League of nations

In January 1919 the Paris Peace conference determined the Treaty of Versailles and the
League of nations.

The treaty of versailles:

1. War guilt → germans were guilty for the first World War
2. Reparations
3. Reduction and control of germany's borders
4. Reduction of Germany's armend forces.

The league of nations:

● It was one of wilson's fourteen points
● Attempted to solve international disputes to avoid war
● Some disputes were handled by the Conference of Ambassadors
● Enforced the treaty of versailles
● Based on a Covenant (26 rules)
○ Article 10: Collective security. 1920-1936

The league and border disputes in the 1920’s:

● Vilna:
○ 1920 Poland took control of the Lithuanian capital Vilna.
○ Lithuania appealed to the League
■ Ruling: France supported Poland
■ Criteria: Self-Interest
● Corfú:
○ After the war the border between Greece and Albania had to be sorted out.
○ The conference of Ambassadors appointed Tellini (Italian general) to
supervise it.
○ On 27 August 1923, Tellini and his team were ambushed and killed in Greece.

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 ○ On 29 August 1923, Mussolini (Italian leader) demanded a pay compensation
and execution of the murderers. (The Greeks didn’t know who were the
murderers)
○ On 31 August 1923, Mussolini occupied the greek island Corfu. (15 killed)
■ Greece appealed to the League for help.
■ As League members were in dispute and there was a danger of war,
they took their dispute to the Council.
○ On 7 September 1923, the Council had prepared its judgement:
■ it condemned Mussolini’s actions.
■ It suggested that Greece should pay compensation, and it would be
held by the League until Tellini’s killers were found, and the money
would go to Italy.
○ However, Mussolini refused to let the matter rest and insisted that this dispute
should be handled by the Council of Ambassadors.
■ Britain did not accept, and was ready to send their forces to Corfu to
remove Mussolini by force.
■ France backed the Italians, mainly because their forces were in the
Ruhr and because they wanted Italy as an ally in case of a second war.
○ The Council of Ambassadors made the final ruling on the dispute.
■ Italian commissioner was the only one that blamed the Greeks
■ However, Greece had to pay compensation to Italy.
○ On 27 September 1923, Mussolini withdrew from Corfu boasting of his
triumph.
*the Geneva protocol 1924
● Bulgaria:
○ On October 1925, Greek troops invaded Bulgaria after some greek soldiers
were killed in the border.
■ Bulgaria appealed to the League for help
■ Gave its army instructions.
○ There was a meeting of the League Council in Paris
■ the League demanded both sides to stand their forces down.
■ the League sent observers to prepare its judgment:

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 ● they were in favor of Bulgaria
● Greece had to pay £ 45,000 in compensation
○ The Greek obayed
○ however they complained that the small states were judged differently from
the large states.
○ Nevertheless this was a major success to the league.
● The Geneva Protocol:
○ On 1924 Britain and France invented the Geneva Protocol.
■ if two members of the League were in a dispute they should appointe
the Council
■ They should accept the Council’s decisions.
○ However, as there was an election in Britain, the new British government
refused to sign the Protocol.
○ This weakened the league.

Successes of the league 1920's:

● The league helped getting refugees and former prisoners back to their homelands.
● Improved Working conditions→ through ILO (International Labour Organization)
● Improved Health issues (diseases, mosquitoes) → through the Health Committee
● Improved Transport

Failures of the league 1920's:

● Disarmament
○ 1921 the USA, Britain, Japan and France agreed on reducing their navies.
○ Germany was angry because they were the only ones who were disarmed.

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 Reduced threat of war:

● The Locarno treaty 1925:

○ Germany is accepted in the League of Nations (promoted trade)
○ Dawes plan. Meant that the payment of the reparations was reduced
○ young Plan. Prolonged payment (in theory) 1955
● Economic recovery:
○ Germany, France and Britain were recovering due to the Dawes Plan from
1924
○ Less tension between these countries → wouldn’t want to go to war.

The league and border disputes in the 1930’s:

The Manchurian crisis:

● problem: Japan invaded Manchuria (northeast China)

● 1931-33
○ Invasion 1, 1931:
■ Chinese attacked a railway in Manchuria that was controlled by the
Japanese.
■ this was an ideal opportunity for Japan, and they used it as an excuse to
invade and set up a government in manchuria.
○ China appeals:
■ China appeals to the league.
■ Japanese said that they were just trying to protect Japan from the state
of anarchy in China.
○ The League investigates:
■ League officials went to manchuria.
■ On September 1932 (1 year later), the League officer presented the
report:
● Japan acted unlawfully.
● Manchuria should return to the Chinese.

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 ○ Invasion 2, 1933:
■ In February 1933, the Japanese announced that they intended to
invade more of China.
■ The Japanese insisted on that this was self defense.
■ On 24 February 1933, the official’s report was accepted by everyone
except from Japan.
■ On 27 February 1933, Japan resigned from the League as a result.
■ A week later it invaded Jehol.
○ The League responds:
■ The League was powerless:
● Economic sanctions: couldn’t be done because the USA was its
main trading partner.
● Remove the Japanese from China by force: Only could be done
by the USA and the USSR, which weren’t members of the
league.
● The league couldn’t agree on banning the arms sales to Japan
● Britain was only interested in keeping a good relationship with
Japan.
● France and Britain were not interested in risking their forces by
going to war with Japan.
○ Consequences:
■ Mussolini and Hitler in only three Years would follow Japan’s
example.
■ Made the league seem ineffective.

Disarmament conference:

● Problem: Germany complained that only it had disarmed

● 1932-34
○ In February 1932 the Disarmament conference got under way.
○ In July 1932 it had produced resolutions to:
■ Prohibit the bombing of civilian populations

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 ■ limit the size of the artillery
■ limit tonnage of tanks
■ prohibit chemical welfare
○ However, there was very little data on how this limits could be achieved.
○ German Disarmament:
■ July 1932:
● Germany proposed that all nations disarmed on its level
● the Conference failed to agree on the principle of equality
● Germany walked out
■ September 1932
● the British sent a note to the Germans agreeing on equality.
● the superior tone of the note made the Germans angry.
■ December 1932
● an agreement was made to treat germany equally
■ January 1933
● Germany came back to the Conference
■ February 1933
● Hitler became Chancellor at the end of January
● Started to rearm secretly.
■ May 1933
● Hitler promised not to rearm Germany if in five years all
nations destroyed their arms.
■ June 1933
● Britain mde a disarmament plan
● It didn’t have support in the conference
■ October 1933
● Hitler withdrew from the Conference and from the League.
● Consequences:
○ By now, all powers knew Germany was rearming.
○ League members didn’t stop it.
○ They started rearming too.
○ The conference ended in 1934

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 ● Reasons for failure:
○ Britain and France didn’t agree.
○ The British allowed Germany to rearm.
○ No one was serious about disarmament.

Abyssinian crisis

● problem: there was a dispute in the wal-wal oasis between Italian and Abyssinian
soldiers. Italy used this as an excuse and invaded Abyssinia.
● 1935-36
○ Phase 1: the League plays for time
■ From January 1935 to October 1935 Mussolini was sending his army
to Africa.
■ However, the British and the French wanted to have a good
relationship with Italy because it would be a good ally against
Germany (It wasn’t)
■ In early 1935 they signed the Stresa Pact:
● formal statement against the German rearmament.
● commitment to stand together against Germany.
● Didn’t talk about Abyssinia.
■ A ballot was taken in 1934-35 by the League of Nations Union in
Britain.
● The majority of British were in favor of using military force to
defend Abyssinia.
■ British politicians began to ‘get tough’
● Hoare made a speech about collective security.
● However, nothing was done against Mussolini
■ On 4 September, 1935 the committee agreed on that neither side was
responsible for the Walwal incident.
■ The league started a plan that would give Mussolini a part of
Abyssinia. He rejected it.
○ Phase 2: sanctions or not?

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 ■ On October 1935, Mussolini launched a full-scale invasion on
Abyssinia
■ The committee was setup to impose sanctions.
● banned arms sale to Italy
● banned Imports from Italy
● Banned the export of rubber tin and metal
● HOWEVER:
● The league didn’t know weather to ban oil exports to Italy:
● Feared USA would not support the sanction
● 30,000 miners were going to lose their jobs in Britain because
they stopped exporting coal to Italy.
● Britain and France didn’t close the Suez Canal to Mussolini’s
supply ships because they were afraid to go to war.
○ The Hoare-Laval Pact:
■ In December 1935, Hoare and laval made a secret plan:
● It stated that they would give two thirds of Abyssinia to Italy in
return for calling off his invasion.
● However the French press got this information.
● Hoare and Laval were sacked
■ In February 1936, the committee concluded that if they did stop oil
sales to Italy, the Italian’s supplies would be over in two months, even
if USA kept selling oil.
■ however it was too late, Mussolini had invaded large parts of
Abyssinia.
■ USA increased the amount of oil sold to Italy.
○ The outcomes
■ 7 march 1936,

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 Wall Street Crash. 2nd October, 1929:
● Historical background:
○ Roaring 20's
○ Growing industries
○ Consumerism
○ The american dream

1928 Hoover is appointed as president (Republican) → Confident

1929 WSC

● Causes of the WSC

○ Speculation
○ Weaknesses in economy:
■ Overproduction in farming
■ Traditional trades failing (coal, textiles)
■ Overproduction of consumer goods (cars)
■ Europe could not afford amernica's surplus products.
● Consequences of the WSC
○ The banking crisis:
■ people stopped trusting banks and withdrew all their money
■ in 1930 the United States bank in New York failed → biggest
failure in US history.
○ The cost of transporting animals was higher than the animals
themselves
○ The human cost:
■ Countryside:
● loss of properties → farmers lived on the road
● hunger and malnutrition
● goods could not be taken to the market → left to rot/ die
● over farming & drought→ dust bowl
■ Towns;
● Unemployment

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 ● Homeless
● hunger and malnutrition
● Hoover's measures
1. Hoover didn't solve anything. Said 'prosperity is just around the corner'
2. Tax cuts and reduced tariffs
3. The Hoover Dam
1932 Franklin D Roosevelt was appointed as president
● Campaign → Promise of a New Deal
● Roosevelt's measures
1. 1932-33 The Hundred days and the New deal
a. The New deal are policies introduced by President FD Roosevelt from 1933
onward to tackle US economy. Most of the new deal was carried out in the
Hundred Days.
b. The Hundred days is the initial period of president FD Roosevelt in 1933 in
which he passed a huge range of measures to help bring economic recovery.
i. The emergency banking act → Closed all banks. Days later he
reopened 5000 trustworthy banks.
ii. Securities exchanged→ regulations that prevented recklessness and
persecution.
iii. Fireside chats→ radio broadcasts
iv. Federal emergency relief administration→ spent $500 million on the
poor.
v. Civilian conservation corps (CCC) → employment. National parks (6
months→ not too much dependency on the state)
vi. Agricultural adjustment administration (AAA) → Reduced
agricultural production so that prices went gradually upwards. It
modernized farming.
vii. National Industrial recovery act (NIRA)
1. Public works administration (PWA) → Jobs. Building schools,
roads, dams, bridges, airports)
2. National recovery administration (NRA) → Improved working
conditions. Outlawed child labour & fair pay.

