Final Exam Study Guide Flashcards
What type of government was used before the Enlightenment?
Monarchy
What are the three largest effects of the Enlightenment?
Less religious outlook
Belief in Progress
Importance on the Individuals
What are the three Natural Rights?
Life
Liberty
Property
According to John Locke, what is a government’s main concern?
To protect the natural rights of its citizens
What different ideas were there about how to set up a government during the Enlightenment?
Voltaire – Democracy needed to have freedom of thought, expression, and religion
Montesquieu – separation of powers
Beccaria - Believed in ending capital punishment and torture. And argued that everyone has a right to a fast and fair trial in front of a jury
During the Dark Ages, whose happiness was the most important? Afterwards?
Kings and Queens, The common people
What is Mercantilism?
The policy of linking national security to national wealth. This made the English view the colonies as nothing more than money makers
What was the Stamp Act?
At attempt to make money by having a tax on all printed goods
Explain how the Enlightenment ideas inspired the American Revolution.
John Locke thought that a government was only supposed to be around to protect natural rights, and if it didn’t it should be overthrown. England was only trying to make itself richer, and wasn’t protecting our rights (the Navigation Acts, the Stamp Act, not allowed us to govern ourselves, forcing us to house their troops, etc.)
In what ways can you still see the impact of the Enlightenment on the United States government?
We have a government that focuses on protecting its citizens’ happiness. Voting rights, freedoms of speech religion, press, etc. 3 branches of government, trial by jury, no illegal search and seizure, capitalism.
Why was all of Europe scared of the French Revolution?
They were afraid that the French peasant uprising would inspire peasants in other countries, and revolt against their kings
How does the French Revolution provide an example of the dangers of democracy?
Democracy is not an easy government to type to run. This one let fear and ignorance overrule reason and education. Another thing it teaches is the danger of not protecting minority groups and people who have opposing views as the government.
What was life like before the Industrial Revolution?
Most people lived on small family farms, grew enough food to eat, most work was done by hand
What are two ways that the Agricultural Revolution helped to produce the Industrial Revolution?
Increased food production
Increased urban population
What are eight reasons that helped England industrialize?
Plenty of fuel for machines Natural Resources Rivers for transport Large harbors Stable Economy Stable Government Trade routes already established Large urban workforce without options or skills
What are 6 problems that the low wage workers faced in their HOUSING during the Industrial Revolution?
No building codes
No national free education
No police protection
Streets had no drains and were piled high with waste
Frequent disease outbreaks
No running water
Literally anything else that we’ve talked about
What are 7 short term changes that happened during the industrial revolution?
Lack of government rules Poor working and living conditions Factory owners grew richer Poor became even more poor No education for lower classes Disease Child Labor
What are five long term effects of Industrialization?
More individual wealth Better health and life expectancy Growth of a middle class Better education Building codes and business regulations enacted and enforced
What does laissez-faire mean?
Hands off
Whose hands does this mean, and what are they keeping off of?
Government’s hands off of the businesses
Who owns the businesses, resources, and make decisions in capitalism?
Individuals
At what scale is capitalism efficient?
Local factory or farm level
How does the “invisible hand” work?
The collective decisions of all consumers informs owners of what to make without the need for government involvement
Explain how capitalism rewards hard work and new ideas?
The harder you work, or the better your invention, the more money you will make
What book laid out the idea of Communism?
Communist Manifesto
According to Communism, how many classes did capitalism have, and what were they?
2, Haves and Have-nots (owners vs. workers, rich vs. poor )
Why and how would the lower classes take control, according to the Communist Manifesto?
They would rise up violently and kill the rich class when the conditions and wealth inequality were bad enough
In Communism, who owns the businesses?
government
What is the goal of Communism?
Equality
When is communism efficient?
At the national scale
What are two problems with Communist theories?
provides no rewards for working hard
not efficient at the local scale
What is imperialism?
The takeover of a country by a stronger one with the intent of dominating its social, political, and economic life
What were the problems that Europeans had in trying to conquer Africa before industrializing?
Terrain was impassable (mountains, deserts, etc)
Rivers were dangerous
Both sides had the same weapons
Malaria and other diseases
What inventions were created to that allowed the Europeans to take over Africa?
Railroads
Steamboats
Maxim Gun
Quinine
What was the purpose of the Berlin Conference?
To split up Africa without going to war with each other
What did Europeans consider when deciding which areas to claim?
Natural Resources
What did they ignore when carving up Africa?
Tribal boundaries and ethnic groupings
What were five negatives of imperialism in Africa?
