Government Changes in 1900: Russia

Overview of Changes to Governments in 1900

• Includes Russia, China, the Ottoman Empire, and Mexico

Russia (Tsarist Control Weakens)

Internal Factors

• Industrialization lagged behind the US, Japan, and most of Europe
• Education expansion for peasants faced resistance, hindering infrastructure and entrepreneurship
• Calls for political reform, like civil liberties and government participation, were resisted
• Bloody Sunday (1905): Peaceful worker protests for better conditions were met with deadly force by the tsar's troops, resulting in 1,300 deaths
• Revolution of 1905: 400,000 workers striked in response to Bloody Sunday
• The Tsar attempted negotiation, but the conflict led to thousands of deaths, injuries, or exiles

External Factors

• Internal weaknesses caused Russia's economy and military to suffer
• Russia lost the Crimean War (1853-1856) against the Ottoman Empire
• Russia lost the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) against Japan
• Revolution took place 1917 during WWI

Effects/Result

• The Bolsheviks, under Vladimir Lenin, seized power to establish a communist government
• This marked the first instance of communists governing a large country
• The Western world considered this a threat to their own governments

China (Qing Dynasty Replaced by Republic)

Internal Factors

• Ethnic Tensions: China consisted of diverse ethnic groups, including the Han and Manchu
• Manchu Qing rulers never gained full acceptance from the Han majority
• Famine: Rapid population growth combined with natural disasters led to constant famine threats, creating the need for a government to ensure stability
• Low Revenues: An outdated tax system hindered the government's ability to maintain essential infrastructure, potentially exacerbating famine risks

External Factors

• Industrialization of Europe increased Europe's presence/influence in Chinese economy

Effects/Result

• A revolutionary movement in 1911 ousted the Qing Dynasty
• Sun Yat-sen tried to enact "The Three People's Principles" (democracy, nationalism, and economic restructuring) while upholding Confucian ideals
• Sun Yat-sen conceded leadership to a military leader due to a weak military presence, however he remained influential as the founder of the Chinese Republic
• The Chinese Nationalist Party/Kuomintang later regained power for two decades, until communist ideology challenged the republic

Ottoman Empire (Collapsed into Republic of Turkey due to Self-Determination)

Internal Factors

• Agricultural Economy: Its inability to compete with Industrialized Europe weakened the economy
• Reform groups such as the Young Turks, advocated for constitution and Turkification (focus on Turkish culture/norms and Islamic ideals), which also led to persecution of Armenians

External Factors

• Weakened Economy: empire relied on its role as a trading center, but as exports waned the economy generally began to crumble
• WWI: Due to resentment of foreign trading policies/investments with the British and French, Ottoman Empire sides with Germany in WWI

Effects/Result

• Post WWI losses, the Ottoman Empire split into countries including the Republic of Turkey
• British forces initially controlled Anatolia and the sultan, but in 1921 Mustafa Kemal and the Turkish Nationalists prevailed
• In 1923, Kemal became the first president, also known as Ataturk
• Ataturk focused on creating a secular nation with reforms like public education for all genders, abolishing polygyny, and granting women suffrage
• His western-style reforms made him a dictator for 15 years

Mexico (Dictator Porfirio Diaz Overthrown, PRI Takes Over)

Internal Factors

• Opposition to policies of Dictator Porfirio Diaz
• Opposition of land reform as the wealthiest 1% controlled 97% of the land

Internal/External Factors

• Foreign investors controlled most of Mexico's resources

Effects/Result

• Diaz was jailed by opponents who wanted to be president, like Francisco Madero
• Diaz gave foreign investors control over most of Mexico's resources (specifically the US)
• The opposition led to the Mexican Revolution, exiling Diaz and initiating significant changes
• Madero formed revolutionary offices in El Paso, TX
• "Pancho" Villa sent troops to defeat Diaz's forces
• Emiliano Zapata redistributed land to impoverished peasants
• Diaz fled, and instability from 1910-1920 led to 2 million deaths and continued political violence
• Mexico adopted a constitution in 1917 focusing on land redistribution, universal suffrage, and public education
• Institutional Revolutionary Party/PRI was formed in 1929
• They were criticized as corrupt and dominated politics led by almost all presidents until 2000

Overview of WWI

• Causes, Methods, Effects

Causes of the War

• (MAIN and the “Spark")

Militarism

• Industrialization enabled mass production of weapons with interchangeable parts and effective damage, along with larger armies
• Chemical weapons, tanks, planes, artillery weapons, grenades, and machine guns were produced

Alliances

• Countries formed alliances to ensure support if attacked
• Triple Alliance/Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy (initially), Ottoman Empire
• Triple Entente/Allies: Britain, France, Russia (initially), Italy later, US later, Japan, China

Imperialism

• Competition over colonization, resources, and spreading culture was a factor

Nationalism

• Extreme pride in culture/national identity fueled the conflict through propaganda making it a global and total war

Immediate Cause/Spark

• Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie
• The heir to the Austria-Hungary throne was assassinated in Bosnia
• Serbian nationalist group, the Black Hand, aimed to reclaim Bosnia

