Chapter 17: The West Between the Wars, 1919-1939
Chapter Overview
The peace settlements at the end of World War I combined with severe economic problems to produce widespread discontent across Europe. Democratic rule in many states gave way to fascism, authoritarianism, and the totalitarianism of Stalin and Hitler.

Section 1 The Futile Search for Stability
The peace settlement at the end of World War I left many nations unhappy and border disputes simmering throughout Europe. The League of Nations proved a weak institution. Democracy was widespread, and women in many European countries gained the right to vote. However, economic problems plagued France, Great Britain, and the German Weimar Republic. When Germany declared that it could not continue to pay reparations, France occupied one German region as a source of reparations. An American plan reduced the burden of reparations and led to a period of prosperity and American investment in Europe. The prosperity ended with the economic collapse of 1929 and the Great Depression. European governments tried different approaches to ending the depression. Many middle-class Germans began to identify with anti-democratic political parties. The new American president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, pursued a policy of active government intervention in the economy that came to be known as the New Deal.

Section 2 The Rise of Dictatorial Regimes
By 1939 most European democracies had collapsed. Only France and Great Britain remained democratic. Benito Mussolini began his political career as a Socialist, but he abandoned socialism for fascism, which glorified the state and justified the suppression of all political dissent. In Italy, Mussolini outlawed most political opposition, but also compromised with powerful groups and never achieved totalitarian control. After the Russian civil war, Lenin restored capitalist practices to prevent economic and political collapse. After Lenin's death, Joseph Stalin emerged as the most powerful Communist figure. Stalin sidelined the Bolsheviks of the revolutionary era and established totalitarian rule. His program of rapid industrialization and collectivization forced horrendous sacrifices on the population. His political purges caused millions to be arrested, imprisoned, and executed. Elsewhere in Eastern Europe and in Francisco Franco's Spain, authoritarian regimes were mainly concerned with preserving the existing social order.

Section 3 Hitler and Nazi Germany
Adolf Hitler, a failed student and artist, built up a small racist, anti-Semitic political party in Germany after World War I. Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch failed. In prison, he wrote Mein Kampf-an account of his movement and his views. As democracy broke down, right-wing elites looked to Hitler for leadership. In 1933 Hitler became chancellor. Amid constant chaos and conflict, Hitler used terror and repression to gain totalitarian control. Meanwhile, a massive rearmament program put Germans back to work. Mass demonstrations and spectacles rallied Germans around Hitler's policies. All major institutions were brought under Nazi control. Women's primary role was to bear Aryan children. Hitler's Nuremberg Laws established official persecution of Jews. A more violent anti-Semitic phase began in 1938 with a destructive rampage against Jews and the deportation of thousands to concentration camps. Increasingly drastic steps barred Jews from attending school, earning a living, or engaging in Nazi society.

 

Chapter 10: Revolution and Enlightenment, 1550-1800
Chapter Overview
The Scientific Revolution gave rise to a intellectual movement-the Enlightenment. Enlightenment thought provided the philosophical foundations for the American Revolution. Britain lost its colonies in North America to the newly formed United States, while Spain and Portugal held onto their profitable Latin American colonies.

Section 1 The Scientific Revolution
Sixteenth-century Europeans began to question the scientific assumptions of the ancient authorities and to develop new theories about the universe. Nicholas Copernicus, Johannes Kepler, and Galileo Galilei revolutionized astronomy. Copernicus claimed that the sun, not the earth, was at the center of the universe-an idea considered heresy by the Catholic Church. Equally revolutionary were Isaac Newton's explanations of gravity and the movement of the planets. There were breakthroughs in medicine and chemistry, and numerous women contributed to the body of scientific research. The new view of the universe affected Western philosophy. The Frenchman Rene Descartes, the first rationalist, declared that matter could be independently investigated by reason. Francis Bacon, an English philosopher, developed the scientific method-a system for collecting and analyzing evidence.

Section 2 The Enlightenment
The Scientific Revolution gave rise to the Enlightenment, an eighteenth-century movement that stressed the role of philosophy and reason in improving society. Enlightenment intellectuals, known as philosophes, were chiefly social reformers from the nobility and the middle class. They often met in the salons of the upper classes to discuss the ideas of such giants as Montesquieu, Voltaire, and Diderot. In the economic sphere, Adam Smith put forth the doctrine of laissez-faire economics. The later Enlightenment produced social thinkers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau and an early advocate of women's rights, Mary Wollstonecraft. Salon gatherings, along with the growth of book and magazine publishing, helped spread Enlightenment ideas among a broad audience. Most Europeans were still Christians. However, the desire for a more spiritual experience inspired new religious movements, such as the Methodism of John Wesley.