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 2. 1934 The tennessee valley authority
3. 1935 Second new deal
a. Wagner act → made employers allow trade unions
b. Social Security Act→ State pensions for elderly & widows, sick & disabled.
Unemployment insurance.
c. Works progress administration (WPA) → Brought together the organizations
that created jobs. (Employed 8.5 million up to 1943)
i. Men → Bridges & Roads (Public Works )
ii. Few women → Seamstresses & School Jobs
iii. Artists & Writers → 2500 murals & 17.000 sculptures (For Public
Works)
d. Resettlement Administration (RA) → Better lands and housing for farmers
that weren't helped by the AAA
e. Farm security administration (FSA) → Loans so that farmers could buy land.
Camps with better living conditions for migrant workers.
● Development of roosevelt's measures
○ 1933. Solutions of the New Deal

Problems Solutions Target Aims

Poor living Federal Emergency Relief Administration Really Poor people Political → government
conditions intervention.
Social → help people
Malnutrition & Federal Emergency Relief Administration
starvation

Unemployment Civilian Conservation Corps Workers in the cities → Political → government

NIRA→ Publics Works Organization industries intervention.
Young unemployed Social → promote labour
Economic → fight depression

Poor Working NIRA→ (NRA) National recovery Political → government

conditions administration intervention.
Social → help workers

Inefficient Agricultural Adjustment Administration Farmers Political → government

agriculture intervention.

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 Social → help farmers
Economic → fight depression

Distrust in Emergency Banking Act All americans Political → government

banks intervention.
Social → help people
Economic → fight depression

Distrust in Fireside chats Political → government

government The promised new deal during campaign intervention.
was taken into practice Social → inform people

○ Effect of the New Deal. The first hundred days and the new deal ( promised in
the campaign) created and immediate effect. It restored confidence in the
government and gave hope to American people.
○ May 1935. Issues with the New Deal:
■ The New Deal was not enough → Senator Long
■ The New Deal was too much → Wealthy business sector
■ The USA was recovering more slowly than europe
■ Companies, such as Ford, stopped respecting the NRA → cut wages.
○ 14 May 1935. Solutions of Second new deal

Problems Solutions Targets Aims

Workers with no Wagner Act Industrial workers Political → government

representation intervention
Social→ Help workers

People who Social security act Widows, elderly, sick, Political → government
couldn't have an disabled intervention
income Social→ Help minorities

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 Unemployment Works progress Artists and industrial Political → government
Administration (WPA) workers intervention
Social→ promote labour
Economic → fight
depression.

Poor living and Resettlement administration Farmers Political → government

working conditions (RA) Migrant workers intervention
in Agriculture Farm security administration Social→ helped farmers
(FSA)

● Opposition from the supreme Court → Dominated by Republicans

27 May 1935. Case Study→ The Schechter Poultry Corporation
○ SPC sold chicken to the NRA
○ The chicken was in bad state → the NRA wanted the money Back
○ The supreme court declared the NRA unconstitutional
○ Roosevelt appointed 6 new judges
○ Americans were alarmed → FDR attacking the system
○ FDR backed down
○ The supreme court became less obtrusive → approved of the second new deal

● Verdicts of the New Deal

1937 → Recession . Unemployment
1940 → FDR re elected. Still unemployment and not fully recovered economy.
Was the New Deal a success?

Aims Measures Were they successful?

Political Government intervention Yes

Social ● Promote employment ● There was still unemployment

● Help farmers ● Lynchings weren't outlawed african americans still

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 ● Reduce starvation and poverty suffered from discrimination
● Help minorities ● Few women were in the workforce
● Improve working conditions ● Native americans remained poor and excluded of
● Improve living conditions society

Economic ● Beat the Great depression ● The USA took longer to recover than Europe
● Solve the Banking Crisis ● Only WWII solved unemployment

Case study: Hoover Dam vs. Tennessee Valley authority (TVA)

Name Hoover Dam Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)

Presidency Hoover → 1929 - 1933 FDR → 1933 - 1945

Political Liberalism Government intervention

approach

Location One dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River Construction of a series of dams in the
Border between Nevada and Arizona Tennessee River.
7 states, including Mississippi & Tennessee

Dates 1931 → started construction 1934 → Started Constructing

1936 → functioning

Contractors Six companies corporation (bid $662 million) State through TVA

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Outcomes Opened, worked; though there were some flaws Short term → reduced unemployment (in
the poorest area of USA)

Medium/ long term → biggest public

company that provides hydroelectric power
in America & irrigated dried out lands.

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 Juan Domingo Perón and Argentina

● Historical Background:

19-20 th Century
○ Argentine economy
■ Agriculture → export of food
■ Industry→ meatpacking & refrigerating
■ Import→ manufactured goods
○ Agriculture
■ Arrival of European immigrants→ + agricultural output
■ USA & Europe invested in Argentina.
■ Landowners → Ruling Class

1930-1943
○ Consequences of WSC
■ Deterioration of the terms of trade → Argentina could not buy
manufactured products
■ Política instability → UCR thrown out by the army
○ Local context → The infamous Decade
■ Economy
● developed national industry to substitute imports (ISI)
● attempted to reduce economic dependance
■ Politics
● Banned political parties
● persecution of opposition
● corruption
● Patriotic Fraud
■ Social
● Gaps in social class
● Internal migration
● Poor working conditions
● Elite in power
○ International context
■ fear of communism
■ Fascism, Nazism, nationalism (Italy & Germany)

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 ● Why did perón come to power?

Long term factors Short term factors

Social division What is the GOU?

● Provinces & Bs As The GOU is a secret lodge conformed by some members
○ Railroads only from Bs As of the military with nationalist and catholic ideals.
○ Malnutrition and illiteracy
● Landowners and peasants GOU aims:
Corruption ● Restore Arg Constitution
Lack of democracy ● Anti communism→ Control communism and
workers
● maintain Arg neutral in WWII → Implicit support
to the Axis
● Develop National Industry

● How did Perón come to power? Rise to power

1943. Coup d'État GOU. Perón → Illegal Official in dictatorship (not constitutional)
1. Secretary of labour & welfare (policies page 14)
● Measures
○ More effective than left wing struggle
○ Policies bound to continuity
■ Improvement in labour legislation
■ Paid holidays
■ Representation for workers
■ Increased wages
● Effects→ Popular support
○ Elections 17 October 1945
○ Vote February 1946
2. Minister of war:
● Measures

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 ○ Control over the budget
■ Higher salaries for members of the army
■ More money for equipment
■ More money draft soldiers
○ Control destination of officers → GOU members appointed in
important positions
● Effect → support of the army

3. Vice-president (President E.Farrell)

● Measures
○ Close contact with political organization of the country:
■ Some UCR supported him
■ Good contacts
○ Contact with other countries
○ Support of Military Government for 1946 elections.

● The influences of the Peronist Ideology

○ Influences of the army
■ Travel→ saw inequality
■ Discipline and indoctrination
○ Influences of catholicism
■ The GOU was catholic
■ Help workers and working conditions
○ Contemporary ideologies
■ nationalism
■ fascism- nazism
■ control of masses
● The peronist ideology→ three principles

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Social justice→ Integration of Economic independence → An appeal to Political sovereignty → The role of
the working classes nationalist elements the state in society

● Distribution of wealth ● Prevent crisis ● The state above all social

● Avoid gaps in social ● Protectionism & nationalism → classes
classes Centralize economic activity in the ● Interfere in social and
hand of the state economic developments to
achieve the aims of the
country

● 17 October 1945
12 October 1945
○ Demonstration against Farrell & the dictatorship → elections
○ Opposition to Perón → Arrest Perón → Arrested in the Military hospital
(Martín García)

People's point of view

CGT announced a strike for 18 October 1945
17 October 1945
○ Workers abandoned their work posts
○ 'Descamisados' → not forman wear
○ March to the 'Casa Rosada' → Release the colonel of the people

Peron's point of view

17 October 1945
○ Peron was taken from the Military Hospital to the 'Casa de Gobierno'
■ Farrell asked him: What are we supposed to do?
■ Perón said: Call elections. The provisional government 'Ya a cumplido
su misión'.
○ Perón went out the balcony to appease the multitudes and gave his 17 of
October sepeach.

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 ● Road to elections
○ Support
■ Peron was candidate for president in the Labour party
■ Obtained support of the UCR JR & trade unions
○ Opposition
■ UD
● communist
● socialist
● Part of the UCR
■ Lacked popular appeal

Labour party UCR JR UCR

Unión Cívica Radical Junta Unión Cívica Radical
Renovadora

Creation 1945 1945 26 de junio de 1891

Representation Workers (Present the 17 of UCR Supporters of Perón Landowners, Industrialists,

October) Businessmen, Middle class

Position in Campaign for the presidency → Supported Perón UD (Democratic Union) →

1946
named Perón as a candidate Fue disuelto en 1947 para Tamborini
integrarse al PJ Opposition to Perón in 1946

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 1946 elections. Perón was appointed as president (1946-1955)
55% of votes
● Consolidation of power
1. Merger of all forces that supported him → PUR → PJ

Supporters of Perón before 1946 1946

Labour party UCR JR FORJA GOU PUR → PJ

Fuerza de Orientación Radical Grupo de Oficiales
de la Joven Argentina Unidos Partido Único de la Revolución-
Partido Justicialista

What Political Party Political Party Political Group Secret Lodge Labour party, UCR JR,
FORJA, GOU

When 1945 1945 1935 1943 1946

Who Represented Represented UCR Influence of the UCR Members of the Supporters of Perón
workers supporters of Perón military

○ PUR → PJ → Personally controlled by Perón

■ Representatives obeyed him
■ “Party Discipline”
○ State apparatus members of PUR
2. Appointed candidates for governor, deputy & senator
○ Opposition→ Cipriano Reyes (Deputy -leader of Labour Party)
■ Tortured
■ Imprisoned (From 1948 to 1955)
3. Disciplined Trade unions→ all joined CGT
○ Opposition → Luis Gay (President Labour Party- Secretary General CGT)
■ Removed from CGT 1947

