Chapter 29: The World in the 1920’s- Challenges to European Dominance
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1920’s and 30’s called the Interwar Period
Period of dislocation in the West
Authoritarian political systems were a response to crisis
Global impact of Great Depression
European imperialism mounted
1. Western European recovered from WWI incompletely (economies and
politics)
2. Cultural creativity was important
3. Everything rested on shaky foundations
Impact of the Mexican, Russian, and Chinese revolutions
Diplomatic Deafness
 India: Gandhi’s nationalist movement- built on Hindu traditions, criticized
caste system and traditional gender relations
 Following WWI, Western powers planned to divide up Turkey like the rest of
the Ottoman Empire, but Turkish nationalists set up an effective army that
took over the country, and negotiated with the West for recognition
The Disarray of Western Europe, 1918-1929
 New political movement, fascism, gained power in Italy
 WWI: damage to European economy, diplomatic relations and political
systems
 Over 10 million Europeans died during WWI
The Roaring Twenties
 Kellogg-Briand Pact, 1928, optimistic document co-authored by American
and French leaders that outlawed war forever.
 Industrial production boomed, mostly in US
 Modern art cubist movement- headed by Pablo Picasso
 Physics: atomic energy- led to atomic bomb
 Advanced understanding of genetics
 Women expected to leave workforce when GI’s returned
 Women’s suffrage granted in Britain, Germany and the US
 “Flappers”: new boundaries pushed for women with less restrictive fashion
 Rayon and Nylon
Fascism in Italy
 1919 former socialist and soldier, Benito Mussolini: formed the fascio di
combattimento, union for struggle in Italy
o corporate state that would replace capitalism and socialism with a
new national unity
o aggressive, nationalistic foreign policy
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o seize power by any means, build strong state, under a strong leader
o create atmosphere of chaos
Fascism: new authoritarian leadership, and devotion to nationalistic values
Upset that Italy didn’t gain a lot of territory from fighting with the Allies in
WWI
1922 Italian king called on Mussolini to form a new government
Mussolini then eliminated most opposition, suspending elections in 1926
o Book burnings
The New Nations of East Central Europe
 Most looked to western Europe for political inspiration and were hostile to
the new communist regime in the Soviet Union
 Bitter rivalries amongst the new countries
 Most went from parliamentary democracies to more authoritarian rule
o Most agricultural and dependent upon sales to western Europe
o Heavily impacted by the Great Depression
o Peasant land hunger and poverty and illiteracy
Industrial Societies Outside Europe
 Canada and Australia continued political consolidation, US combined
economic power with an attempt at political isolation
 Japan experienced rapid industrial growth
 Participation of Canada, Australia, and New Zealand in WWI with Britain,
furthered idea of commonwealth: 1921 self-governing Dominions should be
coequals with Britain
 Canada: exported food widely to Europe, and minerals and wood pulp to US
o Rapid immigration, particularly from eastern Europe
 1901: Australia’s independence
o federation of provinces
o social legislation
o strong trade union movement
o govt ownership of railways, shipping lines, banks, and power plants
o economy adversely effected by Great Depression
The Rise of the American Colossus
 US delayed entering WWI, isolationism
 WWI catapulted US into a leadership position
 US guided many provisions of the Versailles treaty, but US Senate rejected
the Treaty, and US retreated into isolationism between the wars.
 US intervention in Latin America continued
 Hostility to socialism “Red Scare”
 US economy boomed during the 1920’s
 Business growth with high tariffs and low taxes
 New levels of consumerism
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Henry Ford: assembly line in 1913, workers continually repeated small tasks
as product moved on conveyor belts (unskilled labor)
Exportation of US culture: Hollywood, dime store, movies, dance crazes
Japan and Its Empire
 Japan became an industrial power
 Agricultural productivity improved steadily, fertilizers and new equipment
 Rice production more than doubled
 Zaibatsu: industrial combines, sponsored rapid expansion in shipbuilding
 Electrical power, coal, and iron
 Japan exported few items to the West, (silk), but imported important raw
materials, fuels and sophisticated equipment.
 Huge population growth: 73 million by 1940
o Facilitated a low-wage industrial economy
 Military leaders began to take a growing role in setting general diplomatic
policy from the mid-1920’s onward, at the expense of the civilian parties and
politicians.
 Reduction in military budgets in the 1920’s hit military leaders hard
A Balance Sheet
 democratic and parliamentary political forms took further root in Germany
and Canada
 Challenges to democracy arose in Italy and much of east central Europe
 Japanese politics became less stable.
 US tried to isolate from world politics
Revolution: The First Waves
 Direct challenge to the more established industrial, democratic powers,
particularly in the West.
 Surge of anticolonialism in the 1920’s
Mexico’s Upheaval
 10 year civil war and political upheaval
 Mexican Revolution
 WWI disrupted traditional markets for Latin America, forced to rely on
themselves
 End of WWI, US emerged as the dominant foreign power in the region,
replacing Great Britain
 Porfirio Diaz, in power since 1876
o Foreign concessions in mining, railroads
o Prosperity amongst Mexican elite
o Political system stifled dissenters
o Govt repressed workers, peasants, and American Indians
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Francisco Madero, 1910, wealthy son of an elite family, proposed to run
against Diaz
o Madero was arrested, when released he called for revolt
Pancho Villa: unified small farmers, railroaders, and cowboys in the north.
Emiliano Zapata: led peasant-based guerilla movements in the south
o Goal of land reform
o “Tierra y Libertad” (Land and Liberty!)