Section 3 The Impact of the Enlightenment
The Enlightenment influenced both art and politics. The baroque and neoclassical styles of art endured, while a more delicate style, called rococo, emerged. The works of Bach, Handel, Haydn, and Mozart represented one of the greatest periods in European music. Novels attracted a middle-class audience. The Enlightenment interested the absolutist rulers of Europe. However, only one, Joseph II of Austria, attempted far-reaching reforms based on Enlightenment ideas; they were largely a failure. The reforms of Catherine the Great of Russia and Frederick the Great of Prussia were far more limited. Territorial disputes in Europe and in the colonial empires of Britain and France produced the War of Austrian Succession, followed by the Seven Years' War. In the end, France lost India and most of North America, and Britain emerged as the world's greatest colonial power.

Section 4 Colonial Empires and the American Revolution
In the sixteenth century, Portugal came to control Brazil, while Spain established an empire in the Western Hemisphere that included parts of North America and most of Latin America. Portugal and Spain held onto their Latin American colonies for over 300 years. During that time, they profited richly by exporting Latin American gold, silver, and other natural resources and farm products. Spanish and Portuguese officials and Christian missionaries played important roles in Latin American societies. In North America, British control over its colonies began to unravel over issues of taxation. Multiple crises led the Americans to declare their independence in 1776 and to fight Britain until its defeat in 1783. The Articles of Confederation that formed the United States were soon replaced with a Constitution, which created a stronger central government. The Bill of Rights added important freedoms derived from the natural rights expressed by the philosophes.

Chapter 11: The French Revolution and Napoleon, 1789-1815
Chapter Overview
Poverty, social divisions, and economic crisis led to the French Revolution and a reign of terror. Napoleon Bonaparte took power in a coup d'etat and tried to overthrow Europe's old order. After his costly military campaigns, he was defeated at Waterloo, Belgium, and exiled.

Section 1 The French Revolution Begins
Poverty and deep social divisions were the backdrop of the French Revolution. On the eve of the revolution, financial crisis gripped the government of Louis XVI. Rather than accept higher taxes, the commoners in France's legislative body, the Estates-General, broke off to form a National Assembly. Anticipating an attack by the king's forces, commoners then stormed the Bastille prison, marking the start of the Revolution. The new Assembly took control of the Catholic Church and adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen. The document was inspired in part by the American Declaration of Independence and Constitution. The Assembly then wrote a constitution establishing a limited monarchy and a Legislative Assembly. France was soon at war with Austria, where some feared the revolution might spread. Louis XVI was taken captive by the Paris Commune. The commune called for a National Convention and forced the revolution into a more violent phase.

Section 2 Radical Revolution and Reaction
During the first years of the revolution, a republic was established, Louis XVI was executed, and thousands of people were killed on suspicion of opposing the revolution. While factions fought over control within France, European states fearing the spread of revolution made plans to invade France. The National Convention responded by forming a Committee of Public Safety. The committee led a 12-month Reign of Terror, executing close to 40,000 suspected enemies and expunging signs of Catholic influence. The committee also raised the largest army in European history and repelled the invading armies. With the crisis past, the National Convention ended the Reign of Terror and executed its zealous leader, Maximilien Robespierre. Power shifted into the hands of more moderate middle-class leaders who produced a constitution in 1795. The constitution called for a two-house legislative body and an executive committee, called the Directory. The Directory faced mounting problems. In 1799 a popular General, Napoleon Bonaparte, seized power in a coup d'état.

Section 3 The Age of Napoleon
Napoleon formed a new government, the consulate, in which he held absolute power. In 1802 he was crowned emperor and signed a peace treaty with Russia, Great Britain, and Austria. At home, he made peace with the Catholic Church and created a functioning bureaucracy. His Napoleonic Code preserved many of the rights gained in the revolution. War was soon renewed. By 1807, Napoleon had created a French empire. In parts of the empire, Napoleon sought to spread the revolution. However, his invasions had contributed to the spread of nationalism as well. This, along with British sea power, would spell his defeat. After a disastrous invasion of Russia, other European nations attacked Napoleon's army and captured Paris. Napoleon was exiled from France, and the monarchy was restored. Napoleon returned to power briefly, only to face final military defeat against a combined Prussian and British force at Waterloo and to be exiled once again.

