The Second World War: Causes, Development, and Consequences
CAUSES:
Nationalist Discontent: at the end of WWI Germany was unhappy because the Treaty of Versailles made it give territory to Poland and Czechoslovakia, and Italy was unhappy because it hadn’t been given the territories it wanted in the Mediterranean. Both countries desired to recover lost territories. Economic Protectionism: protectionist policies to reduce imports (adopted in the Great Depression of the 1930s) forced the countries to find new markets for their products. This created tensions
Read MoreExploration and Conquest in the Americas: Impact and Consequences
Reasons for the Sea Voyages:
International trade increased in the 15th century, especially in products such as spices, silk and luxury goods from the east. However, in 1453, the Ottoman army occupied the city of Constantinople and blocked trade routes between Europe and Asia via the Near East. For this reason, European kingdoms such as Castile and Portugal began to explore the Atlantic Ocean. They wanted to find an alternative trade route to India and Southeast Asia. These sea voyages led to technical
Read MoreLiberalism and Nationalism in the 19th Century: A Historical Overview
Liberalism
They focus on laws that for them emanate from nature itself (universal laws nobody can break as the gravity law), these laws could be found using reason. Using this, the freedom of individuals, the private property and their right to happiness were established as natural laws, as unbreakable as the gravity law.
National Sovereignty
Power resides by right to the people or nation (democracy) and not to the monarch (autocracy / absolutism) who chooses his way of governing himself by means of
Read MoreMadrid Conference and Oslo Peace Process: A Historical Overview
The Madrid Conference
The Madrid Conference was an irony of the Gulf War: the ultimate beneficiary (winner) of the Gulf War was to be Arafat, and with him the PLO, despite the fact that he had sided with Saddam against the US-led coalition and had, as a result, lost his funding from Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, his principal source of revenue. With the end of the Gulf War, the US pressured Israel in order to fulfill US promises made to the Arab leaders to gain their inclusion in the coalition against
Read MorePolitical Systems, International Situation, and European Alliances 1870-1914
1.1 Political systems
Two different political systems coexisted between 1870 and 1914:
- Parliamentary systems prevailed in Western Europe. Many countries adopted the universal vote for men while suffragette movements began to arise claiming the vote for women, although this was only achieved in Finland (1906) and Norway (1913). Outside Europe, the United States adopted universal male suffrage and Japan introduced a parliamentary system.
- Autocratic systems persisted in Central and Eastern Europe.
1.2
Read MoreCauses and Main Events of World War 1
WW1
1) Causes:
– Militarism: Build-up (group) of armed forces to prepare for war.
– Alliance: Agreement between countries to defend or fight together.
– Imperialism: Belief of a country in building up (creating) an empire and controlling less powerful countries.
– Nationalism: Pride in a country with people wanting to govern themselves or defend themselves.
2) Main events:
- 1914 28 June → Archduke’s Assasination (TRIGGER EVENT)
- 1914 29 July → Russia mobilise its troops to defend Serbia
- Germany declares