Lost independence and were used for forced labor
Many people died from new diseases, resistance movements, and famine
Africans never got the economic benefit of its resources
Totally destroyed African leadership, and put nothing in place when Europeans left
Dividing lines between tribes torn apart some ethnic groups, forced enemies to become allies, and set up the modern problems in africa
Define Geopolitics?
An area is seen as important because its location has strategic value to another country
How did the US get involved in the Philippines?
We were fighting Spain in the Spanish American War, and the Philippines were a Spanish colony
What are the four M.A.I.N. causes of World War I?
Militarism, Alliance System, Imperialism, and Nationalism
What is militarism?
Countries’ focus on having giant, powerful militaries
How did the fighting in WWI differ from previous wars in Europe?
Militaries are MUCH larger
Weapons were far more advanced due to industrialization
Civilians were targeted (total war)
How did imperialism contribute to the start of WWI?
Germany wanted to get colonies, and England and France wanted to keep theirs. The winner would get control of all of them
What is nationalism?
Intense pride in your country
How did nationalism contribute to the start of WWI? (two ways)
Made countries feel superior and were sure they would win a war
Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in an attempt to free Bosnia from Austria-Hungary
What was the name of the terrorist organization that killed Franz Ferdinand?
The Black Hand
Why did Gavrilo Princip assassinate Ferdinand?
He was trying to free Bosnia from Austria-Hungary, and thought they would join with his native Serbia
Describe the basic plan for the Schlieffen Plan?
Germany would focus on beating France first, and then focus on Russia afterwards
Were the new weapons of war more defensive or offensive?
Defensive
Why were machine guns important?
They were so good at defending, they forced soldiers to dig trenches to keep from getting shot.
THIS IS WHAT CREATED STALEMATE AND TRENCH WARFARE
Why did the Russians make such big gains originally?
The Russians arrived earlier than the Germans expected, and caught the Germans by surprise. The German army was still in France when Russia invaded
What was the biggest problem with the Russian war effort?
They were constantly undersupplied
What reasons were there for the Russian soldiers to be undersupplied?
Russia hadn’t industrialized, and they weren’t able to have the allies ship them goods and weapons
What was Russia’s main contribution to World War I, strategically?
They were a distraction to Germany and forced them into a 2-front war
How did unrestricted submarine warfare help to draw the US into the war?
Germans changed from targeting supply ships, to targeting passenger ships and trying to kill civilians, which turned Americans against them
What was the Zimmerman Telegraph?
A letter to Mexico, from Germany, trying to get them to attack us as a distraction. It was the final straw and it is what got us official to join the war
When did the war officially end?
11:00, November 11, 1918
What treaty brought the war to a close?
Treaty of Versailles
How did Woodrow Wilson want to treat the Germans after the war ?
He wanted to treat them fairly
How did the European countries want to treat the Germans after the war?
They wanted to destroy and punish Germany so they wouldn’t ever be a threat to peace again
What was the War Guilt Clause and why was it so important?
It made Germany admit they were fully responsible for WWI, and therefore had to pay to fix everything
How much was the German government supposed to repay after the war?
$64 Billion
What were three major problems with the League of Nations?
Needed a unanimous decision to do anything, Russia and Germany weren’t allowed in, and the United States didn’t join
Explain the slogan of the Bolsheviks?
Peace – Get out of WWI
Land – Split up land from royalty and give to peasants
Bread – Increase basic living standards, such as making sure bread is available
What are four methods that dictators use to control their people?
Religious Persecution
Propaganda
Censorship
Police States
How does a totalitarian government deal with religion?
Replace old religions with leader worship
What is censorship? Why does it work?
Keeping information damaging to the king from the public. People don’t get mad about what they don’t know about.
Why was it important to for Stalin to use censorship?
Because he had done a lot of terrible things that people would be upset about
What is Propaganda?
Using false or biased information to get the public to believe the government’s ideas
What kinds of things would propaganda stress?
pro-communist ideas
anti-capitalist ideas
self-sacrifice
hard work
Describe what a police state is, and why it works to keep people in line.
A country that is run through fear of being imprisoned or killed by the government. Uses a lot of government spies and secret police that can arrest people for any small thing
Why was the Weimar Republic despised by the German people from the start?
Was blamed for losing the war
Was blamed for signing the Treaty of Versailles
What prompted Germany to hyperinflation its economy? What was the effect of this?
Was in response to France invading them to take resources as payments
Destroyed the German economy
What are two reasons that the US economy grew so fast after WWI?