Chapter 12: Industrialization and Nationalism, 1800-1870

Chapter Overview
The Industrial Revolution and a wave of liberal nationalist revolutions transformed Europe during the nineteenth century. A weakened old order gave way, and a number of unified European states emerged. Canada gained its independence, and the northern and southern United States reunited after a bloody civil war.

Section 1 The Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution began in the late eighteenth century and turned Great Britain into the first and the richest industrialized nation. A series of technological advances caused Great Britain to become a leader in the production of cotton, coal, and iron. After the introduction of the first steam-powered locomotives, railroad tracks were laid across Great Britain, reducing the cost of shipping goods. The Industrial Revolution spread to Europe and North America. In the United States, the railroad made it possible to sell manufactured goods from the Northeast across the country. The Industrial Revolution had a tremendous social impact in Europe. Cities grew quickly, and an industrial middle class emerged. The industrial working class, meanwhile, dealt with wretched working conditions. These conditions gave rise to socialism, a movement aimed at improving working conditions through government control of the means of production.

Section 2 Reaction and Revolution
After the defeat of Napoleon, European leaders met at the Congress of Vienna to restore the old order and establish stable borders. Great Britain, Russia, Prussia, and Austria met regularly to maintain the conservative order. Meanwhile, liberalism and nationalism-two philosophies that opposed the old order-were on the rise. Many liberals were middle-class men who wanted a constitution and a share in the voting rights enjoyed by landowners. Liberals tended to be nationalists as well. In 1830, France's upper middle class overthrew the king and installed a constitutional monarchy. Belgium broke free of Dutch control. Revolts in Poland and Italy failed. Economic crisis in 1848 brought a revolt of the French working classes. This time, a Second Republic was formed, under the leadership of Napoleon's nephew, Louis-Napoleon. Revolts followed in Germany and the Austrian Empire. In each case the old order was restored.

Section 3 National Unifica

tion and the National State
Unification occurred at different times and in different forms throughout Europe and in North America. The Crimean War destroyed the Concert of Europe. A defeated Russia retreated from European affairs, and Austria was isolated. Italian and German nationalists exploited Austria's isolation. Both gained important territory in the Austro-Prussian War and the Franco-Prussian War, and a unified Germany and Italy emerged. Growing prosperity and expanded voting rights helped Great Britain avoid revolution in 1848. In 1852, the French voted to restore their empire. Louis-Napoleon became the authoritarian Napoleon III and ruled until France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War. Austria granted Hungarians the right to govern their own domestic affairs. In Russia, Czar Alexander II freed the serfs and instituted other reforms. When a radical assassinated him, his son, Alexander III, reverted to repressive rule. The United States endured a costly civil war to settle the conflict over slavery between the Northern and Southern states. After two short rebellions, Canada won its independence from Great Britain.

Chapter 13: Mass Society and Democracy, 1870-1914

Chapter Overview
The Second Industrial Revolution transformed the Western industrialized societies. Cities grew, mass forms of culture and politics emerged, and the revolutionary ideas of Marx, Darwin, Freud, and others left an enduring mark.

Section 1 The Growth of Industrial Prosperity
The Second Industrial Revolution introduced important new products, such as steel and chemicals, and new sources of power, such as electricity and the internal-combustion engine. These changes led to cheaper transportation and made amenities such as electric lights widely available. Higher wages and lower transportation costs made consumer products more affordable, and industrial production rose sharply. These changes occurred primarily in northern and western Europe. Other parts of Europe remained largely agricultural. Industrial workers seeking to improve their working and living conditions formed socialist political parties and trade unions. Socialism was based on the ideas of Karl Marx, a nineteenth-century thinker who blamed capitalism for the horrible conditions of industrial workers. He predicted that capitalism would be overthrown in a violent revolution. However, many socialists sought change by non-revolutionary means.

Section 2 The Emergence of Mass Society
By the end of the nineteenth century, a mass society emerged in which the concerns of the majority of the population-the lower classes-were central. Many people moved to the cities. Despite crowded urban conditions, most people after 1871 enjoyed an improved standard of living. Europe's elite now included both aristocrats and a wealthy upper middle class. The middle class expanded to include a wide range of professions. Increased leisure time also allowed the middle class to serve as a model of family life and proper social etiquette. Many women now found jobs as low-paid white-collar workers. Feminists began to demand equal rights and full citizenship, including the right to vote. Most Western governments began to set up primary schools to train children for jobs in industry. Society became more literate and enjoyed new mass leisure activities.

