Aims of league Flashcards
Permanent court of international justice.
To play a key role in the league’s work by settling disputes between countries peacefully. Could not make sure whether countries actually followed its rulings.
All aims of the league.
- To discourage aggression from any nation.
- To encourage disarmament from all nations.
- For nations to cooperate with one another in business and trade.
- To improve the living and working conditions of people.
- To stop wars.
Article 10
Idea of collective security in the covenant. - Idea of acting together (collectively), the members of the league could prevent war by defending the lands and interests of all nations, large or small.
Priorities of Britain and France in the 1920s.
Britain: more interested in rebuilding British trade and looking after their empire than being an international police force.
France: Their main concern was Germany. Especially because most of WW1 was fought on France, they were most vulnerable. Feared that without the League of Nation having an army of their own, they wouldn’t be strong enough to protect France from an attack and Britain most certainly wouldn’t sacrifice this either, after ww1. France was thus, prepared to bypass the league if necessary to strengthen its position against Germany.
The council.
Main aim of council: To solve disputes and avoid conflict by talking.
How regular: More regular than assembly and met around 5 times a year.
Permanent Members: Britain, France, Italy, Japan.
Temporary members: these members were elected for a three-year period by the assembly.
Each permanent member of the council had a veto. If even ONE member disagreed on one topic, despite the opinions of all other nations, it could prevent the council from acting on a specific action/decision.
If talking did not work in the council, the council had a range of powers to use: 3 main subjects:
1. Moral Condemnation - Decide which country was the aggressor and condemn their actions/ tell them to stop it.
2. Economic and financial sanctions - members of the league refuse to trade with the aggressor.
3. Military force - armed forces of member countries could be used against an aggressor. Disadvantage: not all countries were willing to risk this.
The assembly.
All decisions and votes of the assembly had to be unanimous.
Met once a year.
Decided on admissions of new members.
Was the parliament of the League.
Could recommend action to the council.
Secretariat
Kept records of league meetings and prepared reports.
International Labour organisation
Brought together employers, governments and workers’ representatives.
Aim was to improve the conditions of working people throughout the world.
Working conditions
ILO successfully banned poisonous white lead from paint and limited the hours small children were allowed to work.
Lack of funds and lack of power - COULDNT do much more than name and shame countries and organisations that didnt follow its rulings.
Health.
Sponsored research into infectious diseases at institutes in Singapore, Denmark and London.
These institutes helped develop vaccines against deadly diseases.
Health committee one of the most successful lewagyue organisations. Work continued after 1945 as world health organisation.
Disarmament
- Washington Conference. Japan, USA, Britain and France agree to limit the size of their navies - this was the furthest it got.
Failure of disarmament was damaging to the league’s reputation in Germany. Germany was forced to disarm while other nations weren’t prepared to any time soon. - not prepared to give up their own armies and not prepared to be one of the first to disarm.
Optimism of 1928
Economies of the different nations were slowly recovering again. In 1924, the Dawes plan helped sort out Germany’s economic situation and helped getting the economies or Britain and France moving again.
Increased trade between countries also helped reduce political tension.
Prosperity of the 1920s
International trade prospered in the 1920s. The USA, the worlds richest nation, was a market for other countries to export to. The USA also gave out loans. For example to Germany.
Japan (Great Depression)
Main imports of silk to USA. As a result of Great Depression, Japan had less money bc USA wasn’t buying their silk anymore. Thus decided to create a large empire, with smaller countries to help get raw materials needed. starting with Manchuria invasion,
Italy great depression
Economic problems motivated Mussolini to try build an overseas empire to distract people’s attention from the difficulties the government faced.
