Ch. 22 Study Guide With Key
Ch. 22 Study Guide With Key
Ch. 22 Study Guide With Key
_______
Per.______
Robert W. Strayer
Ways of the World: A Brief Global History
Ways of the World: A Brief Global History with Sources
Chapter 22, The Rise and Fall of World Communism, 1917-Present, Study Guide
(Original: pp. 659-688; With Sources: pp. 1029-1058)
Global Communism: Comparing Revolutions as a Path to Communism
1. Where did communist governments exercise state power and various degrees of
influence besides the Soviet Union, China, and Eastern Europe during the 20 th
century?
2. Identify the major differences between the Russian and Chinese Revolutions.
3. Why were the Bolsheviks able to ride the Russian Revolution to power?
4. How did the Chinese Communist Party adapt its ideology and strategy during its
long struggle to power?
5. In undertaking the push for modernization, how were China and Russia able to
7. How did the collectivization of agriculture differ between the USSR and China?
11. How did the United States and the Soviet Union court third world countries?
12. In what ways did the United States play a global role after World War II?
13. Describe the strengths and weaknesses of the communist world by the 1970s.
15. What was the result of the reforms instituted by Deng Xiaoping?
Socially:
Politically:
Economically:
17. How did the end of communism in the Soviet Union differ from communisms
demise in China?
Comintern
Warsaw Pac
McCarthyism
Guomindang
Collectivization of agriculture
Great Leap Forward
Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution
Deng Xiaoping
Perestroika
Glasnost
peasant support, Mao experimented with land reform in areas under communist
control, increased efforts to empower women, and created a communist military
force to protect liberated areas form Guomindang attack and landlord reprisals.
Furthermore, in the areas that the Guomindang controlled, the CCP reduced rents,
taxes, and interest payments for peasants; taught literacy to adults; and mobilized
women for the struggle. The struggle expressed Chinese nationalism as well as a
demand for radical social change. (Original: pp. 665-667; With Sources: pp. 10351037)
5. In undertaking the push for modernization, how were China and Russia able to
construct a socialist societies? In economic terms?
In the Soviet Union, under the leadership of Joseph Stalin, the Russians embraced
many material values of Western capitalist societies and were similar to the new
nations of the 20th century, all of which were seeking development. This involved a
frontal attack on long-standing inequalities of class and gender, an effort to
prevent the making of new inequalities as the process of modern development
unfolded, and the promotion of cultural values of selflessness and collectivism that
could support a socialist society. This political state, dominated by the Communist
Party, also controlled almost the entire economy and various professional groups
operated under party control. The Chinese had substantial administrative and
governing experience, unlike the Bolsheviks. The Chinese communists came to
power as the champions of the rural masses, whereas the Bolsheviks lacked
experience in the countryside. In economic terms, China faced even more daunting
prospects than did the Soviet Union. Its population was far greater, its industrial
base far smaller, and the availability of new agricultural land was far more limited
than in the Soviet Union. Chinas literacy and modern education, and its
transportation network, were likewise much less developed. Thus, Chinese
communists had to build a modern society from the ground up. (Original: p. 668;
With Sources: p. 1038)
6. What changes did communist regimes bring to the lives of women?
In the Soviet Union: Women had full legal and political equality; marriage became a
civil procedure among freely consenting adults; divorce and abortion were made
easier and legalized; married women could keep their own names; pregnancy leave
for women was mandated; and women could now work in factories in the countrys
drive to industrialize. The Communist Party set up a special organization, whose
radical women leaders pushed a feminist agenda in the 1920s by organizing
conferences for women, training women to run day-care centers and medical clinics,
Such people would be arrested, usually in the dead of night, and tried and
sentenced either to death or to long years in harsh and remote labor camps known
as the gulag. Many were falsely accused, but in the Soviet Union, the search for
enemies occurred under the clear control of the state. The Terror consumed the
energies of a huge corps of officials, investigators, informers, guards, and
executioners, many of whom themselves, were arrested, exiled, or executed in the
course of the purges. (Original: p. 674; With Sources: p. 1044)
10. In what different ways was the Cold War expressed?
It was expressed through rivalry militarist satellite countries of Eastern Europe;
and a series of regional wars, especially in Korea, Vietnam, and later in Afghanistan.
