lecture 12 - building a new world order 1919-1945 Flashcards
communist world revolution
- Lenin’s revision of the Marxist theory of revolution
- February and October revolutions 1917
- Russian Civil War and Kronstadt rebellion 1918-23
- revolutions in Europe 1917-23: petered out quickly (as they mostly just wanted peace and quiet after the war)
E.g. Germany > Weimarrepublic 🇩🇪 - the revolution betrayed? Stalinism 1927-53
communist world revolution
- classical marxism
- Luxemburg
- Lenin
classical marxist theory of revolution:
- history proceeds in stages of eco. growth (all societies/countries must pass through all)
- steps can’t be skipped (Feudal societies must first dev. some form of capitalism before they can become capitalist)
Lenin’s revision: skipping steps
- Marx: immanent crisis of capitalism -> problem: capitalism persisted crises, adapted (e.g. in some Eu countries wages rose)
*Can marxist theory be saved?
*some social democrats (still marxists) gave up revolution, saw possibilities in gradual - Rosa Luxemburg: crisis will occur when imperialist expansion hits limits (book: the accumulation of capital) = non-capitalist parts of the world were exploited so that capitalism could persist -> eventually capitalist empires can no longer expand -> war
*Luxemburg: agreed with Arendt expansionism
*war really changed everything - Lenin (book: imperialism, the latest stage of capitalism): Russia is the weakest link in imperialist chain (Russia most backward and eco. weak -> was most likely first to collapse
*argued that Russian peasants together with the industrial proletariat could skip stages of dev. + expectation that this would cascade into revos in the rest of the world
February and October revolutions in Russia (1917)
- feb 1917: strikes to end the war -> Romanovs deposed, Russian Empire collapses
- situation dual power / divided sovereignty: Petrograd Soviet vs Provisional Gov. Kerensky (lasted ~7 months)
Lenin: the people need peace, bread, land + the provisional gov. gives war (wanted to continue war + expand territory) and hunger -> leave the landlords, fight for a revo.
- order nr. 1 = declaration of class war to turn enlisted soldiers against aristocratic officers
- clashes revo. workers + Prov. gov. troops
- Bolshevik faction wins influence
- '’Red October’’ 1917 = october revolution: Bolshevik insurrection
-> Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (1918) = secret separate peace treaty to end the war (cost a lot of territory)
Russian Civil War and Kronstadt rebellion (1918-1923)
- civil war: Red Army (Bolshevik), White Army (Tsarist), Green Army (peasants/anarchists) -> millions of casualties + radicalization
- allies invaded Russia from north and east: western powers refused to recognize the government
Kronstadt revolt against Bolshevik gov (wanted new elections, freedom of speech + release of political prisoners), Greens declared solidarity -> Bolshevik brutal revo. (send red army, executions, imprisoning)
Stalinism 1927-53
takes over communist party in Russia late 20s, began personalistic dictatorship
was expert in personnel decisions (was not an intellect like Lenin)
advocated for socialism in one country (withdrawing support for revos. elsewhere, focusing on industrial dev. in Russia)
-> Trotsky advocated for permanent revo.: had to spread outside of Russia, otherwise it would wither away and not resist capitalist powers of the west
(was evt. killed)
(Great Terror 1936-38: e.g. lots of photo editing: removing people that got out of favor of Stalin)
one of the consequences of Stalinism: artificial famine created in Ukraine 1932-33 = the Holomodor
- reason: collectivisation of land -> revolt Ukrainians + unreasonable expectations (e.g. redistribution of all opbrengst to the cities while the farmers were starving)
Peace of Versailles
1919 (conditions for peace, was legally binding) = massive reordering of European borders
- war -> end of 4 great empires: Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, Russian, German -> instability and disorder
- main goal: Austro-Hungarian empire divided into 4 ethnic states (Austria, Hungary, Tsjecho-Slovakia, Yugoslavia)
- Germany was required to make reparation payments to allied powers
*Germany got full responsibility for the war - creation of the League of Nations: international body to prevent another world war from ever happening again
two crucial developments after WW1
- new international project of transforming colonial territories into sovereign states
e.g. because there needed to be some decision about former German colonies - creation of League of Nations: IO of sovereign member states + bureaucratic commissions + liaison with other IOs (e.g. ILO)
-> Antony Anghie: is there a link?
