

12a. Discuss the causes of World War II as well as the motivations of the combatants

• What were the causes of World War II?
• How did the Policy of Appeasement lead to World War II?
• What is fascism, and how did it lead to the formation of the Axis Powers?

The unresolved political and power dynamics of World War I and general economic instability created several power vacuums that would erupt again in warfare during World War II. German resentment toward the Treaty of Versailles and economic depression encouraged the country's extreme nationalist elements to accept Adolf Hitler's fascist rhetoric. 

The Nazi Party promoted Hitler's antisemitic beliefs, which he outlined in his bestselling book Mein Kampf. He blamed the Jewish people for the hardships Germany suffered. On November 9-10, 1936, party supporters attacked and destroyed Jewish businesses during Kristallnacht (the Night of Broken Glass). The Nazi government gradually ostracized the Jews, took away their rights as citizens, forced them to live in ghettos, and eventually transported them into forced labor, concentration, and extermination camps. Historians estimate the government killed six million Jews and at least five million prisoners of war during the Holocaust.

The Empire of Japan's incursions into Asia was fraught with atrocities and genocide. Japan had conquered Korea in 1910, invaded Manchuria in 1931, and entered China itself in 1937. Historians estimate that more than 300,000 civilians were killed during the six-week Rape of Nanking in China in December 1937.

Bound by similar fascist beliefs, Germany, Italy, and Japan engaged in a military alliance known as the Axis Powers. England and the members of the British Commonwealth, France (before the German occupation beginning in July 1940), the Soviet Union (after June 1941), and the United States (after December 1941) formed the Allied Powers. 

To review, see An Unstable Peace and Holocaust.

12b. Describe the fighting that took place, with special attention to the different places where the war was fought

• What were the main military strategies during the war?
• What were the theaters of the war?
• Why did the US drop atomic bombs on Japan?
• How were deception and espionage part of the war effort?

World War II advanced military strategy in addition to military technology. Conflict occurred in the European and Pacific Theaters.

The European Theater relied on fighter planes, tanks, and submarines to drive the Axis powers out of France, Western Europe, and North Africa. Germany tested its strategy for victory, known as blitzkrieg or "lightning war", on Poland on September 1, 1939. Within days, Britain and France declared war on Germany to form the Allied Powers. Germany had overrun Western Europe a few weeks after it had launched its westward offensive on May 10, 1940. However, Germany failed to capture Britain during its battles between the German Luftwaffe and the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the Battle of Britain in 1940. Germany turned its attention to the Soviet Union when it launched Operation Barbarossa in June 1941. The Battle of Stalingrad in 1942 was a major turning point that determined Hitler's eventual defeat. The German Third Reich surrendered on May 7, 1945.

The Pacific Theater primarily involved the United States and Japan after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on December 7, 1941. Japan had to take the small islands in the Pacific, using an island-hopping strategy to land and refuel its planes. Japanese kamikaze pilots terrified the Allied forces by using their fighter planes as weapons to crash into Allied ships during battle. The Battle of Midway in June 1942 was an important turning point in the war because it allowed the United States to reverse Japan's island refueling strategy and attack Japan directly. 

Beginning in August 1942, the United States, via the Manhattan Project, constructed an atomic bomb that the United States dropped on Japan – first on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, and the second on Nagasaki three days later, killing 129,000–226,000 civilians. The Japanese Emperor Hirohito (1901–1989) announced his decision to surrender on August 12, 1945.

To review, see:

• Prelude to World War II
• Theaters of War
• World War II
• End of World War II

12c. Analyze the post-war consequences of World War II and how they reshaped Europe and the world

• How did the end of World War II lead to the creation of the United Nations?
• What is the UN Security Council, and why are the former Allied Powers on it?
• What impact did the U.S. occupation of Japan have?
• How was the end of World War II related to the formation of Israel?
• How did it help end colonialism?

The end of World War II gave birth to a power struggle between the two great superpowers – the United States and the Soviet Union – in a battle between capitalism and communism that would characterize the Cold War (1947-1991), which we discuss in more detail in Unit 13. 

Europe and Asia were in shambles. U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill determined the new European boundaries and their respective spheres of influence at Yalta (February 1945) and Potsdam (July–August 1945). Japan ended the war in the Pacific when it surrendered unconditionally after the U.S. dropped its atomic bombs on Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9, 1945.