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 ● Perón's Measures
Political ○ State apparatus was control of Perón
Policies
■ centralized decisions & policy implementation
to achieve
political ■ The opposition had a poor voice in the parliament
sovereignty.
○ Restriction of political opposition
■ Little access to the press & media
■ Meetings disbanded by police
■ Anti peronist radical leaders → expelled & imprisoned
■ New supreme court Judges → The court was peronalized
○ Restriction of freedom of press
■ Secretariat of Information
● Controlled the output of journalists
● Censored newspapers (La vanguardia)
● Limited paper supply (La Nación, La prensa)
■ The government bought newspapers, magazines & radio stations → Political
propaganda
○ Restriction of freedom of expression
■ any strike that the government declared illegal were punished.
1948 Parliamentary elections
○ What happened?
■ Peronists won 62% → majority in parliament
■ Peron called for a Constituent Assembly → reform the constitution
○ Peróns Aim → to continue his reforms through legal means
○ Why did the Peronist win?
■ Little opposition
■ People enjoyed the social and economic benefits
1949 The 1949 Constitution (Last Constitution 1853)
○ Aims
■ Government intervention
■ Nationalism
■ The commonwealth is more important than the individual

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 ■ Judicial system → When in doubt supported the worker
■ New social rights
○ Measures
■ Re-election → Article 77 to allow the President to stand for immediate re-election.
■ Family→ Protect Marriage & Elderly, Assist mothers & children → Catholic
■ Public services nationalized → buy or expropriate
■ All sources of energy nationalized (Eg. oil, gas)
■ Control of private property → Redistribution of land
■ The state had a right to intervene in economic areas (Eg. foreign trade. Imports,
exports, fix prices)

Social Policies ● Problems before Peron

to achieve ○ Social Division (BS AS- provinces & Rich- poor)
Social Justice ○ Social help came from charities
○ Trade unions had limited support from the state.
● Aim → centralize social policies
○ Trade unions opposed→ FEP (Fundacion Eva Perón)
■ It did not belong to the government
■ Not charity
■ Measures :
Welfare of Children Recreation:
"Los únicos ● República De los niños
privilegiados son los ● Hotels in Chapadmalal
niños" Orphanages
Modern technology in education

Welfare of Elderly Elderly homes

Workers Housing:
● neighbourhoods m ‘JDP’ “EP”= savedra
● Villa pueyrredón
Workers resort
Training in skills

Health Nursing school

Sanitary train
Modern technology in hospitals
○ Women
■ Problems before Perón

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 ● Women could not vote
● Exploitation at work → inequality
● 60% of women did not work
1947 women were granted the right to vote
■ Aims
● Mothers → bring Peronism into home
● Support in 1951 elections (64% of Women elected Perón as president)
1949 Eva Perón created the PPF (Partido Peronista Femenino)
■ Aim
● Improve political and social status of women
● Catholicism & traditional values → no campaign for workforce
■ Outcome
● Women's status improved
● The role of women stayed the same
■ Ideal of Women → Eva Perón
● Cult of personality
○ 'Lady of Hope'
○ 'Mother of the innocent'
○ 'The spiritual leader of the nation'
● Publicly subordinated herself to Perón.
○ Education
■ Before perón
● Poor access in interior provinces → Few educational facilities
● Lack of $
● Education under state control
● Free & compulsory primary school
■ Aims
● Centrally planned & organized education system
● 'New Argentina' → new educational system
● + budget toward education
● Heightened levels of education
■ Measures
● Access to education
○ Expand schools → pupils
○ + schools
○ free transport
○ free meals
○ scholarships
○ schools for adults

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 ○ Public universities became free
● Ideas taught
○ New textbooks
■ National anthem
■ 1949 constitution
■ 17 of October 1945 → 'People's loyalty day'
■ la razón de mi vida
○ Indoctrination of students
■ '“politización” de la infancia'
■ Inculcate the personality cult
○ Teachers
■ Political indoctrination of teachers
■ Purge of anti peronistas

● Collateral social improvement

○ Better living and working conditions of workers → send their
children to school.
○ More teachers → more jobs

Economic ○ Aims:
policies to ■ Government intervention
achieve ■ Nationalism
economic
independence. ● Autarky → self-sufficiency
● Nationalization of foreign companies
● Development of national industries
■ repatriation of foreign debt
■ Increase employment
■ Protectionism
○ Measures
■ Industrialization→ protectionist measures such as restrictions of imports.
■ State subsidies for development of new industries.
■ Nationalization of all railroads, gas companies and power plants.
■ Nationalization of river and air transportation
■ IAPI→ State control of exports the state bought directly from the producers at a fixed
price and sold the products in foreign markets at international prices with significant
profit.
■ State control of imports.
■ State control of currency exchange.
■ Nationalization of the Central Bank of Argentina→ policies that all banks in the country
had to follow.

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1946-1948 economic success
○ Expanded construction industry
○ + agricultural exports
○ + equipment for industrialization
○ Better living standards for the working class
○ 1948 Industry > Agriculture
1949- 1951 economic problems
○ Failure in industries
■ Causes
● Perón wanted to keep the purchasing power of the working class high.
○ He increased salaries of workers
○ Forced low prices
■ Price control
■ Reevaluating the currency
■ Consequences
● Increase of salaries → producers’ costs up
● Forced low prices → stopped producing or sell on the black market
● Reevaluation of currency → Argentine products became more expensive. Imports
were cheaper.
○ Failure in agriculture
■ Causes
● Control of exports (IAPI)
● The revaluation of the peso and high levels of taxation
■ Consequences
● Decrease in agricultural production → Less money for industrial growth
● + Inflation→ government to review its public spending levels.
○ Failure in national companies
■ Causes: Lost money
■ Consequences: Increased state expenditure
1951 economy under review
○ Economic failure led to new economic policies (pragmatism)
■ Flexible export regulations in agriculture
■ Attract foreign investments (Us exploitation of Arg Subsoil)
○ Consequences
■ Failed autarky and nationalism. No "Economic Independence"
■ The opposition: "Foreign investment ≠ 1949 constitution"
○ Peron's miscalculations
■ Wartime profits spent in the nationalization of companies
■ Europe's early recovery

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 ■ No WWIII

Arts & Media ○ Aim→ Promoted 'National Art'

■ National culture
● Argentine traditions
● Peronist values
■ Political sovereignty → Arts coordinated by government institutions
○ Measures
■ Half the music played had to be Argentinian
■ Boom in cinema late 40's & 50's
● Film industry workers & actors → unionized
● State provided subsides & loans
● Eg. MDQ 1954 (Used to be an oligarchy vacation spot)
■ Restricted freedom of expression → Censorship
● Anti-peronists banned
● Government cut film
● 'Self censorship' → artists were careful when creating content
● Eg. Anti-peronist film: 'Deshonra' (1952) → Argentina as a prisión

Political ○ Aim
Propaganda ■ Illustrate the success of the regime
■ Promote peronist values
○ Measures
■ Radio
● Opposition had little access
● Peron's speeches
■ Political propaganda in cinemas→ Newsreels
■ Mass Rallies (1 May, 17 October)
● "Compañeros"
● JDP: Do you like my government?/ People: "Yes, mi general"

The rise of opposition, and the fall and return of perón.

● Opostion:
○ middle class
○ landowners
○ business owners
○ anti - peronists
■ artists
■ teachers

27
 ○ Some armed forces
○ Church
● What increased opposition after 1951?
○ Persecution
○ no freedom of speech
○ reinforcement of cult of personality
○ Eva as vice president→ opposition of traditionalists→ stepped down
1951 General Menéndez Coup d'etat
○ 'Internal state of war' → More control
■ suspended constitutional freedoms
■ more power for peron
26 July 1952 Death of eva perón
○ Cult of Eva Irritated:
■ the Church
■ Traditional sectors of armed forces
○ Control of opposition
■ Priests imprisoned
■ Catholic newspapers banned
● Increased violence and fall of Perón
April 1953 CGT demonstration in Support of Perón
○ Bomb during demonstration
○ Peronist extremis attacked the Jockey Club
June 1955 Corpus Christi Day
○ Catholics accused of burning the argentine flag
○ Catholics accused the police
○ The navy and the air force bombarded the surrounding of the presidential
palace
○ Peronits set Churches on fire
○ Perón offered his resignation
■ Military man → refused to move against armed forces
■ Wanted to keep the support of the peronist armed forces sector
■ Wanted to avoid civil war. Peronist vs Anti-Peronists
○ Opposition rejected
31 August 1955 CGT demonstration in Support of Perón → "To violence we will reply with
greater violence"
16 september 1955 Revolución libertadora
○ Confrontation between peronists and armed forces
○ Military junta took over the government
○ Perón went into exile

28
 The Weimar Republic
● Historical Background:

1914 WWI
○ Proud nationalist society
○ Kaiser → achievements
○ Prosperity in businesses
○ Powerful army
1918 end of WWI
○ Economic impact → virtually bankrupt
■ low national income
■ withows and orfants → ⅓ of national income war pensions
■ few natural resources → little food & little energy
■ low national production
○ Social impact → social division
■ social gaps
■ Powerful army defeated → desilusiones soldiers
■ mad at losing the war
■ flu epidemic
■ lack of food → hunger
○ Political impact→ unstable democracy
■ Communism vs autocracy
■ Opposition wanted the Kaiser instead of ebert (Socialist party)
● The birth of the Weimar republic
○ Transitions to democracy:
■ Allies imposed conditions → abdication of Kaiser
■ The kaiser refused
● Northern sailors mutinies
● Socialists led uprisings
9 November 1918 The Kaiser abdicated.
10 November 1918 Ebert new leader of Republic of germany

29
 ○ Initial measures
■ armistice with allies
■ freedom of speech and freedom of expression
■ new constitution
● Article 48 → emergency power to the chancellor
● Proportional representation in the Reichstag
January 1919 Elections social democratic party (SPD) Ebert was elected as president.
● Reactions to democracy under Ebert

Threat from the left

Party Communist Party→ "Spartacists" Communist party

Leaders Rosa Luxemburg & Karl Liebknecht -

Supporters Communists The communists in Babaria Communists

Some rebel soldiers and sailors

Goals Wanted a Germany ruled by workers (soviets)

Actions First Putsch Second Putsch Third Putsch

January 5, 1919 rebellion February 1919 Bavaria leader 1920 Communist agitation in
Ebert made an agreement with the (Eisner) killed the Ruhr
Freikorps Communists started their rebellion Stopped by police, army.
The rebellion was put down Ebert (Eisner ally) called the
Luxemburg & Liebknecht killed Freikorps
May 1919 600 communists killed

