French general and statesman who led French forces in World War II; served as the president of France from 1959 to 1969
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global warming
Front
Refers to the continuing rise in the average temperature of Earth's climate system; viewed as a result of human emissions of greenhouse gases
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Big Bang theory
Front
Theory which suggests that at some moment all matter in the universe was contained in a single point, which is considered the beginning of the universe
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Adolf Hitler
Front
Leader of the Nazi party in Germany; chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945; dictator of Nazi Germany from 1934 to 1945
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decolonization
Front
Process of the dissolution of colonial territories and the establishment of independent nations
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cultural imperialism
Front
Practice of promoting or imposing one's culture on another, usually between powerful societies and less-powerful ones
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Cold War
Front
Sustained state of political and military tension between members of NATO and members of the Warsaw Pact; dissolution of the Soviet Union was the end of this "conflict"
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Indian National Congress
Front
Organization established in 1885; gave expression to the idea of India as a single nation; played a major role in India's independence movement from British colonial rule
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European Economic Community
Front
Also known as the Common Market; founded in 1957; originally consisted of Italy, France, West Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg; expanded membership to almost all of Europe, including former communist states; renamed the European Union in 1994
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collectivization
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Also known as collective farming and communal farming; system in which the holdings of several farmers are run collectively as a unit; imposed by the government in the Soviet Union
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Mahatma Gandhi
Front
Leader of the Indian nationalist movement during British control over India; used nonviolent civil disobedience, such as hunger strikes
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Great Purges
Front
Period of immense paranoia in the Soviet Union of the late 1930's in which communist members accused each other being corrupted by capitalist ideals; enveloped tens of thousands of prominent communists, including all of Lenin's top associates, and millions more of ordinary peoples; based on suspicious associations in the past, denunciations by colleagues, connections to foreign countries, or bad luck; such people were arrested in the middle of the night, then tried and sentenced to either death or long harsh years in remote labor camps known as gulags; close to 1 million peoples executed between 1936 and 1941; additional 4 to 5 million people sent to the gulag, where they were forced to work in horrendous conditions and died in appalling numbers
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genocide
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Systematic destruction of all or part of a racial, ethnic, religious or national group
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League of Nations
Front
International peacekeeping organization founded as a result of the First World World; proposed by US president Woodrow Wilson; committed to the principle of "collective security" and intended to avoid the repetition of war
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Great Depression
Front
Economic decline as a result of the crash of the American stock market; lasted from 1929 until World War II; causes drop in world trade, loss of investment, and businesses unable to make profit; countries or colonies tied to exporting one or two products hard hit as the West consumed less.
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containment
Front
U.S. policy to prevent the spread of communism abroad during the Cold War; a response to a series of moves by the Soviet Union to enlarge communist influence in Eastern Europe, China, Korea, Africa, and Vietnam
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Cuban missile crisis
Front
Thirteen-day confrontation in October 1962 between the Soviet Union and the United States; Soviet missiles moved to Cuban soil in an agreement by Fidel Castro and Nikita Khrushchev; U.S. responds by blockading Cuba; Khrushchev and U.S. President John F. Kennedy reach an agreement in which the Soviets would remove their missiles from Cuba in return for an American promise not to invade Cuba
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Getulio Vargas
Front
Ruled Brazil from 1930 to 1945; discrediting of established export elites during the Great Depression leads to his dictatorship; supported the military; took steps to modernize Brazil's urban industrial sector
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apartheid
Front
A series of laws initiated by the Afrikaner National Party in South Africa which was designed to divide South African society by skin color and ethnicity; this system also reserved South Africa's resources for whites
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Five-Year Plan
Front
Planned economy in which a committee came together to determine rations
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Jawaharlal Nehru
Front
First Prime Minister of India and was a leading figure in the independence movement against British rule over India
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Chiang Kai-shek
Front
Chinese military officer who was leader of the Guomindang; fled to Taiwan after the Chinese Communist Party came to power in China
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command economy
Front
Planned economy; the economic system in which decisions regarding production and investment are embodied in a plan formulated by a central authority, usually by a public body such as a government agency
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Iranian Cultural Revolution
Front
Period following the Iranian Revolution where intellectuals of Iran were purged of Western and non-Islamic influences to bring it in line with Shia Islam; closed universities between 1980 and 1983, banned many books, and purged thousands of students and lecturers from schools
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League of Arab States
Front