- law professor
Anghie - LoN mandate system
- purpose = govern territories formerly annexed or colonized by the German & Ottoman empires
- humanitarian spirit: no spoil of war (would lead to tension), former imperial territories supervised until they could govern for themselves (paternalism)
- ! European territories of former empires not part of the mandate system (e.g. former Austria-Hungary)
Jan Smuts (South Africa): racist wanted them to be mandates, Woodrow Wilson (also racist) was against this
two sets of rules for IR:
- national-self determiniation for Europeans
- mandates for everyone else
'’mandate system contemplated nothing less than creation of the social, political, and economic conditions thought necessary to support a functioning nation-state’’
(similar projects now-ish: US ‘‘help’’ Iraq)
- purpose = protect interests ‘‘backward’’ people
- in practice: annexation of new colonies by empires (countries with numerous colonies got LoN ‘‘protectorates’’)
3 classes of mandate:
- those that already had dev. -> could dev. nation-state sooner rather than later (e.g. Ottoman, Palestine, Syria, Mesopotamia)
- long term European guidance
*Japan: controlled mandates of former German colonies in the pacific)
effects of WW1 (last lecture)
- War neuroses (PTSD) / shellshock
beginnings psycho-analysis - changed society on the home front: demobilization + women more important role in manufacturing during the war
fascist world domination
- Benito Mussolini and Italian Fascism = Mussolini Black Shirts march on Rome, PNF (national fascist party) + irredentism (extending Italy’s borders to incorporate all ethnic Italian regions)
- Hitler and German National Socialism = NSDAP (nationalist socialist German workers party),
!first nazi tactic = military coup, failed -> legal means: Hitler exploited weaknesses Weimar Constitution and electoral system
*1933: enabling act (chancellor can bypass legislature) -> Hitler dictatorship
heavily militaristic (were old soldiers, trained and accustomed to kill)
fascism = ideological mismatch: ultranationalism, chauvinist militarism, economic corporatism
-> all opposed to liberalism and socialism
*antisemitism Germany: racist shit Arendt described in new imperialism brought into Europe
3 general interpretations of fascism
- comintern (communist international association) definition
'’open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinist and most imperialist elements of finance capital’’
problems: no account of charismatic leader, blames social democrats (social fascism thesis) + all class, no race
- imperial boomerang thesis (Cesaire, Arendt)
Hitler applied to Europe colonialist procedures which until then had been reserved exclusively for the Arabs of Algeria, the ‘coolies’ of India, and the .. of Africa
(aka: idea of superior races applied withing Europe)
- civic foundations thesis (Riley)
- conventional idea = fascism could arise by exploiting
- him: all cases had strong civic organizations (churches, labor unions etc.), but lacked strong political homogeneity, strong policitcal parties that represented the ruling class
- absense of hegemonic politics -> fascism could fill this gap (it is a twisted and distorted form of democratization rather than the opposite of democratization)
antifascism and the popular front
Popular Front govs. Spain and France: socialists, democrats and communists came together to prevent rise of fascism
- often came together with wish for workers rights, welfare state etc.
1930s antifascism
= important role in rise of communism in the rest of the world
true beginnings of the Second World War
not 1933 with invasion of Poland
was going on entire 1930s empires invading, e.g. Japan (Mantsjuria), Italy (Ethiopia) + protest movements against this
- Spanish civil war (prelude all-out world war): republic with demo. elected gov. popular front (socialists, communists, bourgeois democrats) -> general Francisco Franco (nationalists) organizes military coup + invasion of Spain 1936 -> proxy-war: Italy and Germany helped nationalists, USSR helped republicans -> collapse republic + establishment France fascist dictatorship 1938-1975
- (*portugal + Spain last empires to decolonize)
Separate secret peace treaty Russia and central powers
1918
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk
nazi campaign of extermination against European Jews
- crucial medium-term cause
- holocaust
= disintegration of European land empires after WW1 (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Ottomans) = weak sovereignty eastern Europe
(other causes: defeat in Stalingrad, retreat through eastern Europe
failure eastern front accelarized holocaust
Nazi ideology)
holocaust/shoa
- concentration camps (invented by Britain for use in South Africa during second Boer War)
*also used by US for Japanese internment - extermination camps: invented by Nazi Germany for use in ‘‘Final Solution’’ 1942-45
!!all extermination camps were located in Eastern Europe
deportation process requiring collaborators
*NL: highest percentage of jewish population that died in western occupied countries
