The Great Depression and the
Authoritarian Response
Long-Term Causes of the Great
Depression
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WWI led to war-induced
inflation
1920-1921 Brief Recession
Structural problems with
agricultural (farmers couldn’t
repay debts they took out for
machinery)
Dependent economies (noncore nations) fell into trouble
Poor government leadership
including protectionism
The Great Depression
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October 1929 NY
Stock market
crashed
Led to investments
being pulled back
Led to bank failures
Led to U.S Loans
being called back
Effects of the Crash
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Industrial production fell
Social ills led to questioning liberal democracy
as a form of government
Soviet Union largely untouched because it was
cut off from the global market
Japan severely affected because of
dependence on exports and low demand for
main export of silk (down 50%)
L. America- led to new state involvement in
Responses in Western Europe
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First reaction- close and protect, cut down
spending-exacerbated situation
Political polarization, as liberal governments
appear too weak to solve problems
Parliamentary system became ineffective or
overturned
Government help in Scandanavian countries
U.S.
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Franklin Roosevelt’s
New Deal offered
more direct aid and
established systems
like Social Security
As a result, the U.S.
did not experience
extreme political
movements
Nazism and Fascism
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Advocates of fascism attacked weakness of
parliamentary democracy and corruption and
class conflict of western capitalism
Fascists promised a strong leader and
military policy and social reform to alleviate
class distinctions
Hitler led the National Socialist (Nazi) party,
which promised a return to Germany’s
greatness
1932 Nazi party won seats in parliament
Once in power quickly turned into a
totalitarian state that wanted to extend the
empire
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1935 Rearmament
1938 Anschluss (union with
Austria)
Appeasement (Chamberlin
allowed him to occupy the
Sudetenland to avoid
another war)
Sep. 1939 invaded Poland
Agreement with Russia to
invade Poland (MolotovRibbentrop treaty)
Spread of Fascism and Spanish
Civil War
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Nazi triumph led to fascist regimes elsewhere
(Hungary, Romania, Austria, Italy)
Benito Mussolini in Italy 1935 attack on Ethiopia to
avenge colonial loss earlier
No outside power stopped Mussolini and Ethiopia
became a colony
1936-1939 civil war in Spain
Gen. Franco (fascist dictator backed by Hitler and other
European fascists) emerged as leader for next 25
years
Latin America
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Depression followed decades of cultural and social
tension
New pol. Parties attacked liberalism and capitalism
Import substitution industrialization during WWI but
after WW1 wages declined which led to social unrest
Population growth
Dependent economies
Labor and the Middle Class
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Rise of middle class, who demanded more
political rights and the traditional land owning
elite were open to giving them some power
1914-1930 series of general strikes and labor
unrest
Sometimes this led to brutal government
repression
Growing class conflict taking shape
Ideology and Social Reform
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Middle class emerged but only with the power
of the military
Intellectuals complained that L. America was
headed nowhere
Alternative political parties arose (esp. after the
Russian Revolution)
Great Crash in L. America
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Dependent economies crashed and
gave rise to corporatism, which
aimed at cubing capitalism but not
going to Marxism
1930s regimes concerned with
social problems
Lazaro Cardenas (Mexico 1934-40)
enacted large scale land reform and
some of the revolutionary promises
were delivered
Vargas Regime in Brazil
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1929 contested election led to
civil war
Getulio Vargas emerged as
president and launched a new
centralized political program
Staved off two attempted coups
1937 new constitution based on
Mussolini’s ideas
1954 committed suicide
Argentina: Populism, Peron, and
the Military
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Middle class radical party fell in 1929
Military coup failed
1940s workers organized into two
federations
1943 military coup- nationalists
wanted to industrialize and modernize
Argentina
Peron and wife Evita come to power
and ruled in alliance with
workers,industrialists, and nationalists
Militarization in Japan
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Authoritarian military rule
1931 depression but actively responded to the
Depression, so suffered much less
Mass patriotism, new policies
1936 attempted coup led to series of militaristic
prime ministers
1937 Japan had the 3rd largest and newest
merchant marine in the world
1938- Japan ready for wider conquest
Stalinism in the Soviet Union
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1927 acquires full power (after death of Lenin
in 1924)
Collectivization in 1928 offered opportunity to
mechanize farming and control peasantry
Kulaks (wealthy peasants) killed or deported in
1930s
Five-year plans for industrializing (focused on
heavy industry) led to huge increase in output
Move to cities
Factory workers somewhat appeased
Totalitarian Rule
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New control over intellectual
life
Socialist realism as art
Police procedures changed
Famine in Ukraine killed
upwards of 7 million
Great purge 1937-1938 where
over a million were killed
Failed foreign policy because
he got rid of key military
officials