Regional organization of Arab countries in and around North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and Southwest Asia; formed in Cairo in 1945 with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan (Jordan), Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Syria; currently has 22 members
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Cultural Revolution
Front
Also known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution; launched by Mao in the late 1960's; aimed to combat the capitalist tendencies he believed had penetrated even the highest ranks of the communist party itself; involved new policies to bring health care and education to the countryside and reinvigorate earlier efforts at rural industrialization under local control
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Marshall Plan
Front
Ssought to rebuild and reshape devastated European economies; funneled Europe some $12 billion with numerous advisers and technicians; motivated by combination of humanitarian concern, a desire to prevent a new depression by creating overseas customers for American goods, and interest in undermining the growing appeal of European communist parties; required European nations to cooperate with one another
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iron curtain
Front
Heavily fortified border between Eastern and Western Europe
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Great Leap Forward
Front
Mao Zedong's response to distortions of Chinese socialism; promoted smallscale industrialization in rural areas; tried to foster widespread and practical technological education for all rather than relying on a small elite of highly trained technical experts; envisioned an immediate transition to full communism in the "people's communes" rather than waiting for industrial development to provide the material basis for that transition; massive famine which followed temporarily discredited Mao's radicalism
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Holocaust
Front
Mass murder of approximately six million Jews during World War II; a program of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi Germany; led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party
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Fascism
Front
Political ideology which was intensely nationalistic; celebrated action and placed faith in charismatic leaders; and condemned individualism, liberalism, feminism, parliamentary democracy, and communism; adopted by Italy, Germany, and Japan in the years following World War I
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Deng Xiaoping
Front
Successor to Mao Zedong and reformist who sought to incorporate The People's Republic of China into the world economy; dismantled collectivized farming, state enterprises given greater authority, welcomed foreign investment; crushed democracy movement in Beijing's Tiananmen Square
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Gamel Abdel Nasser
Front
Second President of Egypt from 1956 to 1970; planned the overthrow of the monarchy and sought to nationalize the Suez Canal
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Mao Zedong
Front
Chinese communist revolutionary and leader of the People's Republic of China from its establishment 1949 to his death in 1976
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Chinese Revolution
Front
Prolonged communist movement in China and lasted from 1946 to 1950; resulted in the communist takeover of mainland China
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Mikhail Gorbachev
Front
Last general secretary of the Soviet Union (1985 to 1991); passed reforms such as perestroika and policies such as glasnost which led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union
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Central Powers
Front
One of the two warring factions in World War I; composed of Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria; also known as the Quadruple Alliance
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military-industrial complex
Front
Policy and monetary relationships which exist between legislators, national armed forces, and the military industrial base that supports them; include political contributions, political approval for military spending, lobbying to support bureaucracies, and oversight of the industry; most often used in reference to the system behind the military of the United States
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International Monetary Fund
Front
Established in 1944 by the Bretton Woods Conference in New Hampshire; sought to promote market economies, free trade, and high growth rates
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Ho Chi Minh
Front
Vietnamese communist revolutionary leader; was prime minister (from 1945 to 1955) and president (from 1945 to 1969) of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam
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Green Revolution
Front
Series of research, and development, and technology transfer initiatives, occurring between the 1940s and the late 1960s, that increased agriculture production worldwide, particularly in the developing world
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Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini
Front
Religious leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran; led an anti-Western revolution against the Shah of Iran in 1979
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Munich Conference
Front
Meeting of European leaders which permitted Nazi Germany's annexation of portions of Czechoslovakia along German borders mainly inhabited by German speakers; territory now known as "Sudetenland"; widely regarded as a failed act of appeasement toward Germany; agreement was signed in the early hours of 30 September 1938; agreement was signed by Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and Italy; Czechoslovakia not invited to the conference
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UN General Assembly
Front
One of the six principal organs of the United Nations and the only one in which all member nations have equal representation; oversee the budget of the United Nations, appoint the non-permanent members to the Security Council, receive reports from other parts of the United Nations and make recommendations in the form of General Assembly Resolutions
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African National Congress
Front
South African political party formed in 1912; strongly opposed to apartheid
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Che Guevara
Front
Argentine marxist revolutionary who was a major figure in the Cuban Revolution
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Vladimir Lenin
Front
Leader of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and premier of the Soviet Union; sparked a Bolshevik revolution in late 1917.