The Allies were determined not to repeat the mistakes of World War I. U.S. President Harry Truman signed the Economic Recovery Act of 1948, also known as the Marshall Plan, which would provide $13.3 billion in economic aid to Western Europe, including Germany and Italy (which became known as the Western Bloc). The Soviet Union and members of the Eastern Bloc refused the benefits.

The United Nations (UN) was a modern version of the League of Nations, which the United States took part in to help it succeed. The Allied Powers (the United States, Soviet Union, Great Britain, France, and China) are permanent members of the UN Security Council, and each member has veto power.

The main goal of the UN is to serve as a world forum to promote peace and prevent a third world war. The roots lay in the Atlantic Charter, which Winston Churchill and Franklin Roosevelt drafted in 1941 to plan the post-war world that emphasized democratic governments based on self-determination, free trade, and collective security. The UN General Assembly proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on December 10, 1948, affirming that people have the right to life, liberty, education, and self-determination and paved the way for the adoption of more than 70 human rights treaties. It also prohibited torture and acts of genocide.

The post-war period saw the official establishment of Israel as a sovereign nation and officially recognized homeland of the Jewish people. The Holocaust provided a clear rationale for the Zionist movement that had promoted such a homeland since the late 19th century. In 1947, the UN approved partitioning Palestine to create Israel, which became an official country in 1948. This led to increased tensions between the Arab Palestinians and Jewish Israelis that continue to this day.

To review, see:

• Out of the Ashes
• Keeping the Home Fires Burning
• The Reconstruction of Europe after the Second World War
• The Manhattan Project
• The Atlantic Charter through the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
• The United Nations

Unit 12 Vocabulary

• Allied Powers
• antisemitism
• Atlantic Charter
• atomic bomb
• Axis Powers
• Battle of Britain
• Battle of Midway
• Battle of Stalingrad
• Blitzkrieg
• British Commonwealth
• concentration camp
• Eastern Bloc
• Emperor Hirohito
• Empire of Japan
• European theater
• extermination camp
• Franklin Roosevelt
• German Luftwaffe
• ghetto
• Hiroshima
• Holocaust
• Israel
• Jewish homeland
• kamikaze
• Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass)
• Manchuria
• Manhattan Project
• Marshall Plan (Economic Recovery Act of 1948)
• Mein Kampf
• Nagasaki, Japan
• Nazi party
• Operation Barbarossa
• Pacific theater
• Pearl Harbor
• Rape of Nanking
• Royal Air Force (RAF)
• sphere of influence
• superpower
• UN General Assembly
• UN Security Council
• United Nations (UN)
• Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Unit 13: Cold War Conflicts

13a. Summarize the major events of the Cold War and the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union

• How did the Cold War begin?
• Why was it called a Cold War?
• What were the objectives of both sides?
• How did the Space Race factor into it?
• How did the transition to communism affect the people living in China?

The Cold War (1947-1991) was the power struggle that followed World War II between the two superpowers that emerged from the war – the United States and the Soviet Union. As we studied in Unit 12, the leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union divided Europe and Asia into two spheres of influence – capitalist Western Europe and communist Eastern Europe – at the Yalta (February 1945) and Potsdam (July–August 1945) conferences. 

In 1946, George Kennan (1904–2005), an American diplomat in Moscow, wrote the Long Telegram, which argued that the United States and its allies must stop the Soviet Union's aggressive policies to spread communism. Harry Truman, U.S. president from 1945–1953, developed the Truman Doctrine, also known as the policy of containment, which pledged the United States would support democracies and combat Soviet and other authoritarian threats. In 1954, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower coined the idea of the Domino Theory, which warned that democracies around the globe, such as Vietnam and countries in Latin America, would fall to communism like dominos due to the Soviet Union's aggressive tactics.

On April 4, 1949, the United States and Western Europe formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an alliance to discourage the Soviet Union from attacking any of its member states. On May 14, 1955, the Soviet Union followed with the Warsaw Pact, a similar agreement among members of the Soviet Bloc in Eastern Europe.

Due to their military strength and fear of nuclear annihilation or mutually assured destruction (MAD), the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR) engaged in a series of indirect proxy conflicts, such as in Korea, Angola, Vietnam, and Cuba, to contain the other side and establish their hegemony. For example, the United States lent financial, development, and military support to countries in Asia that became close allies, such as Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines. The Soviet Union did the same. 

The "space race" was a unique product of the Cold War, when the United States and the Soviet Union vied for dominance in space after the Soviet Union sent the first satellite (Sputnik) into space in 1957. In 1958, the United States established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which led the scientific effort to send men to land on the moon on July 20, 1969.