30
 Threat from the right

Party Freikorps Nazi

Leaders Wolfgang Kapp Adolf Hitler

Supporters ex-soldiers workers

hated the treaty of versailles traditionalists & nationalists
hates the treaty of versailles

Goals Strong army Nationalism & traditionalism. Anti communist

Autocracy → Kaiser taking over the government of Bavaria

Actions Kapp Putsch Munich Putsch

March 1920 Kapp led 5,000 freikorps into Berlin November 1923 Hitler and the SA took over a
The army refused to fight their ex comrades government meeting
The industrial workers help ebert with a general strike: The police killed 16 Nazis
● No transport Hitler escaped
● No water Trail
● No food
Kapp died before trial

○ The treaty of versailles → external pressure

May 1919 conditions of the treaty of versailles were announced
■ Germany had no representation in the creation of the treaty
■ Conditions. germany lost:
● 10% of its land
● all of its colonies
● 12.5 % of population
● 16 % of coal industry & 48% of iron industry
● reduced army to 100.000 men
● no airforce
● 6 warships
● war guilt & reparations

31
 ■ Reaction of Germans:

Socio-Political consequences of the treaty Economic consequences of the treaty

● Ebert had no choice but to sign the treaty ● After the war there was a very low national
● Psychological impact→ War guilt: Shame & Hate income
● Weimar's Supporters ● Reparations $6.600 million
○ felt betrayed by allies ● Germans couldn't rebuild their economy
○ It was the Kaiser's responsibility ● Inflation
● Weimar's Opponents ● The Ruhr→ Hyperinflation
○ The november criminals had stabbed Germany
in the back
○ Hitler & Mein kampf → The resentment of the
treaty triggered nationalism

○ The Ruhr
1921 First installment $50. Payed
1922 Second installment. Not Payed
1923 France and Bulgaria invaded the Ruhr and took coal as a source of payment
■ German workers refused to work→ passive resistance
■ The french brought their own workers, killed and expelled germans
■ Collapse in Germany's currency → Hyperinflation
○ Hyperinflation 1923

Economic impact Social Impact Political impact

■ The government printed money → ■ Mostly affected → fixed income ■ 1923 Munich Putsch →
money became worthless ● pensioners Nazis
■ Workers were paid daily ● students ■ Weimar lost support of the
● disabled war veterans
■ Money had to be carried in ● teachers & civil servants middle classes
wheelbarrows
■ Loaf of bread ■ Least affected

● 1918= 0.63 marks ● farmers → had food

● small business owners
● 1923= 201.000.000.000 marks
● workers in good trade unions→
(sometimes $ x2 a day)

32
 ● The 'Golden years':
August 1923 Gustav Stresemann was appointed as chancellor
○ Stresemann's achievements
Political Economic Social

The grand coalition→ political Better because of the locarno treaty Public works→ apartments, opera
parties worked together Called of passive resistance in the Ruhr houses, stadiums
Stable politics Created a new currency → Rentenmark Unemployment insurance
then Reichsmark Better wages
Growth of industry like before the war Better standards of living
New american tecnology
+ exports

Culture Foreign policy

Freedom of expression The Locarno treaty (Dawes plan & Young Plan)
+ writers & poets improved international relations
Artists represented day to day life. George Grosz ● August 1926 Germany was accepted in the
● Criticised politicians, businesses church, army League of Nations
leaders ● 1927 the Allies reduced the militarization of the
● traumatised soldiers of WWI Rhineland
Bauhaus → architecture. Kandinsky
Golden age → cinema. Marlene Dietrich (Poster boobs)
Cabaret artists
● sang song criticizing politicians
● songs about sex

33
 ○ Stresemann's failures
Political Economic & social

30% of the votes went to parties against the republic Japan new competitor x exports
Nazis & communist parties growing Winners
1926 the german people appointed Hindenburg as ● big businesses (steel & chemicals)
president ● workers in big industries (representation with trade
● Kiserist unions
● did not want democracy ● landowners (in cities)
Loosers
● farmers
○ overproduction
○ no modernization → not competitive
○ supported the nazis in 1928
● Mittelstand & small businesses
○ threatened supported the nazis in 1928

Culture Foreign policy

Traditionalists thought culture had a moral decline Locarno Pact brought internal conflict
Bauhaus design college forced out of Weimar (Dessau) ● Nationalists complained the accepted the treaty of
Wandervogel → simple country values versailles
● Communists said the treaty was a plot against the
USSR

○ Women & Jews in the 20's

■ Women→ "All germans are equal before the law"
1920 111 women were elected in the Reichstag
■ The 'New Woman' (Cinema from the USA) → Clean home, worked,
glamorus
● Criticizes by traditionalist
● Welcomed by some women
● a burden for other women

34
■ Jews→ Benefited from the social right of the weimar constitution
● Middle class (Doctors & lawyers)
● Pre existing anti-semitism
● New nationalist parties → anti-semitism

35
 Germany under Hitler
1919 locksmith Anton Drexler created the Nazi Party
September 1919 Hitler joined the Nazzi party

● Hitler's role in the party

○ He became in charge of propaganda and the political ideals
○ Helped to draw up the '25 points' --> anti-semitism & nationalism
1920 Hitler removed Drexler as leader
○ He made scapegoats to blame for Germany's problems
■ The Allies
■ The versailles treaty
■ the 'November criminals' (Ebert)
■ The communists
■ The Jews
○ He created the Nazi flag → swastika
1921 He created the SA to combat disruptive opponents in his successful meetings & disrupt
other party's meetings
○ The munich Putsch
November 1923 Hitler, the SA and Ludendorff took over a government meeting in Bavaria
■ The police killed 16 Nazis. Others imprisoned.
■ Hitler escaped
■ Trail → publicity for Hitler and his ideas
● Impressed Judges→ only five years of prison (vs life sentence)
● He ended up spending 9 months in a castle→ H had sympathy
and support from key figures in the legal system
● Because of Ludendorff → support of the army

36
 ● The Nazis on the wilderness (1924-1929)
○ Prison → Mein Kampf
■ Get to power through democracy not violence
May 1924 won 32 seats in the Reichstag
● Hitler failed to win over industrial workers
○ Elected the democratic party (spad)
○ Workers were doing well
1928 only 12 seats in the reichstag
● Hitler gained more support from peasants and middle classes
(shop owners) → were not doing well. 35% of the population
○ Peasants are the pure race
○ H promised agricultural development
○ Contrasted the 'clean' life of peasants vs the 'immoral'
life in the cities→ Jew's fault
■ Increase membership and expand geographical base
● Copied the communists→ youth organizations & recruitment
drives
● He enlarged the SA
● Created the SS (bodyguards)
● Joseph Goebbels→ propaganda
■ Domination of the Fuhrer → Refused sharing decision making

37
 ● The depression and the rise of the Nazis
1929 the WSC
○ economic collapse
■ Businesses bankrupt
■ unemployment
○ The nazi ideas
■ Insensitive government → Germany needs a strong leader
■ problems because of reparations → abolish the treaty of versailles
■ unemployment → join the army and create infrastructure
1930 107 seats in the reichstag (Second biggest party)
○ Reasons for Nazi Success in the reichstag
1. The wall street Crash
2. Nazi campaigning
■ H was a powerful speaker
■ films, records, and radio
■ rallies → enthusiasm order and discipline
■ ss, sa → discipline and order
■ soup kitchens & shelter for unemployed
3. Negative cohesión
■ Attracted people from the hatred of the scapegoats
4. disillusionment with democracy
5. The communist threat
■ 'Fear of communism'
■ Businesses feared government intervention
■ farmers feared the expropriation of land (like in the USSR)
6. Decadence
■ morale
■ decadence of traditional values

38
 ○ Hitler becomes chancellor
July 1932 Reichstag elections
■ Nazi's were the largest single party, but not majority
■ Hitler demanded being chancellor to hindenburg → he refused
■ Von papen continued → no support, reichstag election
November 1932 Reichstag elections
■ Largest party→ however, their share of votes fell
■ Nazis were running out of funds
December 1932 Hindenburg refused to appoint hitler as chancellor
■ Kurt von Schleicher→ a month later he resigned
■ Proportionate representation introduced by the weimar constitution
was failing
■ Hindenburg had overthrown democracy using his emergency powers
■ To restore and rescue the democratic system he needed a chancellor
with support in the reichstag
January 1933 secret meeting Hindenburg, von Papen with industrialists, politicians and
army leaders
January 30 1933 Hitler was appointed as chancellor
■ They thought they could control H
● Few nazis in the cabinet
● Von papen vice chancellor
■ They were wrong

○ Consolidation of power
1. The reichstag fire
■ Hitler as chancellor wanted a Nazi takeover in germany
● political propaganda using the state media
27 February 1933 Reichstag fire
● Hitler blamed the communists (an attempted uprising)
● Hindenburg gave Hitler emergency powers
○ arrested communists
○ frightened voters

39
 ○ broke up meetings
March 1933 new Reichstag elections → to get majority
● Won their largest share of votes
2. The enabling act
■ SA & SS intimidated the Reichstag and allowed H to pass the
Enabling Act
■ pass laws without consulting the Reichstag → H virtual dictator
● communists banned
● the church supported the nazis
3. The night of the long knives
■ Opposition
● Left Germany
● taken by the SS to concentration camps
■ Suspicion or Ernst Rohm (SA leader) → H & the Army
20 & 30 June 1934 the night of the long knives
■ Purge of Ernst Rohm and other 400 SA leaders
● Hindenburg Thanked H
● The army was finally satisfied
● The SA became subordinate to the SS. Some members
absorbed by army & SS
4. August 1934 Hindenburg dies → Hitler takes over as Supreme leader (Führer)
5. The Army Oath
2 August 1934 the entire army swore an oath of personal loyalty to Adolf Hitler as Führer of
Germany
■ Army→ stayed out of politics & served H
■ Hitler→ rearmament & conscription

40
 ● The use of force in the regime

The Police State

The Gestapo The Police and the Courts Concentration Camps The SS

● Secret state police Police 1933 1st Concentration 1925→ fanatic loyals to H
● Feared by ordinary ● Reported to Himmler camps 1934→ dissolved SA
citizens ● Nazis in top jobs ● temporary prisons ● Led by Heinrich Himmler
● Led by Reinhard Dietrich ● ignored nazi's crimes ● Warehouses, abandoned ● destroyed opposition
● Arrested citizens, sent Courts factories ● racial policies
them to concentration ● Controlled by Nazis Late 1930's → purpose ● Subdivisions
camps without trial. ● Unfair to opponents built ○ Death Head units
● Helped Goebbels control ● ignored nazi's crimes ● isolated in rural areas Concentration camps
opposition ● Run by SS Death's Head Slaughter of Jews
units ○ Waffen SS
● Prisoners fought alongside the regular
○ hard labour army
○ limited food ● Helped Goebbels control
○ beatings & executions opposition