Tense standoffs occurred, like the Cuban Missile Crisis. The nuclear arms race
escalated into the stockpiling of nuclear warheads. There was competition for
influencing undeveloped countries worldwide, and fomenting revolutionary groups
around the world. (Original: pp. 675-677; With Sources: pp. 1045-1047)
11. How did the United States and the Soviet Union court third world countries?
Cold War fears of communism penetration prompted U.S. intervention, sometimes
openly, and often secretly, in Iran, the Philippines, Guatemala, El Salvador, Chile,
the Congo, and elsewhere, and in the process the U.S. supported anti-communist
but corrupt and authoritarian regimes. Indonesia received large amounts of Soviet
and Eastern European aid, but that didnt prevent it from destroying the
Indonesian Communist Party in 1965, butchering half a million suspected
communists in the process. When the Americans refused to assist Egypt in
building the Aswan Dam in the mid-1950s, Egypt developed a close relationship with
the Soviet Union. However, neither superpower was able to completely dominate
its supposed third world allies, many of whom resisted the role of pawns in
superpower rivalries. (Original: p. 678; With Sources: p. 1048)
12. In what ways did the United States play a global role after World War II?
The United States lead the Western world in an effort to contain the spread of
the communist movement. It deployed military might around the world; it became
the worlds largest creditor and its chief economic power; and it became an
exporter of popular culture. (Original: p. 678-679; With Sources: pp. 1048-1049)
13. Describe the strengths and weaknesses of the communist world by the 1970s.
By the 70s, communism had reached the greatest extent of expansion. The Soviet
Union had matched its military might with the U.S. However, divisions within the
communist world increased, especially between Eastern Europe and the Soviet
Union, China and the Soviet Union, and China and Vietnam. The horrors of Stalins
Terror and the gulag, of Maos Cultural Revolution, and of something approaching
genocide in communist Cambodia all wore away at communist claims to moral
superiority over capitalism. (Original: p. 680-681; With Sources: pp. 1050-1051)
14. Explain the economic and moral failures of the communist experiment. (Could
the USSR match the West in quality and availability of consumer goods?)
Despite early success, communist economies by the late 1970s showed no signs of
catching up to the more advanced capitalist countries. The highly regimented and
state controlled Soviet economy was largely stagnant; its citizens had to stand in
long lines for consumer goods and complained endlessly about their poor quality and
declining availability. The eroding away of communist claims of moral superiority
over capitalism was undermined by Stalins purges, Maos Cultural Revolution in
which millions died of starvation, and Cambodias attempt at genocide. This erosion
occurred as global political culture more widely embraced democracy and human
rights as the universal legacy of humankind. After all the boasting, Communism was
increasingly being seen as the road to nowhere. (Original: p. 682; With Sources: p.
1052)
15. What was the result of the reforms instituted by Deng Xiaoping?
Socially: Banned plays, operas, films, and translations of Western classics
reappeared, and a literature of the wounded exposed the sufferings of the
Cultural Revolution; a problem of urban over-crowding; terrible pollution in major
cities; street crime, prostitution, gambling, drug addiction, and a criminal
underworld, which had been eliminated after 1949, surfaced again in Chinas
booming cities.
Politically: Some 100,000 political prisoners, many of them high-ranking
communists, were released and restored to important positions. Local governments
and private enterprises joined forces in thousands of flourishing township and
village enterprises that produced food, clothing, building materials, and much more.
Economically: More dramatic was the rapid dismantling of the countrys system of
collectivized farming and a return to something close to small scale private
agriculture. Managers of state enterprises were given greater authority and
encouraged to act like private owners, making many of their own decisions and
seeking profits. China welcomed foreign investment in special enterprise zones
along the coast, where foreign capitalists received tax breaks and other
inducements. On the other hand, the states growing economy also generated
the problems and corruption of the Soviet system. (Original: p. 684; With Sources:
p. 1054)