Meanwhile, Mao Zedong's (1893–1976) communist forces took control of China and established The People's Republic of China in October 1949. Mao imposed a series of measures to forcefully industrialize China. Similar to what occurred in the Soviet Union, historians estimate that Mao's Great Leap Forward (1958–1962), mandatory collectivization, forced labor, and the famine that ensued caused the deaths of 18–30 million people in China. The Cultural Revolution (1966–1976) was Mao's attempt to purge China of anything deemed corruptive to the communist cause. The government and local citizens suppressed anything that promoted capitalism or democracy or was considered Western, American, or European. 

To review, see:

• The Cold War Begins
• The Cold War
• The Long Telegram
• Rethinking the Space Race
• The Spread of Communism
• The Great Leap Forward
• The Cultural Revolution
• Mao Zedong's Victory and Its Aftermath

13b. Explain how the Cold War intersected with other global events, such as decolonization

• How did the Cold War impact decolonization?
• What was the Non-Aligned Movement?
• How did the Angolan Civil War symbolize the transition from colonialism?

During his speech at the 1955 Asian-African Conference of newly independent nations in Bandung, Indonesia, Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964), the prime minister of India, argued that developing nations did not benefit from military alliances with the United States or the Soviet Union. Instead, developing nations should work together to pursue independent developmental paths free of burdensome pro-communist or anti-communist (capitalist) alliances. This Non-Aligned Movement expressed the benefits of avoiding the entanglements of Cold War politics.

A proxy war would develop in Angola, a Portuguese colony that plunged into a long and deadly civil war when it gained independence in 1975. Fighting continued between the communist Cuban-backed People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), the capitalist South-African-backed National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), and the National Liberation Front (FNLA). In this proxy war, the Soviet Union indirectly supported the MPLA while the United States supplied aid and training to FNLA and UNITA. The Korean and Vietnam wars offer similar examples.

To review, see:

• The Non-Aligned Movement
• The Angolan Civil War
• The Cold War and Decolonization

13c. Discuss how and why so many new states came into existence after World War II

• What countries were created after World War II?
• What was the Year of Africa, and why is it important?
• How did communism contribute to the formation of new countries?

Many former European colonies obtained independence during the period of decolonization as Europe turned inward to recover from World War II. We see examples in India, Indonesia, and the Philippines. 

In October 1945, delegates who met at the Fifth Pan-African Congress in Manchester, England, called for an end to colonialism. In August 1947, Ghanaian leaders called for their independence during the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), which they obtained in 1957. The Belgian government agreed to grant independence to Congo in June 1960 following violent nationalist protests. The United Kingdom granted independence to Kenya in 1963 following the bloody Mau Mau Rebellion from 1952 to 1956. Civil war also erupted in Rhodesia, which the United Kingdom recognized as Zimbabwe in 1980. In 1947, the United Kingdom created the Commonwealth of Nations, which consists of Britain's former imperial possessions, except for Ireland and Zimbabwe.

Other nations formed as communist forms of government spread. For example, Che Guevara (1928–1967), an Argentine Marxist revolutionary, helped Fidel Castro (1926–2016), a Cuban revolutionary, wrest control from Fulgencio Batista, whom the United States supported financially, to establish the Republic of Cuba in 1959, which had ties to the Soviet Union. This change of government led to a massive exodus of people from Cuba to the United States and threatened nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the United States during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962.

However, efforts in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia devolved into the Vietnam War (1954–1975), when their leaders tried to break free from French and U.S. interests. 

To review, see:

• Jawaharlal Nehru Speaks to the Bandung Conference Political Committee, 1955
• Global Tensions and Decolonization
• The Decolonization in the British Empire

13d. Explain how the Cold War ended and what factors led to its end

• Why did the Cold War end?
• How were the Soviet-Afghan War and the Vietnam War symbolic of the Cold War?
• What was Tiananmen Square, and what does it symbolize?
• How did the Soviet Union come to an end?

During the 1980s, the Soviet Union could no longer hide the constant food lines, corruption, and inequities of its centralized economy. Mikhail Gorbachev (1931–2022), the new president of the Soviet Union in 1985, adopted the policies of Glasnost (openness) and Perestroika (restructuring) to transition the Soviet economy to greater private ownership of the factors of production. However, the drastic changes led to economic and political turmoil, and the Soviet Union officially collapsed in 1991. The United States quickly recognized 12 independent republics and established diplomatic ties with Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, and Kyrgyzstan. At that time, the United States became the world's sole superpower.

