Download Rise of the Modern State System

Rise of the Modern
State System
1900-1950
Outline
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1900 – early part of the cold war.
Effects of WWI & Versailles
Rise of the Soviet Union
League of Nations – Western Europe
Isolationist State – United States
Post WWII Peace
Imperialism
WWI
• Major Restructuring of World Politics
• The three dominant states that collapsed
were: Austro-Hungarian Empire, Ottoman
Empire and the Russian Empire.
Russian Revolution
Lenin & Stalin
• Russia & surrounding area:
Civil War 1917-1922
• Total Death Toll in WWI: 15 million
• Russ Civil War: 10 million
• Soviet Union under Stalin: 20 million
Collective Security
• League of Nations was created in 1919, following the Treaty of
Versailles.
• The hope of the envisioned collective security would protect individual
states and prevent secret treaties, which was one of the factors that
caused WWI.
• The main problem in IR was war; war needed to be prevented.
• The idea behind the League of Nations was that International
cooperation would promote peace.
• Political idealism dominated international politics.
• Issue of reparations: France and Britain wanted Germany to pay for the
entire cost of the war.
• Both Britain and France was in debt to US due to costs of the war.
• United States had not officially signed the League of Nations.
Peace after WWI
Post WWII Period
• Altered the distribution of power in the world.
• The map of Europe changed during the “big three
conference” of Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill at
Yalta in 1945.
• Post WWII saw the recreation of states by the
allied powers and the Soviet Union.
• The post war period saw emergence – United
States and the Soviet Union as superpowers.
• European colonial powers had been weakened.
Yalta
Post WWII Realism
• By mid-twentieth century the balance of power had shifted
from the European Colonial Powers to the Superpowers of
the United States and the Soviet Union.
• A new kind of arms race began, new alliances were
formed.
• North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) – the alliance
of Western Europe and North America.
• However, it is interesting to note that the post war period
also saw the creation of the United Nations.
• The twentieth century marks a period in history where we
see the international struggle for power continue, but
increasingly a need for international cooperation.