Section 3 The National State and Democracy
By the late nineteenth century, progress had been made toward establishing constitutions, parliaments, and individual liberties in the major European states. In practice, however, the degree of democracy varied. Political democracy expanded in Great Britain and France, while regional conflicts in Italy produced weak and corrupt governments, and an anti-democratic old order remained entrenched in central and eastern Europe. In Russia, working-class unrest led to the Revolution of 1905. After the American civil war, the slaves were freed, but the South remained dominated by white supremacists. American cities grew, and unions campaigned for workers' rights. The United States also gained several offshore possessions. Canada gained new provinces, amid lingering distrust between English- and French-speaking peoples. In foreign policy, European powers drifted into two rigidly opposing camps. Crises in the Balkans only heightened tensions between the two camps.

Section 4 Toward the Modern Consciousness
Groundbreaking scientific discoveries of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries forced a rethinking of the ideas of the Enlightenment. Some of these ideas had a major social impact. Albert Einstein's and Sigmund Freud's works defied the orderly view of reason. Charles Darwin's description of life as a biological struggle for survival led to the Social Darwinism of Herbert Spencer and others. Extreme nationalist ideologies also borrowed from this line of thinking. Europe had a long history of anti-Semitic persecution. The spread of threatening anti-Semitic activity in France, Germany, and Austria-Hungary led many Jews to emigrate. Some went to the United States. Others went to Palestine, where Zionists were trying to restore Jewish life. Writers, artists, and musicians rebelled against traditional literary and artistic styles and created new ones that sometimes shocked critics with their audacity.

 

 

 

 

Chapter 19: World War II, 1939-1945
Chapter Overview
The German and Japanese occupations of neighboring countries led to a brutal war that took millions of lives. Both countries were defeated, but not before the Nazis had killed millions of people in pursuit of Aryan domination of Europe.

Section 1 Paths to War
Aggressive moves by Germany and Japan set the stage for World War II. Adolf Hitler began a massive military buildup and instituted a draft in violation of the Treaty of Versailles. The German annexation of Austria alarmed France but did not shake Great Britain's policy of appeasement. Mussolini became a German ally. Appeasement of Germany peaked at a conference in Munich where Hitler claimed he sought only one final territory, the Czech Sudetenland. This soon proved false. When Hitler signed a nonaggression pact with Stalin and invaded Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany. Japanese expansion into Manchuria and northern China brought condemnation from the League of Nations. While still at war with China, Japan launched a surprise attack on U.S. and European colonies in Southeast Asia.

Section 2 The Course of World War II
German forces swept through northern Europe early in the war and set up the Vichy government in France. German air attacks on Great Britain resulted in fierce British retaliation. In the east, harsh weather and a resolute Soviet Union defeated an invading German army. The Japanese conquered the Pacific but miscalculated when they attacked the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor. The United States surprised Japan by abandoning its neutrality and entering the war to retake the Pacific. By the end of 1943, the tide had turned against Germany, Italy, and Japan. After the invasion of Normandy, the Allies liberated Paris and defeated Germany. U.S. President Harry Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Premier Josef Stalin met at Potsdam, Germany, to plan the post-war world. The war in Asia continued until the United States dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, causing massive casualties and bringing Japan's surrender.

Section 3 The New Order and the Holocaust
To further their war effort and Hitler's plans for Aryan expansion, the Nazis forced millions of people to resettle as forced laborers. No aspect of the Nazi New Order was more terrifying than the deliberate attempt to exterminate the Jews. As part of the Nazis' Final Solution, Jews were locked into cramped, unsanitary ghettos or forced to dig their own mass graves before being killed. When this proved too slow for the Nazis, they transported Europe's Jews to death camps where they were worked to death or sent to die in gas chambers. The Nazis killed between five and six million Jews and nine to ten million non-Jews. In Asia, Japan showed little respect for the conquered peoples in its effort to secure industrial markets and raw materials. Japanese treatment of prisoners of war was equally harsh. Japan professed a commitment to ending Western colonialism, but the brutality of the Japanese convinced many Asians to resist Japanese occupation.

Section 4 The Home Front and the Aftermath of the War
World War II reached almost every area of the world, and mobilization for war brought widespread suffering and even starvation. The war caused 20 million civilian deaths. The United States, which did not fight the war on its own territory, sent its forces to fight and produced much of the military equipment for the Allies. Segregation in the U.S. military led African Americans to demand civil rights. Racism and suspicion led to the war-time detention of more than 100,000 Japanese Americans. The bombing of cities by the Allied and Axis powers cost thousands of lives, but probably did nothing to weaken the morale of either side. After the war, ideological conflict between the West and the Soviet Union resulted in the Cold War. The Cold War centered around the status of Soviet-dominated Eastern Europe.