41
 ● Social policies

Propaganda, culture and mass media→Joseph Goebbels (G) → limited opposition

The Nuremberg rallies The media Culture

Yearly summer Rally No freedom of expression unlike Weimar

● Marches ● Newspaper ● Books
● flying displays ○ were only printed with G's approval ○ were only Published with G's
approval
● H's speeches ○ Jewish editors and journalists banned ○ 1933 he burnt books ≠ ideas
● bands ○ Anti-Nazi newspapers banned ● Artists
impact on the people ○ Boring→ circulation fell by 10% ○ were only produced with G's
● excitement approval
● Radio broadcasting
○ Aryan heroes & Aryan families
● sense of belonging ○ Spread the Nazi message ● Cinema
● show the power of the state ○ Cheap Radios→ everyone bought 1 ○ Controlled by G
● everybody is Nazi ○ All films carried a Pro-Nazi
○ Controlled the Radio stations
message
● emphasised order ○ Loudspeakers in streets and in bars ○ Foreign films censored
○ Political propaganda in
newsreels
● Jazz Music
○ Banned→ Blacks, inferior race

○ Case study: The 1936 Olympics

Propaganda opportunity Foreign reaction Results

● portray aryan superiority ● USA pressure → Jew in one ● Germany on top of the medal table
● Star Jesse Owens → Black runner
● Success of Germany team
● Modern, civilized & successful ● Visitors during the game.
○ Eg. Stadium Appalled at
■ 100,000 people ○ H's devotion
■ modern lighting ○ many SS & army
■ televisión ○ Blatant propaganda
■ photo- electroni

42
 Youth→ Indoctrination Women

■ Education → Nationalism, ■ 'The traditional balance' → Support for

anti semitism & brainwashing women in the countryside and small
● Made children nazi loyal towns
● The Fuhrer is right & good ● Women's role → Limited
● History ○ Wife and mother
○ Germany was 'stabbed in the back' ○ Headline: 'No true german woman wears
○ Anti semitism Jews stole German's trousers'
profits ○ Resentment & discrimination towards working
● Biology women → keeping men out of jobs
○ Aryan superiority ○ Women stayed at home taking care of the
■ Hitler youth (HY) & League family
of German Maidens (GM) ● Men's role
● Parched in parades ○ worked
● Physically fit ○ Nazi→ Male dominated organization
● Summer camps ■ Falling Birth rates → Aryan families
○ Camping outdoors encouraged
○ HY → cleaned rifles ● Financial incentives → > 4 children
● GM ● Gold cross & privilege seat in Nazi meetings→ 8
○ good physical health children
○ housekeeping skills ● Posters, radio, newsreels→ motherhood &
■ Confusion at home homebuilding
● Private opposition of families ≠ what ■ Prominent women → Gertrud
children were taught Scholtz-Klink
● Head of the Nazi Women's Bureau
● Excluded from important decisions
■ Impact of war
Late 1930's few unemployed men → needed working women
● Women struggled with work & home responsibilities
1942-45 (crisis & war effort) Nazi insisted on traditional
stereotypes → women not work in the armed forces

43
 Nazi Workers Farmers Big businesses & middle
classes
Relevance Loyalty of workers needed to Main support group in H's rise to
to H
make the German Empire power

Beneficial Propaganda praised workers Reich Food estate Elimination of communist

Measures
Strength through joy → $ benefits ● Boards to buy agricultural threat
Beauty of labour→ Better working production Order for germany
conditions ● Distribution across Germany Big businesses→ no trade
Volkswagen Beetle 'People's Car' Reich entitle Farm Law union strikes
● State protection of farms
● Racial aim→ 'Blood and Soil'
(Farmers true germans)

Restrictions Trade Unions Banned → General Reich Food estate→ limitation to Small shops :( → department
labour front efficient farmers stores not closed
● Controlled workers Reich entitle Farm Law
● No strikes ● eldest son got farm→ rural
● No wage rise depopulation
● Banks would not lent money

○ Volksgemeinschaft
■ All Aryan germans are part of National Community
■ No social division

44
 ● Economic policies
1933 5 million people were unemployed
○ Economist Dr Hjalmar Schacht organized finances to find The National
Labour Service
■ Public works
■ Motorways & autobahns
■ Railway extention
■ House building
○ Rearmament→ employment & national pride
1935 opened conscription
■ Jobs in the army
■ Jobs to provide the army (miners, engineers, designers, etc…)
1936 4-year plan to get germany ready x war

● Dealing with more Oppostion

1. The Relationship with the Church
At first positive
1933 Concordat with the catholic Church
■ Church control of schools
■ Church out of politics
Then negative
○ Reich church→ all of the protestant churches together
■ Leader→ Bishop Ludwig Müller
■ Germans still wanted their original churches
○ Alternative pagan German faith
1941 Catholic Bishop Galen protest against the Nazis
■ Criticized the nazis during the 30's
■ Protested against Nazi policies killing mentally ill and physically
disabled
■ Strong support→ Nazis did not stop him
○ Protestant Ministers resisted the Nazis
■ Niemoller→ criticized the nazis during the 30's
■ Bonhoeffer → alternative protestant Church to the Reich Church
○ Consequences
■ Niemoller→ 1938-1945 Concentration camp
■ Bonhoeffer → 1937 Stopped by Gestapo. Killed in 1942

45
 2. Persecution of minorities→ Aryan Superiority

Who? Why? Measures

Gypsies Were considered inferior ⅚ Gypsies were killed → No outcry

Homosexuals Threat to traditional family life

Purge, taken to concentration camps→ No outcry
Prostitutes, alcoholics, Were considered immoral &
homeless, criminals & inferior
beggars

Mentally & Physically Threat to the 'perfect race' Sterilization forced in 300,000 families hereditary illnesses
handicapped Euthanasia program killed 5,000 mentally handicapped
children & babies
● starvation
● Injection
72,000 mentally ill gasses → Public outcry

Jews Context before H 1933 Jews banned from Civil Service and Public services
Marginalized in all europe Marked with the ✡ → People stopped buying in their shops

● Religious persecutions 1935 Nuremberg Laws

● Success (good Jew's citizenship was removed
education→ jobs) Forbidden to marry or have sex with a pure german

Goebbels→ Anti semitism with propaganda

Hitler in the 20's Adult Jews → refused from jobs & shops
Hated jews that has successful Children jews→ segregated in school

businesses in Vienna
Kristallnacht- The night of the broken glass
Offended the idea of Aryan 1938 young jew killed a German diplomat in Paris
superiority SS (Dressed as civils) with hammers
● vandalized Jew's shops
Blamed jews for WWI
● killed 91 Jews
H said it was "spontaneous reaction from ordinary
Germans"
● No One believed this → no outcry
● The few who protested killed

46
 ○ Why was there little opposition?
■ No political freedom → TERROR
■ No political freedom in exchange for Nazi success
● Work → economic recovery
● Strong government→ discipline & traditional values
● Foreign policy → Power after the humiliation of WWI
■ No political freedom because of Economic Fears
● Lose your job
● Businesses could go bankrupt
■ Propaganda → no info about negative things
● The impact of WWII
1930's H fulfilled his promises. At the cost of war→ People weren't enthusiastic (They
remembered WWI)
■ Reverse the treaty of versailles
■ rebuild armed forces
■ unite austria & germany
■ expand territory to eastern europe
Late 1939 Rationing of food & clothes
○ People supported H because Germany was winning the war
1941 Invasion of USSR → very expensive
○ The human cost. Civilians…
■ cut heating
■ work longer hs
■ recicle rubbish
○ Political Propaganda by Goebbels
■ + censorship
■ Sacrifice for Germany
○ Hitler was very preoccupied with the war
■ Stopped appearing in public
■ Goebbels broadcasted his old speeches
1942 'The final solution' → Mass killing of Jews
○ Albert speer became in charge of the economy

47
 ■ focused on the war effort
■ entertainment was closed (Except cinemas→ newsreels propaganda)
■ Many women joined the workforce
○ Defeat looming. Civilians…
■ little supported the Nazis
● no rallies
● No salute
■ Stopped declaring food
20 July 1944 The July bomb plot. Opposition of the army.
■ What?→ Colonel von Stauffenberg left a bomb in H's conference
room to kill him
■ Why? → Hitler is taking germany to the rouin. Stauffenberg wanted to
end the war
■ Outcome→ He failed. Hitler survived.
■ Consequences → H killed 5,000 🚹
○ The bombing of Dresden
1942 Allies decided to bombard Germany to weaken industry & civilian support
February 1945 Bombing of Dresden (Killed between 35.000 & 150.000)
1945 The end of the war
○ 3.5 million german civilians killed
○ Short food supply
○ Hitler & other officials killed themselves
○ Germany divided between allies.
● WWII & young people. Opposition of Youth.
○ The 'Swing' movement
■ Who? → middle class teens
■ What? → Parties, English & American music, accepted Jews, Talked
about Sex
■ Outcome → handbook to help authorities identify them
○ The Edelweiss Pirates
■ Who? → Working class teens
■ What? → Campings, Mocked germans songs, sex.

48
 ■ Outcome→ arrested or ignored
■ 1944 Pirates helped prisoners escape, took armaments, attacked the
Gestapo → 12 Publicly hanged.
● WWII & the Jews. Persecution of jews
○ The Ghettos
■ Defeat of poland
■ Polish Jews sent to ghettos (sealed areas)
● Able-bodied → worked
● Young, sick, elderly → killed
○ Mass Murder
■ Invasion of USSR
■ 3 million russian Jews + Jews from other nationalities → Mass
shootings
○ The 'Final Solution' to the 'Jewish Question'
■ Wannsee Conference→ Himmler in charge of the systematic killing of
Jews
■ Slave labour & death camps → Auschwitz, Treblinka, Chelmno built
● Young, sick, elderly → killed
● Able-bodied → worked & used for medical experiments
● Prisiones worked to death, gassed or shot
○ Resistance
■ Many Jews could escape before the killings
■ Some jews hid
■ There were Jewish resistance troops

49
 Fidel Castro and Cuba
Section 1.

● Origins and nature of authoritarian and single- party states –

Cuba. Background

○ Cuban independence
■ Treaty of Paris (USA & Spain)→ lost sovereignty over Puerto Rico,
Guam and the Philippines to the USA in exchange for money.
■ Spanish-American War (Cuba & Spain)→ lost sovereignty over Cuba
1898
● Cuba was placed under military occupation by the USA for five
years.
● In 1902, the Republic of Cuba was declared.
○ The Platt Amendment annexed to the Cuban
constitution→ Cuba was not fully sovereign: USA kept
the right to intervene in finances and foreign relations.
■ Preventing the influence of third-party countries
in Cuba.
■ Guaranteeing US control of Cuban affairs.
■ Protecting US economic interests on the island.