Assassination

• June 28, 1914, Black Hand members attempted to assassinate the archduke
• Bombing attempt failed as the device was delayed
• Gavrilo Princip fatally shot Franz Ferdinand and his wife after a wrong turn
• The assassination ignited MAIN causes

Conducting/Methods

• WWI was thought to be a short, glorious adventure, new technologies led the conflict to become a four year long stalemate with high casualties

New Technology/Strategies

• Trench warfare was a strategy that was used
• Various poisonous gases such as chlorine, phosgene, mustard gas
• The newly created machine gun
• Submarines called U-Boats which are German Submarines
• Airplanes and tanks were still in their early editions
• Barbed wire was first used for warfare

Total War vs Global War

• Total war involved all levels of society in fighting the war
• Seen in propaganda and women in factories/operators
• Global War expanded beyond Austria-Hungary and Serbia to include allies and colonies
• Colonies used for resources and soldiers

US Enters WWI

• Germany sent the Zimmerman Note to Mexico which led Germany to assist US in getting back territory
• Continued attacks were made by U-Boats

Effects and Interwar Years

WWI ends with the Paris Peace Conference with the Treaty of Versailles

• The Big Four (Woodrow Wilson, David Lloyd George, Georges Clemenceau, and Vittorio Orlando) had different ideas on settling peace
• Wilson = Peace without Victory; Fourteen Points: League of Nations and self-determination of colonies
• Clemenceau = severe reparations needed (France had suffered, wanted protection from Germany)
• Russia not invited, Italy walked out due to being denied Dalmatia territories
• Some colonies got self-determination, self-determination of colonies mostly ignored

Treaty of Versailles Signed

• Germany accepted the blame for WWI
• Germany was forced to pay billions
• Germany gave up its colonies and restricted its military

Overview of Interwar Period

• Build-up to Great Depression

Major Event - Great Depression

• 1920s:
• Germany printed money creating inflation
• France and Britain struggled to pay war debts to the US
• Russia refused to pay prerevolutionary debts

Immediate Causes

• Causes for Agricultural overproduction and US Stock Market Crash in 1929

Impact

• Germany inflation, reparations, and bank failures
• Reliant Economies in Africa, Asia, and Latin America suffered
• Japan relied on foreign trade, so it suffered too
• Victors and the war-torn cities suffered
• Over 30 million people worldwide unemployed as of 1932

Policies to Fix The Great Depression

• Keynesian Economics: Argued by John Maynard Keynes, rejected laissez faire
• Fix the economy by policies like deficit spending
• Said it would fix the economy if governments enacted policies the economy, cutting taxes, increasing spending of consumers back to work/into jobs
• New Deal: Policies used by Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his administration, essentially using Keynesian Economics in the US
• New policies and programs to bring the 3 Rs (relief, recovery, reform)
• Relief for citizens suffering: poor, unemployed, farmers, minorities, women
• Recovery to bring the nation out of the Great Depression through government spending
• Reform to change government policies to prevent this from happening again
• Devaluing Currency: The step used by Japan to revitalize economy rapidly
• Government lowered the value of its money in relation to other currencies, making Japanese products cheaper than other imports
• Japan expanded its military
• WWII helps the US out of economy by making money on selling military equipment

Major Event - Political Revolutions and their Attempts to fix Economies

Russia

• Even though the communists are successful in the Russian Civil War (19180-1921), many people are facing starvation and the empty promises of "peace, land, and bread"
• Citizens went on strike, peasants begin hoarding food/stocks, production of industry and agriculture dropped

Vladimir Lenin's Fix

• enacting the 1921 New Economic Plan (NEP) to fix the economy by reintroducing private trade and some economic liberties (not many)

Joseph Stalin's Fix

• Stalin was a dictator after Lenin's death
• He abandoned the NEP and creates a Five Year Plan to make the USSR/Soviet Union industrialized/competitive
• Giving farmland to collectives to manage
• Collectivization angered farmers who retaliated by burning crops, killing livestock, moving to cities
• Industrialization did lead to new jobs

Mexico

• The Institutional Revolutionary Party/PRI
• Improved the economy with help from Lazaro Cardenas, however very few changes made socially

Major Event - Rise of Right Wing Governments

Fascism

• Italy and Benito Mussolini
• Italy was neglected at the Paris Peace Conference despite winning WWI
• The parliament was taken over by Mussolini meaning he became dictator
• The traits were to glorify militarism, create a totalitarian state.

Spain and Facism

• Republicans/Loyalists/Popular Front was fighting in the Spain Civil War
• USSR, British and the U.S support the Republican's
• Nationalists/Conservative forces: forces were Catholic Church, high ranking militia who were opposed to changes, led by Francisco Franco Franco wins and leads Spain to remain neutral during WWII

Brazil and Facism

• Getulio Vargas takes over as president during a bloodless coup (illegal seizure of power) in 1930 due to discontent over economic issues during Great Depression
• Vargas did not act like a democracy instead he acted like Mussolini took away individual political freedoms, censored press, abolished political parties, imprisoned political opponents, hypernationalism
• He sided with Allies in WWII
• Hitler and Nazi Germany