Diaz was driven from power
Madero took control, but steadily lost control of his subordinates
1913 military coup removed Madero from the government and he was
assassinated
General Victoriano Huerta, sought to impose a military dictatorship, but Villa
and Zapata rose up against him
o By 1914, Huerta was forced from power
o Period of warfare (including female soldiers, soldaderas)
o US intervened
o Alvaro Obregon, emerged as leader of the government
In Mexico, China, Russia, and Iran there were rapid changes.
o Governments tried to establish strong centralized control and sought
rapid modernization, but made their nations increasingly dependant
on foreign investments and world financial markets
o Growing nationalism in Mexico
o 20% of nation’s territory was owned directly by citizens or companies
from the US
1920 Mexican Revolution had ended (assassination of Zapata) Obregon was
elected president
Mexican Constitution of 1917: promised land reform, limited foreign
ownership of key resources, and guaranteed the rights of workers.
Land reform slow in coming
President Lazaro Cardenas, 1934-1940, distributed more than 40 million
acres, most as ejidos, communal holdings.
Culture and Politics in Postrevolutionary Mexico
 Nationalism and indigenism, (concern for the indigenous peoples and their
contribution to the Mexican culture, lay beneath many reforms).
 Mexico now attempted to “Indianize” the nation through secular schools
 Important artist, muralists Diego Rivera and Jose Clemente Orozco
 Many leading Mexican intellectuals followed Marxist socialism
 Secularization of society, especially education met strong opposition from
the Catholic Church and clergy
 Cristeros: conservative peasant movement backed by the church: fought the
slide towards secularization
 US intervened diplomatically and militarily during the revolution
 US sent a force across the border after Pancho Villa’s forces raided across the
border, but the mission failed.
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US owned oil companies ran into problems with workers
Revolutionary leadership tried to institutionalize a one-party system
o Party of the Institutionalized Revolution (PRI): incorporated labor,
peasant, military, and middle-class sectors
o Presidents were strong, but presidency was limited to one six-year
term, so there was some change in leadership.
Revolution in Russia: Liberalism to Communism
 March 1917: strikes and riots in St. Petersburg (then named Leningrad, then
back to St. Petersburg in 1991)
 Tsar Nicholas II abdicated in 1917
 8 months, liberal provisional govt. struggled to rule the country, led by
Alexander Kerensky
 Serious popular unrest continued, provisional govt. stayed in WWI
 November (or Oct. on Russian Calendar) Bolshevik Revolution, led by Lenin
 Treaty of Brest-Litovsk took Russia out of war, but lost territory to Germany,
nullified with German defeat
 Russia was ignored at Versailles peace conference
 Revolution did meet with foreign hostility and domestic resistance
 Internal Civil War: 1918 to 1921
o Famine and unemployment
Stabilization of Russia’s Communist Regime
 Leon Trotsky led the Red Army
 1921: Lenin issued his New Economic Policy- temporary limited capitalismfood production began to recover
 Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
o Dominance of ethnic Russians
Soviet Experimentation
 Rapid spread of education promoted by the government
 Literacy gained ground
 Move away from organized religion
 Lenin died 1924, Trotsky and Stalin jockeyed for power
 Stalin took power
 Comintern: Communist International office to guide process of communist
parties in the West
 Collectivization program: attacking peasant land ownership
Toward Revolution in China
 Abdication of Puyi, the Manchu boy-emperor in 1912 signaled the fall of the
Qing Empire
 Yuan Shikai: centered in north China, founded a new dynasty
 Versus the Western-educated, middle-class politicians like Sun Yat-sen
China’s May Fourth Movement and the Rise of the Marxist Alternative
 Sun Yat-sen headed the Revolutionary Alliance, a loose coalition of anti-Qing
political groups that had spearheaded the 1911 revolt.
 Sun elected president at the end of 1911
 Resigned presidency in favor or warlord Yuan Shikai in 1912
 Japan had entered WWI on side of Allies, but immediately began seizing
German-held islands in the Pacific
 Early 1915, Japan presented Yuan’s govt with the 21 Demands, which would
have reduced China to the status of a dependant protectorate.
 Hostility to Japanese won Yuan’s rival support and Yuan was forced to resign
the presidency in 1916.
 May 4, 1919: series of protests, upset over the treatment of China at the
Treaty of Versailles because Japan won the German controlled areas in
northern China…initial aim to transform China into a liberal democracy.
 Li Dazhao called for a reworking of Marxist ideology to fit China’s situation,
one of this students was Mao Zedong- anger at imperialist powers, hostility
towards merchants and commerce, authoritarian state
The Seizure of Power by China’s Guomindang
 Guomindang= Nationalist Party
 Competed with the Communist Party for control in China
 Alliance forged by Sun Yat-sen and the Communists: temporary
 1924: Whampoa Military Academy was founded with Soviet help, and staffed
by Russian instructors
 Chiang Kai-shek: head of the academy, made career in the military
 Many issues in China: upheaval, disparity between rich and poor, famine,
disease
Mao and the Peasant Option
 Committed from early age to revolutionary solutions that depended on
peasant support
 Sun Yat-sen died and 1925, Chiang Kai-shek fought to seize power of the
party.
 Captured Yangtze River Valley, and Shanghai, and capital at Beijing
 Head of a warlord hierarchy, but most foreign governments recognized
Chiang Kai-shek as the new president of China
 Brutal massacre in Shanghai in 1927, many workers were gunned down or
beheaded.
o Mao Zedong propelled to leadership of Communists
o Long March 1934, 90,000 followers of Mao Zedong marched more
than 6,000 miles
 Chiang allied with communists to fight the Japanese threat, but it
undermined his authority.