○ Economic and social aspects:

■ The USA’s interests in Cuba were protected by policies that benefited
their investments in the island.
■ Cuba was a monoculture economy: Sugar→ provided the most
important income for the republic (Although it also produced tobacco,
coffee and rice.).
● Cuba sold a high percentage of sugar at a high price to USA
● Cuba was to give preferential access to American products.
● Cuban economy was tied to the USA→ Cuba was not
industrialized and depended US investment and the revenues
from exported sugar to...
■ buy manufactured goods and oil.
■ develop service and utility industries, such as
gas, electricity, communications, railways and
the banking system.

50
 ○ Political aspects
■ Between independence (1898) and revolution (1953), Cuba was led by
a series of governments that:
● showed high levels of corruption
● limited success in solving economic problems and social
inequality.
■ 1934: the armed forces under the command of General Fulgencio
Batista controlled the nation by the appointment of puppet
Presidents.
■ 1940: Batista became President of Cuba and ruled until 1944.
■ 1944-52: there was a return to democracy, but with corruption,
inflation and unemployment.
■ 10 March 1952: Batista overthrew President Carlos Prío Socarrás and
suspended the constitution to rule as a dictator.

○ The rule of Fulgencio Batista (1952-59)

■ Political corruption and economic problems worsened, social and
political unrest developed. Batista used repression to maintain control
of the country.
● Cuban economy worsened → decline in sugar prices on the
international sugar market.
○ ‘deterioration of the terms of trade’1 → rise in the cost
of imports
■ shortages and inflation
○ the rise in the price of oil
■ affected transportation
■ the operation of sugar mills
■ increased unemployment 17% and 13% level
of underemployment and low wages for those
who were employed.
○ Cuba could not develop an industry to substitute its
imports because of its international obligations with the
USA
■ Opposition to dictatorship intensified: not organized and had not yet
found a leading figure.
● The rural workers, poorly housed and undereducated.
● Urban workers were affected by the economic problems of
inflation and unemployment
● Student unions demanded freedom and democracy.

1
Relationship between the prices at which a country sells its exports and the prices paid for its imports.

51
 ● The higher social classes, who were losing their purchasing
power and whose businesses were being affected by the
atmosphere of economic uncertainty.

○ The rise of opposition to Batista

Partido Auténtico Partido Ortodoxo PSP

Full name Partido Revolucionario Partido del Pueblo Cubano or The Partido Socialista
Cubano- Cuban Revolutionary Cuban People’s Party Popular-Popular Socialist Party
Party

Founded 1934 Split of the Authentic Party-1948 1925

Ideology Socialist and nationalist End government corruption and communist party→ it suffered
elements. to nationalize US-owned persecution and was banned
● workers to be companies from participating in elections
represented by trade ● ‘Integrity against Money’ several times.
unions.
● ‘Cuba for the Cubans’.

Leaders Ramón Grau San Martín Eduardo Chibás→ commited

&Carlos Prío Socarrás→ ruled suicide 1951.
during one of the most corrupt Fidel Castro was a member of
and undemocratic periods in the party until he formed his own
Cuban history. organization, the 26th of July
Movement.

Section 2.

● The Cuban Revolution and the rise of Fidel Alejandro Castro

Ruz:
○ Born in 1926, in Oriente province.
○ His father, an immigrant from Spanish Galicia, owned sugar plantations.
○ 1945: law school in Havana and joined the Orthodox Party, where he gained
popularity:
■ Outstanding orator

52
 ■ Exceptional memory
■ Fine athlete
○ 1952: Batista’s coup against Prío Socarrás→ No elections. Castro could not
run for a seat in Congress.
○ Castro showed opposition to Batista’s rule. 1953: he tried to depose him for
the first time.

● Three main stages in the role of castro:

○ 1953: The Moncada Barracks assault
■ opportunity to be known by fellow citizens
■ launch the 26th of July Movement.
○ 1956: The landing of the Granma expedition
■ marked the beginning of the armed struggle at a national level.
○ 1956–59: The campaign in the Sierra Maestra
■ his Rebel Army entered into Havana city in January 1959.

● The Moncada assault (1953) and the birth of the 26th of July
Movement

○ 26 July 1953: Fidel Castro, his brother Raúl and Abel Santamaría led 140 men
(aprox.) to Moncada Barracks
■ dressed in military uniforms.
■ mostly members of the Partido Ortodoxo
○ Moncada Barracks
■ military garrison situated in Santiago de Cuba, in the Oriente province
■ second-largest in the country
■ had large supplies of ammunition
■ Oriente → social unrest that could provide popular support for the
attack.
■ Far from Havana→ Batista’s troops would take a long time to arrive→
enough time to complete the takeover.
■ Fewer soldiers in the garrison→popular celebration in the streets of
Santiago.
○ Aim
■ Obtain weapons
■ Gather massive popular support for the uprising against Batista
○ Last-minute problems
■ surprise factor→ However: army managed to defend the building
■ Almost half of the rebels were killed→ many were captured and
tortured to death, including Abel Santamaría.

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 ■ Fidel and Raúl Castro escaped→ However: soon captured by Batista’s
forces and imprisoned.

○ Trial
■ Opportunity to:
● show of Batista’s strength
● Show determination in crushing any opposition to the regime
● discouraging rebels.
■ Fidel Castro’s trial :
● Defended himself
● Took place in a separate room and attendance was restricted→
However: his speech ‘History will absolve me’ became...
○ his defence
○ programme for the political and social reform of the
country.

○ Consequences of the Moncada assault

■ foundation for political movement, ‘26th of July’
■ The rebels became known as the ‘Generation of the Centenary’
■ Fidel Castro became the only political leader who opposed and planned
on ending with Batista’s dictatorship;
■ Rebels were the aggressors→ However: Batista’s excesses in
repression, torture and persecution resulted in rebels becoming martyrs
of the dictatorship.
■ Batista attempted to consolidate his power:
● 1954: Batista held elections and ran as presidential candidate.
○ He had no opposition
■ Castro in prison
■ PSP banned
○ Used the elections to claim that he was chosen by the
people.
● 1955: made other concessions made to appear democratic
○ Allowed political parties to regroup
○ Released many political prisoners→ leaders of the
Moncada assault.
■ Fidel Castro was free
■ Went into exile in Mexico to prepare the
revolution.
● Despite Batista’s efforts to appear democratic…
○ Demonstrations increased→ armed clashes in towns and
cities.
○ Revolutionary organizations in the countryside:

54
 ■ Promoting rural insurgence
■ Sabotaging property across the island
■ Organizing guerrilla groups.
○ Communications and the delivery of food disrupted:
■ Sabotage against sugar mills, oil refineries and
railroads→ Sugar production dropped
■ Political parties (not 26th of July Movement→
believed in revolution) demanded elections but
Batista refused to hold them.
● 2 December 1956: Fidel Castro returned to Cuba and launched
the next stage that would take him to power.

● The Granma expedition (1956)

○ 1956: Fidel and Raúl Castro returned from exile and landed in Oriente
■ Poorly equipped yacht: Granma.
■ Overcrowded: 80 rebels→ recruited in Mexico.
○ The expedition was rough
■ Granma was weighed down by...
● Men and weapons
● Extra oil→ reach the shores of Cuba.
■ Radio failed & poor engines→ Granma landed two days in delay.
○ Coordination was affected by the delay:
■ The urban arm of the 26th of July Movement (Command of Frank País)
had planned a strike in Santiago de Cuba to support the landing
■ People prepared land support for the operation
■ The group of rebels was spotted by the government forces
● left behind their supplies and ammunition
● Ambushed at Alegría del Pío
● Survivors (12/82) hid in the Sierra Maestra→ regroup and
emerge as the Rebel Army.
○ 1957-58: Rebellions led by groups in the cities continued
■ Failed attempt to seize the presidential palace and murder Batista→
However:
● Showed Batista the difficulty to maintain his power.
■ Batista couldn't control the situation as his opposition was becoming
more violent.

55
● The cast of characters: men and women contributed to the success of the 26th
of July Movement
○ Raúl Castro
■ Fidel’s younger brother
■ took part in the attack on the Moncada Barracks
■ imprisoned with Fidel and later exiled to Mexico→ helped prepare
the Granma expedition.
■ 1959→ :Fidel’s right-hand man & served in key positions
● Head of the (Cuban) Communist Party
● Minister of Defence and Vice-President of the Council of State.
● 2008: He was appointed President after his brother resigned for
health reasons.
○ Vilma Espín
■ Wife of Raúl Castro
■ Took part of urban uprisings in support of the Granma expedition.
■ Founded the Federación de Mujeres Cubanas
■ Member of several government organizations (←2007: died)
○ Camilo Cienfuegos
■ A survivor of the Granma expedition
■ Responsible for many victories in the guerrillas in the Sierra
Maestra.
■ Head of the armed forces (←1959: died)
○ Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara
■ A medical doctor born in Argentina
■ Travelling through Latin America→ wanted a solution to its poverty
and corruption.
■ He met the Castro brothers in Mexico and joined the Granma
expedition.
■ Leading figure in the Sierra Maestra fighting and became an icon of
the revolution.
■ Post-revolution
● purged of Batistianos and other opponents.
● Acted as head of the Bank of Cuba and Minister of Industry.
● 1965: spread the revolution worldwide→ travelled to Congo.
Failed.
■ 1967: he was killed in Bolivia.
○ Haydée Santamaría

56
 ■ A member of the 26th of July Movement and sister to Abel.
■ Together with her friend Melba Hernandez, she was one of the few
women to participate in the Moncada assault.
■ She then became responsible for distributing copies of Castro’s
‘History will absolve me’ speech.
■ 1959: founded Casa de las Américas, a key literary institution of Cuba,
which was visited by leading intellectuals and artists from all over the
world.
■ 26 July 1980: Committed suicide
○ Celia Sánchez
■ A close friend of Fidel and an early member of the 26th of July
Movement
■ Responsible for providing land support for the Granma expedition.
■ In Sierra Maestra founded the female ‘Mariana Grajales’ army.
■ Occupied different government positions (←1980: died)

● In the Sierra Maestra mountains (1956–59)

○ Support by the people from the Sierra Maestra increased
■ supplying the army with food and shelter
■ joining the rebels
○ Why Cubans felt attracted to the 26th of July Movement? → Peasants
received more from the it than from the Cuban government
■ No suppression like Batista’s army
■ Rebel Army did not steal from the peasants & paid for the food they
were given.
■ Respected women
■ Put their doctors at the service of the peasants
■ Taught them to read and write and helped in the household chores.
■ Any soldier breaking this code was sentenced to death.
■ Leaders explained what they were fighting for → new society they
were hoping to achieve.
● Agrarian Reform:
○ promised peasants end to ownership of large estates by
a small sector of society or companies
○ fairer distribution of the land.
○ Communicating the message:
■ by Radio→ to spread their message and news
● 1958: Radio Rebelde broadcasted from ‘the territory of Free
Cuba in the Sierra’
● People relied more on Radio Rebelde than on the government
media.

