WHAP Spring Final

European View of Science (Early 20th C.)

Rapid success of the Second Industrial Revolution, germ theory, and physics led Europeans to believe human reason and technology could solve all societal problems, reinforcing notions of global dominance and 'civilizing' superiority.

Technological Innovations (Early 20th C.)

Electricity, domestic appliances, rockets, and early automotive transit. Electricity allowed cities to expand outward into suburbs via streetcars, while domestic appliances reduced household labor time.

Collapse of the Qing Dynasty

Fell in 1911 due to relentless foreign imperialism (Opium Wars, Spheres of Influence) and massive internal upheavals (Taiping and Boxer Rebellions) that the imperial court failed to manage.

Collapse of the Ottoman Empire

Known as the 'Sick Man of Europe'; collapsed due to rising ethnic nationalism in the Balkans, severe economic stagnation, failure to modernize, and choosing the losing side (Central Powers) in WWI.

Collapse of Tsarist Russia

Fell in 1917 due to extreme economic inequality, military incompetence and massive casualties in WWI, and acute wartime food/fuel shortages that sparked the Bolshevik Revolution.

Challenge to Scientific Progress

The World Wars and radical regimes proved that scientific advancement did not guarantee moral progress. Technologies were weaponized for industrialized slaughter (poison gas, atomic bomb) and state-sponsored genocides.

MAIN Causes of WWI

Militarism (arms races), Alliances (secret pacts), Imperialism (colonial rivalries), and Nationalism (ethnic self-determination, especially in the Balkans).

Social Darwinism (WWI Context)

Late-1800s racial ideology applying 'survival of the fittest' to human societies; it justified aggressive imperial expansion, racism, and the belief that powerful nations were destined to conquer weaker ones.

Germany, Zollverein, and Britain

The Zollverein (customs union) economically unified German states before political unification in 1871. A newly unified Germany rapidly industrialized, overtaking Britain in steel production and threatening British naval hegemony.

The Spark of WWI

The June 28, 1914 assassination of Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip, a member of the Serbian nationalist group the Black Hand.

WWI Alliances

Triple Entente (Great Britain, France, Russia) vs. Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy—though Italy later defected and Ottoman Empire joined the Central Powers).

Schlieffen Plan

Germany's tactical strategy to avoid a two-front war by rapidly invading and defeating France through neutral Belgium first, then rushing east to confront slower-mobilizing Russia. It failed.

Total War

A conflict requiring a country to mobilize all civilian and economic resources toward the war effort. Includes government economic control, rationing, conscription, mass propaganda, and targeting civilian infrastructure.

14 Points vs. Treaty of Versailles

14 Points: Woodrow Wilson's idealistic plan emphasizing national self-determination, free trade, and a League of Nations. Versailles: The actual treaty dominated by Allied revenge, punishing Germany with massive reparations and the 'War Guilt Clause'.

League of Nations vs. United Nations

League: Post-WWI, lacked US membership, had no military arm, required unanimous votes. UN: Post-WWII, includes the US, possesses a Security Council with peacekeeping forces, uses majority/veto voting.

Causes of WWI vs. WWII

WWI: Caused by imperial competition, complex entangling alliances, and diplomatic escalation. WWII: Caused by unresolved WWI grievances, the failure of appeasement at the Munich Conference, and fascist expansionism.

Causes of the Great Depression

The 1929 US Stock Market Crash, agricultural overproduction, bank failures, and unsustainable credit. Interconnected global loans meant the American collapse dragged down European and colonial economies.

Hitler's Reasons for Targeting Jews

Grounded in radical Aryan Social Darwinism; he scapegoated Jews for Germany's loss in WWI, the humiliating Versailles Treaty, and the economic devastation of the Great Depression.

Einsatzgruppen

Nazi mobile killing squads that followed the German army into the Soviet Union during WWII, executing over a million Jews and political opponents via mass shootings.

Marxism (Core Beliefs)

The theoretical ideology that human history is driven by class struggle, predicting that the industrialized working class (proletariat) would inevitably overthrow capitalism to form a stateless, classless society.

Marxism vs. Communist Reality

Instead of transitioning into a stateless, classless society run by workers, Marxist states in Russia and China became highly centralized, authoritarian totalitarian regimes ruled by a single vanguard party.

Causes of the Russian Revolution

Disastrous military losses in WWI, severe food and fuel shortages, weak leadership under Tsar Nicholas II, and the Bolsheviks' popular promise of 'Peace, Land, and Bread'.

Joseph Stalin's Rise to Power

Following Lenin's death, Stalin utilized his administrative position as General Secretary to appoint loyalists, outmaneuver ideological rivals like Leon Trotsky, and secure totalitarian control by the late 1920s.

Stalin's Collectivization & Famine

The forced consolidation of individual peasant farms into state-run collectives. Resistance from wealthier peasants (kulaks) led to brutal purges and state-engineered famines like the Holodomor in Ukraine.

Mao's Great Leap Forward

A radical 1958 economic plan to rapidly industrialize China and collectivize agriculture through rural communes and 'backyard steel furnaces'. It failed completely, triggering a catastrophic famine killing tens of millions.

Mao's Cultural Revolution

A socio-political movement (1966-1976) using student paramilitary groups (Red Guards) to purge capitalist elements, intellectuals, and traditional Chinese culture to reinforce Maoist ideological purity.

Soviet vs. Chinese Communism

Similarities: Both used totalitarian control, forced collectivization, and heavy industrialization. Differences: USSR relied on urban factory workers; China focused on the rural peasantry.