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Muhammad Ali Jinnah
Front
Founder of Pakistan and the leader of the All-India Muslim League until Pakistan's independence
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environmentalism
Front
Ideology which regards the environmental concerns
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fundamentalism
Front
Ideology which demands strict adherence to orthodox theological doctrines
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Section 2
(50 cards)
total war
Front
Conflict which requires the mobilization of each country's entire populations
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HIV/AIDS epidemic
Front
Epidemic which was first discovered in 1981 among homosexual men and intravenous drug users in New York and San Francisco; eventually became widespread around the world, particularly sub-Saharan Africa; virus attacks and destroys the immune system, which causes a fatal disorder in the immune system; spread through sexual contact with an infected person, contact with contaminated blood, and transmission from mother to child
during pregnancy and breastfeeding
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influenza epidemic
Front
Epidemic caused by the H1N1 influenza virus; lasted from 1918 to 1920; resulted in 50 to 100 million deaths, ranking it one of the most deadliest natural disasters in human history
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weapon of mass destruction
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Weapon which has the capability to kill large numbers of people and decimate large swaths of land
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quantum mechanics
Front
Branch of physics which deals with physical phenomena at a nanoscopic (1-100 nanometers) scale
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1917 Russian Revolution
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Collective term for the series of revolutions in 1917 which ousted Tsar Nicholas II and the tsarist autocracy and replaced it with the communist Bolshiveks
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transnational corporations
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"Multi-national corporation"; an organization that owns or controls production or services facilities in one or more countries other than its home country
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Treaty of Versailles
Front
Document which formally concluded the World War I in 1919; established the conditions for a World War II; Germany losses colonial empire and 15% of its European territory, required to pay heavy reparations to the winners, had its military forces severely restricted, and had to accept sole responsibility for the war; immense German resentment created from the treaty
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theory of relativity
Front
Idea which is composed of special relativity and general relativity; proposed by Albert Einstein; proposes that measurements of various quantities are relative to the velocities of observers, space and time should be considered together and in relation to each other (Spacetime), and the speed of light is constant
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non-governmental organization
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Organization that is neither a part of a government nor a conventional for-profit business
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stateless nation
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Term used for ethnic groups which are not the majority population in any nation state and for whom it is implied that they should have their own state
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World Bank
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United Nations international financial institution that provides loans to developing countries for capital programs; its primary goal is to reduce poverty
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Woodrow Wilson
Front
28th President of the United States (1913-1921); leader of the Progressive Movement; famous for his Fourteen Points, which sought to avoid another worldwide conflict
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post-modernism
Front
Late 20th Century movement in the arts, architecture, and criticism; includes skeptical interpretations of culture, literature, art, philosophy, history, economics, architecture, fiction, and literary criticism
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Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Front
Policy adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1949 regarding acceptable conduct between peoples
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neoliberalism
Front
Refers to economic liberalism through economic liberalizations, free trade and open markets, privatization, deregulation, and enhancing the role of the private sector in modern society
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sphere of influence
Front
Concept in which a state or organization has a level of cultural, economic, military, or political exclusivity, accommodating to the interests of powers outside the sphere; examples include European "semi-colony" of China
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space race
Front
Competition between the Soviet Union and the United States for supremacy in spaceflight capability; pioneered advancements such as artificial satellites, as well as manned and unmanned missions into outer space
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Truman Doctrine
Front
International relations policy set by the U.S. President Harry Truman in a speech on March 12, 1947; stated that the U.S. would support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent them from falling into the Soviet sphere; often referred to as the beginning of the US policy of containment
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New Deal
Front
Series of reforms proposed by United States President Woodrow Wilson; lasted from 1933 to 1942; experimental combination of reforms seeking to restart economic growth and prevent similar failures in the future; argued that government actions and spending programs could moderate recessions and depressions; consisted of immediate programs of public spending (for dams, highways, bridges, and parks) and long-term reforms, such as the Social Security system, minimum wage, and various relief and welfare programs
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Pan-Africanism
Front
Ideology which encourages the unity of Africans worldwide
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Nazi Germany
Front
The Third Reich; lasted from 1933 to 1945; Germany under the leadership of Adolf Hitler
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glasnost
Front
Soviet policy established by Mikhail Gorbachev which permitted cultural and intellectual freedoms
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social realism
Front
International art movement; refers to the work of painters, printmakers, photographers and filmmakers who draw attention to the everyday conditions of the working classes and the poor; often are critical of the social structures that maintain these conditions
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United Nations
Front
Organization established in 1945 as a successor to the League of Nations; attempts to find solutions to global problems and deal with virtually any matter of concern to humanity
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al-Qaeda
Front
Terrorist organization formerly headed by Osama bin Laden; behind the 9/11 attacks
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North Atlantic Treaty Organization