We didn’t have to rebuild anything
We had sold the world its war goods, and now we sold them its construction goods
What are five characteristics that all fascists share?
Extreme devotion to one leader and the nation
Worldview based on hyper-nationalism (your race is better than all others)
Nations were either taking over another, or getting taken over
Obsessed with military strength
Hatred of Communism
In what ways are fascists similar to Communist dictators?
Replacing religion with leader worship
Censorship
Propaganda
Police State
How did the Reichstag fire help the Nazis gain power?
The Communists were blamed, and Hitler was able to arrest them, and use it as a scare tactic to make people think he was keeping them safe. In the following elections, the Nazi party won a majority.
What was appeasement, and how did it help Hitler be able to take over Europe so quickly?
Giving in to a threat in order to avoid war. It gave Hitler the ability to take over countries that were smaller without anyone stopping him. It also gave him time to build his massive military before the Allies joined.
What was the Non-Aggression Pact?
Agreement between Russia and Germany not to attack each other
What reasons were the for both Russia and Germany to sign the Pact?
German wouldn’t get a 2-front war, and Russia wouldn’t have any war at all
They secretly agreed to invade Poland together to regain territory lost in WWI
What happened at Dunkirk?
The Allied troops were surrounded on a beach, but Hitler allowed them to be rescued by the British Navy and civilians in boats and taken to England. They would later be part of the D-Day invasion.
Why was it a positive for the Allies?
It allowed us to save the troops, who participated in the D-Day invasion a few years later.
How was it also a disaster for them?
They lost all their supplies and weapons. It also basically gave France to Hitler.
What was Hitler’s original plan for the Jewish citizens of his empire?
To make life so awful they would leave
What did the Nuremberg Laws take away from German Jews?
Citizenship, along with all the rights and protections that go with it. They also lost the right to work in more jobs
What happened on Kristallnacht? Why is this a significant event?
The German government plan and led an uprising of citizens in numerous cities that destroyed Jewish property, and began arresting German Jews and sending them to concentration camps
What were ghettos?
Cities in Poland that had been made into prisons. They were meant to starve the Jews to death.
Where were the death camps? Why?
They were located in Poland, because that is where the most Jewish people lived
What are three reasons that Stalingrad had strategic value?
It sits on the only river into Moscow, so it is important as a way to choke off transportation
It is near massive oil fields
It is a large industrial center full of factories making war goods
When and what is D-day
June6, 1944. It was the day the Allied countries launched an invasion on the beaches of Northern France.
Why was the landing in France a big problem for Hitler?
It was the beginning of another front of the war, when he was already losing to Russia
What did we do instead of invading Japan in WWII?
Used atomic bombs against civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki to make them surrender
How many were killed instantly? How many were killed in the following weeks from radiation poisoning?
100,000 and 300,000
Why did the Indians fight in World War I?
They were promised more freedoms and rights from the British in return for fighting for the British
What was the Rowlatt Act?
This outlawed the act of protesting in the Indian colony. It was passed in response to the Indians protesting the lack of rights they were promised. It carried a two year mandatory jail sentence.
What was the Amritsar Massacre?
10,000 Indians met in the town of Amritsar to protest the Rowlatt Act. They were shot by the British police, which ended with 100 dead and 400 injured.
Explain how non-violence works to achieve your goals.
You provoke a response from your adversary and refuse to retaliate. This makes your opponent become the “bad guy” even if you are the one technically breaking the rules.
What is Civil Disobedience?
Openly and deliberately breaking laws that you think are unjust.
What was the Salt March?
Gandhi’s first major act of civil disobedience. He marched to ocean with thousands of supporters and made salt, which was illegal in India.
Who met at the Yalta Conference?
Stalin and Franklin Roosevelt. Or the US and USSR.
How was Europe split up at the Yalta Conference?
The eastern half was to be controlled by the Soviets, and would become soviet controlled communist dictatorships.
The western half would be controlled by the Americans, British and French and would become capitalist democracies.
In what ways was our experience in WWII different for the US and the USSR?
After WWII the United States was the wealthiest and most powerful country and economy in the world. We started as a second rate power, and ended as a superpower.
The USSR ended the war with most of the major cities totally destroyed, lost 25% of their population, and over a quarter of all factories were destroyed. This was the second time Germany had done this to them in 30 years.
What was the goal of the United States after WWII?
We wanted to united Europe and Germany and have them all be capitalist democracies that we could trade with. Wealthy countries don’t become communist.
What was the goal of the USSR after WWII?
