20th Century Global Conflicts, 1914-present

From the book "Crash Course: AP European History"

Fourteen Points

President Woodrow Wilson’s idealistic peace aims. Wilson stressed national self-determination, the rights of small countries, freedom of the seas, and free trade.

Bolsheviks

A party of revolutionary Marxists, led by Vladimir Lenin, who seized power in Russia in 1917.

New Economic Policy

A program initiated by Vladimir Lenin to stimulate the economic recovery of the Soviet Union in the early 1920s. This program utilized a limited revival of capitalism in light industry and agriculture.

Existentialism

Philosophy that God, reason, and progress are all myths. Humans must accept responsibility for their actions. This responsibility causes an overwhelming sense of dread and anguish. This philosophy reflects the sense of isolation and alienation during and after World War I.

Relativity

A scientific theory associated with Albert Einstein that holds that time and space do not exist separately. Instead, they are a combined continuum whose measurement depends as much on the observer as on the entities being measured.

Totalitarianism

A political system in which the government has total control over the lives of individual citizens.

Fascism

A political system that combines an authoritarian government with a corporate economy. Governments under this system glorify their leaders, appeal to nationalism, control the media, and repress individual liberties.

Kulaks

Land-owning peasantry in tsarist Russia. Joseph Stalin accused the kulaks of being class enemies of the poorer peasants. Stalin “liquidated the kulaks as a class” by executing them and expropriating their land to form collective farms.

Keynesian Economics

An economic theory based on the ideas of 20th century British economist John Maynard Keynes. According to this theory, governments can spend their economies out of a depression by using deficit-spending to encourage employment and stimulate economic growth.

Appeasement

a policy of making concessions to an aggressor in the hopes of avoiding war. Associated with Neville Chamberlain’s policy of making concessions to Adolf Hitler.

Holocaust

During World War II, mass extinction of Jews and other minority groups by Nazis under Adolf Hitler. Part of Hitler’s ruthless attempt to create a “new racial order.”