After Mao Zedong's death in 1976, the Chinese government, led by Deng Xiaoping (1904–1997), also implemented several capitalist reforms, such as inviting foreign trade and investment. However, Deng had no intention of allowing opposition to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). In 1986, university students protested in major Chinese cities.

The government suppressed their actions but hesitated to be as heavy-handed when students gathered at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on April 17, 1989, to mourn the death of party official Hu Yaobang, who had supported them. They began demanding democratic reform, an end to government censorship, greater rights to protest, and more money for education. Some decried corruption in the CCP. On June 3, 1989, tanks entered Beijing and cleared the square, killing up to several thousand people. A journalist captured an iconic moment when a student defiantly stared down a tank. 

To review, see:

• The Vietnam War
• A New World Order
• Tiananmen Square, 1989: The Declassified History
• Glasnost, Perestroika, and the End of the Soviet Union

Unit 13 Vocabulary

• Angolan Civil War
• Asian-African Conference
• Cold War
• Commonwealth of Nations
• Containment
• Cultural Revolution
• Deng Xiaoping
• Domino Theory
• Eastern Europe
• Fifth Pan-African Congress
• George Kennan
• Glasnost
• Great Leap Forward
• Harry Truman
• Long Telegram
• Mao Zedong
• Mau Mau Rebellion
• Mikhail Gorbachev
• mutually assured destruction (MAD)
• National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
• non-aligned movement
• North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
• nuclear annihilation
• People's Republic of China
• Perestroika
• Potsdam Conference
• proxy conflict
• Sputnik
• Tiananmen Square
• Truman Doctrine
• United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC)
• Vietnam War
• Warsaw Pact
• Western Europe
• Yalta Conference

Unit 14: The Contemporary World and Ongoing Challenges

14a. Discuss changes to the global economy and the consequences of those changes

• How did the global economy change during and after the Cold War?
• What were the Japanese and Korean miracles, and why are they important?
• How did globalization lead to economic disparity between the developed and developing worlds?
• What is outsourcing, and what is its impact?
• What is the global south, and how did it develop?
• How did China become so powerful?
• Why are India and Vietnam important economies today?

Several key organizations and international trade agreements were created to help preserve a peaceful world order after World War II. The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund were created at the Bretton Woods Conference in 1946. The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was signed in 1947 and became the World Trade Organization in 1995. 

Reductions in trade barriers and advances in computers, communications technologies (including the Internet in 1983), and transportation improved interconnectivity among nations and led to dramatic economic growth for multinational corporations such as Amazon, Apple, Aldi, Costco, Ikea, Microsoft, Samsung, and Toyota.

In 1957, the countries of Europe created the European Economic Community, or Common Market, which eventually evolved into the 15-member European Union in 1993 to promote the free movement of goods, services, money, and people. Despite the United Kingdom's amicable exit in 2016 (Brexit), the EU includes 27 member states in 2024 and uses its own currency, the euro. 

Following the successful Japanese industrialization model, the rapid economic growth among the Asian Tigers (Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and South Korea) seemed especially dramatic to those in the Western world. The destruction of World War II prompted Japan to build new factories from the ground up, using the latest technologies to produce high-quality cars, electronics, and consumer goods. Japan is one of the most powerful nations in the world. Mega corporations, such as Samsung and LG, have pushed South Korea to be the 13th largest economy in the world. Today, the K-pop industry dominates global music. As we learned in Unit 13, China has also become an economic powerhouse.

However, globalization and outsourcing have also provoked a nationalistic and xenophobic backlash in many countries, including the United States. Many U.S. and European companies have offshored some of their operations to countries in Asia and Central America, where labor is much cheaper. Many workers in the United States and Europe have lost jobs due to free trade when others can compete with open borders. Meanwhile, globalization has outraged consumers who see the same poor, unsafe, and unfair working conditions proliferate in some countries that existed in Europe and the United States during the 19th and early 20th centuries. 

To review, see:

• A Global Economy
• Globalization
• Economic Development in East Asia

14b. Describe what climate change means, how humans are affecting it, and what its effects will be

• What is climate change?
• How are humans impacting climate change?
• What implications does climate change have?
• What measures are being taken to address climate change?

Climate change refers to changes in weather patterns, temperatures, and environmental conditions due to the increased use of fossil fuels and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions that have warmed the planet, reduced air quality, and decreased access to clean water. Industrial waste, fertilizers and pesticides, and the increased use of non-biodegradable plastics and single-use consumer goods have led to widespread pollution and litter that clog waterways, contaminate streams and oceans, and poison wildlife.