The USSR wanted to ruin the Germans so they couldn’t’ attack every again. The Eastern European countries under their control would become soviet buffer states that would act as a shield against any future invasions.
What is the purpose of the United Nations?
They were supposed to settle disputes between countries before they turned into shooting wars.
What is the Security Council of the UN?
The inner circle that deals with world peace. It has 5 permanent and 10 rotating members.
Who fought in the Civil War in China?
The Kuomintang vs the Communists
Why was there a temporary truce called in the Chinese Civil War?
They were invaded by the Japanese at the start of WWII.
What were the first actions taken by the Communists after the Chinese Civil War?
The got rid of all other political parties, took control of factories, took land from the wealthy, created collective farms and started a 5 year plan.
What was the result of the “Great Leap Forward”?
Chairman Mao decided that the switch to Communism wasn’t happening fast enough, and this was their way making a huge step towards that goal. They put together huge 25,000 person farms called collectives which were fully controlled by the government. Due to poor management 20 million people died from hunger.
What happened during the Cultural Revolution?
Red Guards, which were communist militias made of young people, tried to force the country to finish the revolution and destroyed anything that was old, or didn’t fit their view of the “new” China. They targeted the intellectuals, educated people, artists and the wealthy.
What was containment?
The US policy to deal with Communism. Instead of trying to beat them, we just wouldn’t let them spread their ideas to new countries. We thought they would eventually collapse without friendly nations.
How did we “contain” the Soviets?
We gave a ton of money to countries that were in danger of becoming communist.
What was the purpose of the Marshall Plan?
It was to give countries that were close to a communist rebellion money so they could fix their economy, make their people happy, and not fall into communism.
What was the Berlin Airlift?
When the Soviets blocked off access to our part of Berlin, we responded by flying in all the supplies that were needed for survival. After one year, the Soviets reopened the road, and we had won the first real issue of the Cold War.
What is NATO?
North Atlantic Treaty Organization. This was an alliance of most of Western Europe and the United States that was formed to stand against the Soviet Union.
What was the Warsaw Pact?
This was the alliance against NATO. It included the Soviet Union and most of Eastern Europe.
What is Brinksmanship, and what is the problem with this idea?
This was the original US policy of responding to any Soviet threat with a nuclear attack. It doesn’t work, because there are a ton of issues that came up that were not serious enough to need a nuclear response.
Who started the Space Race first?
The Soviets launched the first satellite called Sputnik.
How did the Korean War start?
The North Koreans attacked the South first. They almost completely beat the South before being pushed almost completely out of their own country themselves.
What did President Truman fire Douglas MacArthur?
MacArthur wanted to use nuclear weapons against China and turn the Korean War into a war against communism in general. When Truman said no, MacArthur tried to get the public on his side and was fired.
Who won the Korean War?
No one. The country was split at the same place as it was before the war started.
How did the North and South Koreans differ after the war?
The North became a terrible communist dictatorship that is an international outcast. The South became a dictatorship that was allied with the United States.
Why was the battle of Dien Bien Phu important?
This was the battle that made the French decide to leave Vietnam.
What was the Domino Theory?
This is the idea that if one country is allowed to become communist, its neighbors would follow suit
Who were the Vietcong?
Communist rebels from South Vietnam
What are some of the reasons that we lost the Vietnam War?
The South Vietnamese Government was very unpopular with their own people, we had to fight many different enemies at once, it was in a jungle where our power isn’t useful, and the North had powerful allies in the USSR and China.
Why did the United States back Fulgencio Batista?
He treated American businesses well and allowed them to make a ton of money.
What changes did Fidel Castro start when he took power in Cuba?
He made land, education, economic, and healthcare improvements. He also took over sugar companies that were owned by the American businesses.
What happened in the Bay of Pigs Invasion?
Cubans living in Florida were trained, and sent to invade Cuba. We promised air support, but that never came and the Cubans were killed or arrested before they ever got off the beaches.
Describe the Cuban Nuclear Missile Crisis.
The Soviets were trying to ship nuclear weapons to Cuba, which is only 90 miles from our coast. We told them not to, and they refused to back down. President Kennedy ordered a blockade of the island, and the Soviet ships eventually turned away to avoid nuclear war.
What three reforms did Mikhail Gorbachev make that started the collapse of the Soviet Union?
Glasnost, Perestroika, and increased democracy
What is Glasnost?
Openness - Allowed more freedom of speech and press, and allowed criticism of the government
What is Perestroika?
Economic restructuring away from government control and and towards a market/capitalist system
What happened to the Republics that were part of the now-collapsed Soviet Union?
They became independent countries.
