Globalisation, Economic Systems, and Authoritarian Leaders Revision

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering globalisation, economic models, greenwashing, and the rise/rule of Hitler, Mao, and Stalin.

Globalisation

The process by which businesses, cultures, and governments interact and integrate across the world through trade, technology, communication, migration, and the spread of ideas.

Free trade agreements

Inter-country arrangements where tariffs are lowered to encourage trade, such as the WTO, NAFTA, and the EU single market.

Multinational corporations (MNCs)

Global companies like Nike, Apple, and McDonald's that operate in dozens of countries.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)

Capital investment from foreign entities that allows developing nations to gain export opportunities and economic growth.

Cultural homogenisation

The disappearance of local cultures as Western brands and global media dominate the landscape.

Race to the bottom

A competitive state where countries offer the lowest wages and weakest regulations to attract Multinational corporations.

Linear Economy

A production and consumption model following the path: TAKE $\rightarrow$ MAKE $\rightarrow$ USE $\rightarrow$ DISPOSE.

Planned obsolescence

The business strategy of designing products with a short lifespan so they must be replaced quickly.

Circular Economy

A sustainable model based on REDUCE $\rightarrow$ REUSE $\rightarrow$ REPAIR $\rightarrow$ RECYCLE, where waste is designed out of the system.

Greenwashing

When a company misleads consumers by spending more effort appearing environmentally friendly than actually reducing its environmental impact.

Vague claims

A type of greenwashing using labels like 'eco-friendly' or 'natural' without certification or proof.

Hidden trade-offs

A greenwashing tactic highlighting one green feature (like organic cotton) while ignoring overall harm (like high water usage or poor labor conditions).

Transparent Supply Chain Marketing

A business strategy where companies openly share detailed information about factory costs, worker wages, and material sourcing to build trust.

Political Power

Control exercised through formal institutions like elections, laws, and political parties, requiring legitimacy.

Military Power

Control through armed force or threat, such as Stalin's NKVD or Hitler's SS, creating compliance through fear.

Ideological Power

A durable form of power where citizens obey because they genuinely believe in the leader's ideas, such as Mao's communist ideology.

Smart Power

The successful simultaneous use of political, military, ideological, and economic power by authoritarian leaders.

Propaganda

Biased or false information designed to manipulate public opinion and behaviour in favour of a political cause.

Cult of Personality

A propaganda technique portraying a leader as a divine or infallible figure, such as Mao being called the 'Great Helmsman'.

Stab in the Back myth

The false claim that the German army was not defeated militarily in WWI, but betrayed by socialists and Jews on the home front.

Article 231 (War Guilt Clause)

A condition of the Treaty of Versailles requiring Germany to accept $100\%$ of the blame for WWI.

Article 48

A Weimar Constitution clause allowing the President to rule by emergency decree, bypassing parliament.

Beer Hall Putsch

The failed armed coup in Munich in November $1923$ that led to Hitler's arrest and trial.

Mein Kampf

The book written by Hitler in prison outlining Nazi racial hierarchy, antisemitism, and the need for Lebensraum.

Enabling Act (March 1933)

Law giving Hitler the power to make laws without the Reichstag for $4$ years, effectively ending democracy.

Night of the Long Knives (1934)

A purge where Hitler murdered SA leader Ernst Röhm and over $85$ rivals to consolidate his control over the party.

Führerprinzip

The 'Leader Principle' in Nazi ideology stating one strong leader's word is law, rejecting majority rule.

Lebensraum

The ideological goal of 'living space', justifying the conquest of Eastern Europe for the Aryan race.

Mao's Ideological Innovation

The conviction that the rural peasantry, rather than the urban proletariat, would be the engine of the communist revolution.

The Long March (1934-1935)

A $6,000$ mile strategic retreat by the CCP, transformed by propaganda into a heroic founding legend of revolutionary sacrifice.

Great Leap Forward (1958-62)

Mao's policy to rapidly industrialise China via communes, resulting in a famine that killed an estimated $15$ to $55$ million people.

Cultural Revolution (1966-76)

A mass campaign using Red Guards to destroy the 'Four Olds' and eliminate Mao's political rivals.

NKVD

Stalin's secret police responsible for mass informers, interrogation through torture, and filling arrest quotas.

The Great Purge (1936-1938)

Also known as Yezhovshchina, a period of terror where $750,000$ people were executed, including $3$ of $5$ Soviet marshals.

Gulag

A system of forced labor camps in remote regions of the USSR that held approximately $1.7$ million prisoners by $1940$.

Collectivisation

The process of merging small peasant farms into large state-controlled collective farms (kolkhozy) starting in $1929$.

Holodomor

The man-made famine in Ukraine ($1932-33$) caused by collectivisation, resulting in the deaths of $3.5$ to $7.5$ million people.

Five Year Plans

Stalin's heavy industry targets that tripled coal production and quadrupled steel production between $1928$ and $1940$.

Socialist Realism

The state-mandated artistic style in the USSR where every work had to glorify the state and depict Stalin positively.