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 ● Castro successfully addressed the people on Radio Rebelde
● Castro revealed what government censorship was hiding
■ News about progress made encouraged urban support for the
revolution. → Workers in towns and cities joined the revolution
underground
● Printed leaflets in support of the rebels
● Condemned Batista.
● Planted homemade bombs to blow up installations, railways
and public buildings, and sabotaged telephone lines, electricity
stations and gas services.
● Assassinated suspected enemies of the revolution.
○ Fighting in did not guarantee success→ Political alliances
■ Castro made contact with leaders from different political parties.
■ 1958: Pact of Caracas
● The majority of the opposition recognized Fidel Castro as a
leader in the struggle to overthrow Batista.
● Included...
■ All the main political parties and organizations,
■ Even PSP→ which were critical of the
Moncada attack and Castro’s leadership until
then.
● Exposed Batista’s political isolation.

● To what extent did Batista contribute to the success of the

revolution?
○ The success of the guerrilla war was due in part to the excesses of Batista’s
regime.
■ The police and the army imprisoned and tortured anyone suspected of
being a rebel or having helped rebels. → Death and imprisonment of
many innocent people.
■ To reduce support for the rebels, Batista ordered peasants to evacuate
the countryside → otherwise: traitors.
■ Eliminated rebels in jungle→ plantations were set on fire→ peasants
lost their crops.
■ Fear did not stop people from helping the rebels→ people were drawn
to them, in hatred of the government.
○ July 1958: Major attack against the guerrillas in the Sierras→ campaign
failed.
■ Soldiers, fearful of the guerrilla forces deserted or surrendered to the
rebels without firing a shot.

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 ■ The weapons and equipment left behind by deserting soldiers were
used by the rebels.
○ 1958: Elections.
■ Batista’s candidate: Andrés Rivero, was fixed to win.
● disappointed the believers in a democratic solution.
● Rivero did not obtain US backing.
○ March 1958: USA imposed an arms embargo on Cuba→ disagreement with
Batista’s violent actions
■ Difficult for the government access weapons and ammunitions→
discouraging effect on the army.
■ Batista rejected a proposal from the USA:
● to capitulate to a caretaker government
● the USA could give military and diplomatic support in order to
prevent Fidel Castro coming to power→ feared communism.

● The triumph of the revolution

○ After success in the Sierra, Castro wanted e to spread the war to the other
Cuban provinces→ campaigns
■ Leaders: Camilo Cienfuegos, Raúl Castro and Che Guevara
■ Joined by more volunteers, marching at night or under the rain to hide
from Batista’s planes.
■ Christmas 1958:
● The city of Santa Clara (capital of Las Villas), had been taken.
● Raúl and Fidel Castro marched towards Santiago de Cuba,
while in Havana rebel leaders increased their acts of sabotage
and their attacks against army installations.
■ 1 January 1959:
● Batista exiled Cuba
○ Politically isolated
○ Unable to control the situation
● The national army refused to continue fighting→ Ceasefire was
ordered.
● Fidel Castro and his barbudos entered Havana→ provisional
government.
○ Fidel Castro’s charisma→ rise to power
■ Max Weber→ Leader is highlighted because of exceptional personal
qualities or his exemplary actions, which inspire loyalty among his
followers.
■ Eric Selbin in Modern Latin American Revolutions→ charismatic
leaders promote and make the revolutionary process possible by their

59
 ability to represent the people’s needs and aspirations in a vision of the
future.
Section III:
● The rule of Fidel Castro
○ Fidel Castro→ Cuba needed
■ a new government
■ a new order.
● Cuba’s economic independence.
● Cubans wanted their political rights back & better living conditions.
● Redistribution of land, improved working conditions and better wages
● Raising living standards
● Health and education made accessible to all.

● The consolidation of power (1959–62)

○ 1959-62: Consolidated his power.
■ Measures:
● Removed the people associated with Batista’s regime.
● Consolidated the position of the 26th of July Movement
within the provisional government.
● Launched reforms to show that the revolution lived up to
its promises, and to gain support.
● Exploited the idea that Cuba was threatened by the USA→
sense of nationalism.
■ Elimination of opposition: Citizens who had served in the Batista
government & armed forces
● Imprisoned or executed
● Properties → confiscated
● Trial:
○ took place with little time
○ did not conform to the standards of justice.
■ Criticism from USA & Cuba for not offering
human rights to prisoners.
■ However → Rebels claimed ‘immediate
justice’ was more necessary than a fair trial.
■ Provisional Government
● January 1959
● Had a significant number of liberals.
○ Hoped to moderate
■ rebels of the 26th of July Movement

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 ■ PSP, the Cuban communist party.
● Leaders:
○ Manuel Urrutia→ President
○ José Miró Cardona → Prime Minister.
○ Castro→ real authority from the very start.
■ set up an office at the Havana Hilton hotel,
as commander of Cuban armed forces.
■ Speeches:
● ideals of social justice
● economic security
● political freedom.
■ Connected with people
● luck:
○ March 1959: Cardona unexpectedly resigned →
Castro stepped in as Prime Minister.
○ July 1959: Urrutia resigned → Osvaldo Dorticós
stepped in as president (1959-76)
● Castro as Prime Minister:
○ introduced reforms to transform the country into
communism by 1961.
○ Supported by the members of the PSP.
○ Rebels who had been against Batista were unified:
Integrated Revolutionary Organizations (ORI),
■ provide the government with a political
party of its own.
■ The ORI was formed by
● the 26th of July Movement (led by
Castro)
● the PSP and the Directorio
Revolucionario (Revolutionary
Directorate)
● a revolutionary student organization
○ 1962: ORI→ became the Partido Unido de la
Revolución Socialista de Cuba (PURSC) under
Castro’s leadership.
○ 1965: the Party was renamed Partido Comunista
Cubano (PCC; Cuban Communist Party).

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 ○ 1965 →: PCC remains the only officially
authorized political party in Cuba
■ PCC→ newspaper, Granma
■ Youth branches:
● Young Communist League
● the José Martí Pioneers
● Opposition within rebels:
○ Huber Matos→ a leader of the 26th of July
Movement & Military Chief of Camagüey
■ Resigned→ he opposed communist ideas in
the revolution and also objected to lack of
elections.
● embarrassment for Castro
● could encourage more opposition
within the movement.
■ Castro ordered Camilo Cienfuegos to inform
Matos that he was under arrest and would be
tried for conspiracy and treason against the
revolution.
● Matos was accused of treason and
sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment.
He was released after he fulfilled his
sentence and left Cuba in 1979.
■ Shortly after, Cienfuegos’ plane disappeared
in an accident.
● Castro had Cienfuegos eliminated.
● Castro was disturbed by Cienfuegos’
popularity.
● The Cuban government has always
explained these events as an accident.
● The reforms of 1959–62
○ The speeches → focusing on the challenges ahead and the proposed solutions.
■ work for the unemployed
■ land for rural workers
■ improved working conditions for the urban workers.
■ The middle class were promised they would be able to become
professionals
■ women that they would be able to work in equal conditions to men.
○ The Agrarian Reform Act:

62
 ■ Aims:
● making the distribution of land more equitable
● agriculture more efficient
● Cuba less dependent on sugar.
■ Measures:
● restricted the land that could be owned→ if anyone had more
than the established→ expropriated the extra & received
bonds as compensation.
● Expropriated land was to be organized in cooperatives.
● Nationalized the land in foreign hands
● Ended both Cuban and foreign ownership of large estates→
however, still allowed private medium- and small-sized farms.
(These would be the targets of the second (1963) and third (1968) Agrarian
Reform laws.)
■ Opposition:
● property owners affected by the reform,
● criticized by the Cuban press.
● USA
○ Companies affected saw it as a confiscatory measure
○ Refused to settle for the compensation in Cuban bonds
○ Washington began to consider cutting the sugar quota in
retaliation.
○ Other reforms
■ Positive for lower classes:
● increase in wages
● the reduction of rents
● the government intervened in many of the conflicts between
classes→ often in favour of the workers
■ Negative for middle and upper classes.
● Foreign-owned companies faced strikes → workers demanded:
○ increases in wages
○ improved working conditions.
● Some foreign companies were threatened with expropriation,
accused of representing countries that had provided Batista
with weapons.
■ Import taxes were imposed on ‘luxury goods’→ Objectives:
● Reducing their imports so that less money was spent on them
by Cubans.
● money raised with these taxes→ invest in industrialization and
the diversification of the economy (i.e. break with the sugar
monoculture).
● USA was affected→ sales to Cuba decrease by 35%

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 ○ Education and Health reforms
■ To improve the living conditions
■ 1961: literacy campaign
● Effects of the reforms
○ Castro & PSP→ gain popularity & to consolidate their position in the
government.
○ Cubans accepted the idea that the old political, social and economic systems
should be dismantled.
○ Cubans became less expectant of the elections.
○ Opposition:
■ Small groups opposed the pace of the revolution and took up arms in
some parts of the country.
■ Local opposition was controlled by the government and did not lead to
major crises→ Castro still allowed those against the revolution to
leave the country.
● Between January 1959 and October 1962, approximately
250,000 people left Cuba:
○ Former batistianos
○ Middle-class citizens→ feared the radicalization of the
revolution
○ Members of religious congregations→ disliked the
communist nature of the reforms.
■ USA:
● More difficult to manage for Castro
● Relations between Havana and Washington deteriorated
dramatically between 1959 and 1962:
○ The Bay of Pigs invasion (1961)
○ The Cuban Missile Crisis (1962)
● American–Cuban relations (1959–62)
○ Fidel Castro→ Cuba needed to develop its economy outside the shadow of the
USA.
○ AAC:US interests→ affected by Cuban policies
○ AAC:Washington pressed other countries to prevent economic aid from
reaching the island.
○ AAC:Castro then ordered the expropriation of US property in Cuba. I
○ AAC: Eisenhower cancelled the sugar quota→ extended into an economic
embargo that was intensified in October 1960, after all US banks in Cuba had
been confiscated.
○ USA vs Cuba ⇔ Cuban & USSR
■ May 1960 the Soviets established formal diplomatic relations between
the two countries.

