Course Content
Lesson Plans
The Western Heritage ©2000
by Kagan, Ozment, and Turner
Focus Lesson 23
Chapter 31: "The Cold War Era and the Emergence of the New Europe"
AP* Course Description
- Intellectual and Cultural History
- Major trends in literature and the arts
- Intellectual and cultural developments and their relationship to social values and political events
- Developments in social, economic, and political thought
- Impact of global expansion on European culture
- Political and Diplomatic History
- The rise and functioning of the modern state in its various forms
- Relations between Europe and other parts of the world: colonialism, imperialism, decolonization, and global interdependence
- The evolution of political elites and the development of political parties and ideologies
- The extension and limitation of rights and liberties (personal, civic, economic, and political); majority and minority political; persecutions
- The growth and changing forms of nationalism
- Forms of political protest, reform, and revolution
- Relationship between domestic and foreign policies
- Efforts to restrain conflict: treaties, balance of power diplomacy, and international organizations
- War and civil conflict: origins, developments, technology, and their consequences
- Social and Economic History
- The growth of competition and interdependence in national and world markets
- Private and state roles in economic activity
- Development of racial and ethnic group identities
Key Components
- Instructor's Manual: pp. 57–59
- Study Guide and Workbook, Vol. II: pp. 185–196
- Test Item File: pp. 169–175
Key Web Sites
Given the changing nature of the Internet, you may wish to preview these sites. Always check for updated links.
- Stalin's Body Removed From Lenin's Tomb
- The Cold War
- European Unification
- Gorbachev and Perestroika
- The Meaning of the Maastricht Treaty
- Maastricht Treaty
- Eurotreaties General Information
- Death of the Father
- The Berlin Wall
- NATO
- Confrontation or Co-existence?
- Twenty-Five Lectures on Modern Balkan History
- Central Europe Online: Features
- Central Europe Online: Travel
Key Words and Terms
- Cold War
- euro
- containment
- Truman Doctrine
- peaceful coexistence
- Sputnik
- summit meetings
- Paris Summit Conference
- Cuban Missile Crisis
- Prague Spring
- Brezhnev Doctrine
- German Democratic Republic
- Pan-African Congress
- Indochina War
- Geneva Settlement
- Southeast Asia Treaty Organization
- Vietnamization
- Christian Democratic Party
- August 1991 Coup
- ethnic cleansing
- Treaty of Rome
- Dayton agreement
- Treaty of Maastricht
- Iron Curtain
- Three Crises of 1956
- European Commission
- Helsinki Accords
- détente
- Strategic Arms
- Limitation Agreement
- Afghan War
- Gdansk strike
- Solidarity
- Third World
- Strategic Defense Initiative
- Treaty of Brussels
- perestroika
- centralized planning
- glasnost
- Congress of the People's Deputies
- Tiananmen Square
- Central Committee
- Baltic Republics
- UN police action
- Korean War
- Yugoslav civil war
- Common Market
- Open Door policy
- Secret Speech of 1956
- European Union
- Marshall Plan
- Christian Democratic Movement
- Cominform
- Berlin Wall
- Berlin Blockade
- Berlin Airlift
- German Federal Republic
- superpowers
- NATO
- COMECON
- Warsaw Pact
- Balfour Declaration
- Zionists
- Supreme Soviet
- UN Resolution in 1947
- Arab-Israeli conflict
- Social Democratic Party
- European Coal and Steel Community
- European Economic Community
Suggested Pacing
Chapter 31 should be combined with Chapter 30 (social developments in the twentieth century) to create a unit on twentieth-century social history and post-World War II political and economic developments. This unit could be completed in two-and-a-half weeks. If the schedule suggested in these Focus Lessons is followed for the entire book, at this point approximately two weeks will be left before administration of the AP* European History Exam. This time could be used for a review of the course.
Test Strategy
Linking information from different periods is important in developing an understanding of concepts. This ability to make connections is an important skill that students need to showcase in their essays on the AP* exam. Linkages demonstrate an advanced placement level of understanding the content.
Key Concepts
- The Cold War
As World War II drew to a close, the two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, moved from being cautious allies to being open enemies. Each gathered its European allies into defensive organizations—NATO and the Warsaw Pact—as it struggled to gain ascendancy over the other. Each superpower offered financial, military, and political aid to woo nations to its side, the United States through the Marshall Plan and the Truman Doctrine, and the Soviet Union through Cominform. As the students study this diplomatic maneuvering, it is essential that they see this as a process of actions and reactions, as each country's fear of the other escalates the Cold War. - European union
Attempts at union of the peoples of Europe stretch back to the days of ancient Rome. This dream of one Europe continued through history with such leaders as Charlemagne, the Holy Roman Emperors, Napoleon, and Hitler. The first effort at voluntary unification of European nations in the post-World War II world was the Benelux Treaty of 1948, which focused on cooperation among Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. Major European nations formed the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951 to collaborate on economic activities. This movement grew into the European Economic Community (the EEC or Common Market) in 1957. The European Free Trade Area was begun in 1959 as a smaller version of the EEC. In 1993, the European Union was formed from the EEC. - Collapse of European communism
Mikhail Gorbachev, though never repudiating socialism, began programs of rapid change to end inefficiencies in the Soviet system and to improve the Soviet standard of living. These programs of glasnost and perestroika soon led to open elections. As the Soviet system softened from within, cracks showed in relations with its satellites. In 1989, as Eastern European nations moved toward more liberal governments, the USSR did nothing to stop them. The liberal revolutions had a domino effect, moving across Eastern Europe and eventually rolling toward, and in 1991, encompassed the Soviet Union itself.
Summing Up Student Understanding
The Russian people have seen many political and social changes since World War II. Have students simulate a DBQ by answering the following writing prompt, using the documents in their textbook on the following pages: 1074, photograph on 1076, 1077, 1081, 1082, 1083, 1085, 1086, 1097, 1099, 1100, 1103, 1107.
Trace the development of post-World War II Soviet communism.
Students' essays should note that Stalin's brutal regime (as evidenced by the Cominform Manifesto and the Berlin Blockade) gave way to less brutal, though no less repressive, actions by Khrushchev and his successors (as shown by the development of the Warsaw Pact, the Secret Speech, the Hungarian revolt, the Berlin Wall, and the Prague Spring). With the rise of Gorbachev, the satellite states began a process that lead to the demise of the Soviet Union itself (as covered in Poland's declaration of martial law, Lithuanian demonstrations, shortages of consumer goods, Gorbachev's 1990 speech, and Solzhenitsyn's article).
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
You might also find these additional readings useful to develop students' background knowledge or for DBQ activities:
- Aspects of Western Civilization, Vol. II, edited by Rogers—Chapter 11
- Sources of the West, Vol. II, edited by Kishlausky—Part VI, "The Transformation of Eastern Europe," and "Toward a New World"
- Documents in World History, Vol. II, edited by Stearns, Gosch, and Grieshaber—Section Three, Reading 25