In 1962, Rachel Carson sparked the Green Revolution when she published Silent Spring, a best-selling book that connected the politically powerful chemical industry with the proliferation of dangerous pesticides like DDT and other chemicals that contaminate our ecosystem, food supply, and human bodies. 

The nuclear power disaster in Chornobyl in the Soviet Union in 1986 offered a cautionary tale to countries that do not take proper safety precautions. Higher temperatures have led to drought conditions, while rising sea levels and extreme weather events (hurricanes, heat waves, and forest fires) have made other places unlivable and forced people to flee their homes as climate refugees.

Many governments and corporations have found it politically expedient to adopt policies of environmentalism that promote sustainability to curb the impact of climate change and counteract the rise in greenhouse gasses. 

To review, see Debates on the Environment and Global Climate Change.

14c. Analyze ways in which technology has impacted 21st-century issues, both positively and negatively

• How is science and technology advancing in the 21st century?
• What are the positive and negative impacts of advances in technology?

Since the Digital Computer Revolution began during the 1940s and 1950s, advances in computer science have allowed for the rapid development of new technologies that have promoted global interconnectivity and trade.

These advanced technologies have enriched our lives, extended the human lifespan with new vaccines and medical treatments, and created innovative telecommunications networks like the Internet and social media. Unfortunately, many of these advances – which require financial support, specialization, and time – have deepened the digital divide between lower-income and wealthier communities in addition to developing and more economically developed nations.

However, as in the case of post-World War II Japan, many developing countries have younger populations that may be able to leapfrog others when they deploy the latest innovations from scratch, such as WIFI and wireless technologies, without having to spend money to upgrade older, less efficient systems.

To review, see:

• Science and Technology for Today's World
• Globalization and Technology
• The Clean Energy Hub of the Future

14d. Describe 21st-century geopolitical challenges and crises and what possible effect they might have on the global order

• What is the global refugee crisis?
• What challenges do Syrian refugees face?
• How might the War in Ukraine impact the global order?
• How do you think colonialism and other political dynamics we have studied in this course may have caused or exacerbated these global conflicts?

We have seen several recent threats to global peace and security. Hotspots include the continued conflict in the Middle East (such as in Israel and Palestine); the rise of militant groups (such as al Qaeda and the Islamic State or ISIL) in Iraq and Syria; conflicts in Ethiopia, Sudan, and other parts of Africa; war between government and drug cartels in Latin and South America; and, the recent Russian invasion of Ukraine. Refugees continue to flee these war-ravaged parts of the world in search of economic opportunities in Europe and the United States. However, this influx continues to provoke radical nationalist and xenophobic groups to action worldwide.

In Syria, the population rose up to protest the totalitarian rule of Bashar al-Assad (1965– ) – this regime was not only brutally oppressive, but it did not represent the interests of the majority Sunni Muslim community. Although their circumstances differ, Libya and Yemen are embroiled in civil wars that have devastated their populations and have involved similar external entanglements. The war between Russia and Ukraine has unleashed political and economic forces that will reverberate for a long time and what it means to the global community.

Refugees are often forced to live in tent cities that lack access to proper food, medicine, clean water, and sanitation facilities. These holding camps are dangerous and subject to human and sex trafficking. Balancing humanitarian concerns and the human rights of refugees has exacerbated the housing crises we see in many countries in the developed and developing world.

To review, see:

• Ongoing Problems and Solutions
• The Syrian Refugee Crisis
• What the War in Ukraine Means for the Global Order

Unit 14 Vocabulary

• Al Qaeda
• Asian Tigers
• Bahar Al-Assad
• Bretton Woods Conference
• Brexit
• Chornobyl
• climate change
• climate refugee
• Digital Computer Revolution
• drug cartels
• European Common Market
• European Economic Community
• European Union
• extreme weather event
• fossil fuels
• General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade
• globalization
• greenhouse gas
• human rights
• humanitarian concerns
• International Monetary Fund
• Islamic State (ISIL)
• Middle East
• multinational corporations
• nationalism
• non-biodegradable plastics
• outsourcing
• Rachel Carson
• refugees
• Russian Invasion of Ukraine
• Silent Spring
• trade barriers
• Western Bloc
• Winston Churchill
• World Bank
• World Trade Organization
• xenophobia
• Zionist movement