Front
Military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty which was signed in 1949; alliance in which its member states agree to mutual defense in response to an attack by any external party; consists of 28 member states across North America and Europe
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Fourteen Points
Front
Statement given on January 8, 1918 by United States President Woodrow Wilson declaring that World War I was being fought for a moral cause and called for postwar peace in Europe
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Mustafa Kemal Ataturk
Front
Founder and the first President of the Republic of Turkey; passed a series of reforms to transform the former Ottoman Empire into a modern, secular, and democratic nation
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Joseph Stalin
Front
Leader of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1952; implemented a highly centralized command economy, which resulted in the transformation of Russian society from agrarian to industrialized; imprisoned millions in labor camps and deported many to remote areas; issued the Great Purges, in which hundreds of thousands, including many prominent communists, were executed
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Potsdam Conference
Front
Conference which was held from July 17 to August 2, 1945; participants include the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States; gathered to decide how to punish Nazi Germany, sought to establish a post-war order, address peace treaty issues, and counter the effects of World War II
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perestroika
Front
Economic program launched by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev which freed state enterprises from government regulation, permitted small-scale private businesses, offered opportunities for private farming, and welcomed foreign investment in joint enterprises
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Warsaw Pact
Front
Agreement which brought the Soviet Union and Eastern European communist states in a military alliance designed to counter NATO
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Pan-Arabism
Front
Ideology proposing the unification of the countries of North Africa and West Asia from the Atlantic Ocean to the Arabian Sea, referred to as the Arab World
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Winston Churchill
Front
British politician; Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 and from 1951 to 1955
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North American Free Trade Agreement
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Regional alliance founded in 1993 and consists of Canada, Mexico, and the United States; the world's second largest free-trade zone
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World War II
Front
Conflict which lasted from 1939 to 1945; pitted the Allied Powers (Soviet Union, United Kingdom, United States, China and France) against the Axis Powers (Germany, Japan, and Italy); resulted in an Allied victory, the creation of the United Nations, and set the stage for the Cold War
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Third World
Front
Term which describes the countries that did not align with the Soviet Union or the United States
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Palestinian Liberation Organization
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Organization founded in 1964 with the purpose of creating an independent State of Palestine
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Nikita Khrushchev
Front
Leader of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964; responsible for the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union and backing of the Soviet space program
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Nelson Mandela
Front
South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and politician; President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999; served as President of the African National Congress from 1991 to 1997
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ebola epidemic
Front
Viral epidemic with symptoms that include fever, throat and muscle pains, headaches, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, and decreased functioning of the liver and kidneys; an 2014 outbreak in West Africa has led to a reported 142 deaths
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UN Security Council
Front
One of the six principal organs of the United Nations; in charge of the maintenance of international peace and security; this body is able to establish peacekeeping operations, establish international sanctions, and authorize military action through resolutions; the only UN body with the authority to issue binding resolutions to member states
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Prague Spring
Front
Period of political liberalization in Czechoslovakia during the era of Soviet domination; began on January 5, 1968, when reformist Alexander Dubček was elected First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, and continued until August 21 when the Soviet Union and other members of the Warsaw Pact invaded the country to halt the reforms
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World Trade Organization
Front
Established in 1994 by the 123 members of GATT; took over GATT activities in 1995; developed into a forum for settling international trade disputes
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Benito Mussolini
Front
Leader of the Italian National Fascist Party; prime minister of Italy from 1922 to 1943
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Osama bin Laden
Front
Islamic militant who was the leader of the terrorist group al-Qaeda; mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks; played a key role in the US-backed effort to aid mujahideen who fought Soviet forces in Afghanistan
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trench warfare
Front
Type of warfare using occupied fighting lines consisting largely of trenches, in which troops are significantly protected from the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery; resulted in enormous casualties while gaining or losing a few yards of ground during World War I
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Vietnam War
Front
Conflict which occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1956 to 1975; U.S. entered the war to prevent South Vietnam from becoming communist, as a result of its containment policy; Soviet Union backed Northern Vietnamese forces in an attempt to spread communism to Southeast Asia; resulted in the unification of Vietnam under a communist government and the spread of communism to Cambodia and Laos
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World War I
Front
Conflict which lasted from 1914 to 1918; also known as the Great War; pitted the Allies (United Kingdom, France, Russia, Italy, Japan, and the United States) and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria); resulted in an Allied victory and Treaty of Versailles, which set the stage for another world war
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Section 3
(2 cards)
Yalta Conference
Front
Meeting which lasted from February 4 to February 11, 1945; meeting attended by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Premier Joseph Stalin for the purpose of discussing Europe's post-war reorganization; convened in the Livadia Palace near Yalta in Crimea
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Zionist Movement
Front
Movement of Jews and Jewish culture that supports the creation of a Jewish homeland in the territory defined as the Land of Israel