Containment Policy

US foreign policy (Truman Doctrine) to halt the spread of communism without fighting a direct war.

Korean War (1950-1953)

A Cold War proxy conflict triggered when communist North Korea invaded US-backed South Korea. Ended in a stalemate and armistice near the 38th Parallel, keeping the peninsula divided.

Cuban Missile Crisis (1962)

The closest the world came to nuclear war. Triggered by Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. Resolved when the US blockaded Cuba, and Khrushchev agreed to dismantle the sites in exchange for a US promise not to invade Cuba.

Perestroika and Glasnost

Mikhail Gorbachev's late-Soviet reforms. —————: Economic restructuring allowing limited capitalism. —————: Political openness and free speech, which accidentally unleashed suppressed ethnic nationalism.

Tiananmen Square (1989)

A student-led pro-democracy protest in Beijing. Deng Xiaoping ordered a brutal military crackdown, proving that while China would embrace economic capitalism, it would rigidly reject political democracy.

Survival of Chinese vs. Soviet Communism

The USSR collapsed because Gorbachev introduced political freedoms alongside economic reforms. China survived because Deng Xiaoping ruthlessly suppressed political challenges while successfully transitioning to a state-directed market economy.

Causes of Post-WWII Decolonization

European empires were economically bankrupted and militarily weakened by WWII, destroying the myth of European invincibility. Imperial subjects who fought for freedom demanded national self-determination.

Satyagraha & Gandhi

'Truth-force' or non-violent civil disobedience. Gandhi used boycotts, strikes, and peaceful marches to expose the moral cruelty of British colonialism, making Indian occupation economically and politically unviable.

Amritsar Massacre (1919)

A turning point in Indian decolonization where British troops fired on a crowd of peaceful protesters, killing hundreds and permanently turning public opinion against British imperial rule.

Social Reform in India (Sati & Child Marriage)

Nationalist leaders and social reformers targeted traditional practices like Sati (widow burning) and child marriage to modernize Indian society and secure greater rights for women.

The Partition of India (1947)

Due to deep religious rifts, Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League demanded a separate state. British India was split into India (Hindu-majority) and Pakistan (Muslim-majority), causing mass displacement and violence.

Zionism & Balfour Declaration

Zionism: The nationalist movement for a Jewish homeland in Palestine. Balfour Declaration (1917): A British statement expressing formal support for the establishment of a 'national home for the Jewish people'.

1948 Jewish War for Independence

Conflict triggered immediately following Israel's declaration of statehood. Surrounding Arab nations invaded; Israel won, securing its sovereignty and expanding its borders beyond the original UN partition plan.

Six-Day War (1967)

A preemptive strike by Israel against mobilization by Egypt, Syria, and Jordan. Israel won a decisive victory, capturing the West Bank, East Jerusalem, Gaza Strip, Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula.

Yom Kippur War (1973)

A surprise coalition attack by Egypt and Syria on Israel during a holy holiday. Israel successfully repelled the forces, leading directly to a retaliatory OPEC oil embargo against Western nations.

Camp David Accords (1978)

A historic US-brokered peace treaty where Egypt became the first Arab state to officially recognize Israel, and Israel returned the occupied Sinai Peninsula to Egypt.

Apartheid & Sharpeville Massacre

Apartheid: South Africa's legal system of total racial segregation. Sharpeville Massacre (1960): Police shot peaceful black anti-apartheid protesters, drawing international fury and escalating ANC resistance led by Nelson Mandela.

Post-Independence African Ethnic Conflicts

Caused by artificial borders drawn by European imperialists during the Scramble for Africa, which forced rival ethnic/religious groups into single nations, causing civil wars for state control post-independence.

Accelerators of Globalization

Rapid extraction of fossil fuels, jet aviation, the Internet, fiber optics, and medical breakthroughs (antibiotics/vaccines) that connected markets instantly and caused population growth.

Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) & Interdependence

Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. Demonstrates economic interdependence: its 1973 oil embargo against Western nations supporting Israel caused severe fuel shortages and massive inflation worldwide.

GATT & WTO

The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) evolved into the World Trade Organization (WTO). Both operate globally to systematically lower tariffs and eliminate trade barriers to promote free trade.

North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

A regional trade bloc between the US, Canada, and Mexico designed to eliminate tariffs, promote economic integration, and create fluid regional supply chains.

Neoliberalism / Free-Market Capitalism

An economic theory promoting global deregulation, privatization of state industries, free trade, lower tariffs, and minimal government intervention (popularized by Reagan and Thatcher).

Keynesian Economics

An economic theory stating that market economies are prone to crises and that governments must actively intervene using fiscal policies and spending to stimulate demand during downturns (e.g., the New Deal).

Command Economy

An economic system in which the central state apparatus completely controls production, fixes pricing, and manages the distribution of goods and services (e.g., Stalinist USSR, Maoist China).

Munich Conference

A meeting where Britain, France, and Italy agreed to let Nazi Germany annex the Sudetenland, a German-speaking region of Czechoslovakia. Designed to avoid war through appeasement, it ultimately failed when Hitler invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia months later.

Muslim League

Established to protect the political rights and cultural identity of India's Muslim minority, it became the driving force behind the demand for an independent Muslim state, leading to the creation of Pakistan in 1947

Nelson Mandela

South African anti-apartheid revolutionary, political leader, and the country's first Black president. He led the African National Congress (ANC) against the oppressive system of apartheid.

Iron Curtain

Winston Churchill's term for the ideological and physical division of Europe into democratic West and communist East.