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 ■ Trade agreements were signed→ Cuba: new market for its sugar.
■ The USSR also granted loans→ Castro purchased industrial equipment
and weapons.
■ USSR promised to help Cuba ‘prevent an armed United States
intervention’
● The Bay of Pigs Invasion (1961):
○ April 1961: origin of the Bay of Pigs invasion.
■ Washington contemplated a plan for the invasion of the island.
■ Using Cuban exiles, trained as a paramilitary force, to return to Cuba
and overthrow Castro.
○ The plan:
■ 1961–63: President J.F. Kennedy had promised a tough attitude against
the penetration of Marxism in Latin America.
■ AAC: He approved the plan, which had been devised during President
Eisenhower’s administration (1953–61).
● Cuban exiles trained in Guatemala and Nicaragua in
preparation to invade Cuba to start a popular uprising against
Castro.
● US troops were not to be directly involved in the invasion.
● The Cuban Revolutionary Council→ was ready to take over
and form a provisional government after the fall of Castro.
○ an anti- Castro group
○ led by former Prime Minister Miró Cardona
○ now exiled in the USA
○ The failure:
■ Cuban forces led by Castro himself defeated them and imprisoned
more than 1,000 participants.
■ The spontaneous uprisings against Castro, that Washington hoped for
didn't happen→ because of significance of the new reforms
■ Fidel Castro emerged from Bay of Pigs more powerful than before.
● The victory against the USA → Cubans thought Castro was
making Cuba a stronger country
● Credibility of the revolution was reinforced.
● The image of Castro→ hero-worship and reinforced Cuban
nationalism.
● It provided Castro a visible enemy.
● Tempted the USSR to establish stronger military ties with
Cuba, and a military presence within Cuba itself.

65
 ● The Cuban Missile Crisis (1962)
○ October 1962: when Washington and Moscow confronted each other over the
Soviet placement of nuclear missiles on Cuba→ The crisis took the world to
the brink of nuclear war.
○ After 13 days of tense negotiations..
■ the Soviets removed the missiles and dismantled the sites in Cuba. In
exchange
■ the USA removed its own nuclear missiles from Turkey and made a
promise that it would not invade the island.
○ AAC: Soviets would no longer defend his island.
○ 1962:
■ Fidel Castro had freed himself from..
● the batistianos and the liberals in government.
● revolts in the provinces→ implemented revolutionary domestic
policies.
■ Castro: Indisputable authority.
■ he emerged with a more radical position
● accepting Soviet assistance
● made public that he was a Marxist-Leninist. In December 1961, for
example, he declared ‘I am a Marxist-Leninist and shall be one until the end of
my life.’

● Fidel Castro’s ideology

○ It is often discussed whether Castro had always intended to align the
revolution with Marxism or whether this was the product of US policies that
pushed Cuba into the arms of the USSR.
○ It was not clear in 1959 that Cuba would soon adopt a communist ideology.
■ The inclusion of liberals in the provisional government→ revolution
was hoping to change was tyranny for democracy.
■ Castro seemed little inclined to commit himself to any specific
ideology or detailed programme, and he publicly denied any relation
between the 26th of July Movement and the communists.
■ He refused to answer questions about which global political ideology
matched his own.
○ Any observance of a fixed set of principles, such as communism, would have
restricted the methods at Castro’s disposal.
Section IV:
● Castro in power: Economic policies and their impact
○ Cuban economy was to remain linked to the decisions and policies of other
nations:
■ The US embargo
■ The economic dependence on the Soviets

66
 ■ the impact of the collapse of the USSR
○ According to these, Castro shaped different economic policies.
■ claimed to uphold the aims of the revolution→ however→ Cuba
responded to the internal and international challenges with different
instruments.
○ After success in achieving the revolutionary aims→ economic policies
● The influence of Che Guevara: Moral incentives and
voluntarism
○ Revolution in power→ Guevara believed it was time to adopt communism.
■ He favoured a centrally planned economy:
● state directs and controls all major economic areas
● national plan→ decides upon the distribution of resources and
production
■ Emphasis on moral incentives and self-sacrifice.
● People should work for the ideals and values of the revolution
rather than for personal gains.
● Moral incentives included
○ socialist emulation
■ A term used in the USSR→ competition among
workers as a method to achieve the set targets.
○ party membership
○ state recognition
■ All workers were to receive equal pay→ overtime would not be paid
for, as workers were expected to cover it voluntarily as their personal
contribution to the revolution.
■ ‘new man’ → sacrifice himself for a higher good
○ Communism in practice:
■ 1962: Cuba changed the national currency
● anyone with their savings in banks that did not belong to the
state lost them overnight.
● In the cities, rents were abolished.
■ 1963: a second Agrarian Law
● Reduced the amount of land that could be owned by a single
person→ prevented ‘rich’ peasants.
■ After 1963: the state owned 70% of the land
■ 1968: the remaining 30% (small farm) were expropriated
○ Obstacles
■ Cuba faced a lack of specialized personnel and technicians, many of
whom had left the country since the revolution→ assessment of
problems and the implementation of solutions was limited.
■ Moral incentives were not efficient

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 ■ Farmers sold their product to the state at very low prices→ lost
motivation→ sugar production levels were very→ government plans
of diversification failed.
■ Industrialization:
● Government→ buy machinery from the USSR and Eastern
European nations→ increase its debt.
● AAC:
○ Cuba was again trapped in trade relations of subsidized
sugar in exchange for goods
○ By 1964: it had to return to intensive sugar production
to reduce debt.
● The Revolutionary Offensive (1968)
○ March 1968: Castro launched the ‘Revolutionary Offensive’
■ to move Cuba further towards a communist state
■ remove the last vestiges of capitalism
○ The Offensive emphasized → ‘new man’
○ Castro ordered the expropriation of all remaining privately owned enterprises:
■ e.g: such as family stores restaurants grocers
■ Owned and managed by the state and put at the service of a centrally
planned economy.
■ Farmers’ markets were eliminated.
■ Self-employment was banned→ pursuing individualist aims.
○ Negative aspects for Castro:
■ Did not achieve an increase in productivity
■ Produced administrative chaos as the number of government agencies
needed to organize the different fields of production and sales grew
exponentially.
■ policy of moral incentives→ high levels of absenteeism and vagrancy.
● The ‘Year of the Ten Million’ (1970)
○ to solve the problems of the revolutionary offensive (1969) → reach a 10
million ton output in 1970.
○ Campaign→ ‘a liberation campaign’
■ Aims:
● obtain from the harvest enough money to pay off Cuban debts
to the USS
● selling surplus sugar→ make investments to achieve
economic diversification.
■ battle for Cuban pride
■ mobilized the entire population and became a political test for Castro.
○ In order to achieve the 10 million Castro appealed for the ‘militarization’ of
labour (organized and disciplined like an army)

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 ■ Everyone worked cutting cane side by side as ‘volunteers’.
■ The armed forces → charge of the sugar mills.
■
■ To increase productivity, bars and theatres were closed and even
Christmas and New Year celebrations were cancelled.
○ Failure→8.5 million tons was reached
■ Castro was forced to admit that they had been unable to reach the 10
million tons target.
■ Economic failure:
● The agricultural machines had been overused
● agricultural production of crops other than sugar had suffered
● other economic areas such as forestry and fishing had seen
important losses.
■ Morale failure:
● the campaign had exhausted Cubans and lowered their
morale→The soldiers felt their status diminished.
■ Political failure:
● Castro manages to survive
○ Admitted failure was due to the administrative
apparatus rather than the ordinary citizens’
commitment.
○ offered his resignation to a crowd that cheered his name
● Consequently:
○ abandonment of Guevara’s ideas of solidarity,
voluntarism and self-sacrifice,
○ economic dependency on the USSR.
○ Farmers’ markets were reinstated.
○ State-owned companies were given some autonomy
○ Material incentives, (pay for overtime work) were
introduced.
○ Cuba continued to suffer similar economic problems.
○ AAC: recession.
■ USSR cut the price it paid for Cuban sugar.
■ Unemployment, debt and policies that limited consumption led to
increased discontent, which contributed to the 1980 Mariel exodus,
when 125,000 abandoned Cuba for the USA

● The Rectification Campaign (1986)

○ 1986: Castro blamed liberal measures for the present economic problems.
○ AAC: return to the values of solidarity and voluntarism under the ‘Rectification
Campaign’.

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 ■ Aim: ‘rectify errors and negative tendencies’ linked to the relaxation of
communist principles after 1970.
■ Measures:
● farmers’ markets were again banned
● bonuses and extra pay were abolished and self-employment
was discouraged.
● New Agrarian Reform Act
○ the percentage of land managed by independent
farmers dropped to 2 per cent.
○ Labour discipline was enforced and the workers lost
many union rights.
■ However: Economic improvement was poor.
● Productivity fell
● Absenteeism at work increased.
● Reduced supplies of milk, oil, textiles and sugar led to an
increase in their prices.
● Black markets → offer rationed or ungettable goods
● Transport and electricity rates also increased and affected the
population’s living standards.
● The Special Period (1991)
○ 1991: The dissolution of the USSR
○ AAC: Cuba’s economy and social development ended suddenly and
unexpectedly.
■ Soviet technicians left Cuba as hundreds of projects were abandoned.
■ Subsidized goods, oil, access to international loans and everything the
USSR had provided to Cuba were finished.
○ AAC: ‘special period in peacetime’.
■ new levels of rationing as basic goods disappeared from the market.
■ energy limited→ imposed long black-outs and restricted public
transport.
○ Policies & Measures:
■ state-owned farms began to be run as worker-managed cooperatives in
an attempt to increase levels of productivity.
■ Cuba was opened to international business→ tourism, mining and
energy.
■ 1993: legal for Cubans to buy and sell US dollars.
■ Farmers’ and handicraft markets reappeared and some level of
self-employment and private businesses was allowed.
■ The state aimed at saving money by reducing some subsidies and
increasing taxes.
■ 1994:

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● Cuba was showing some signs of economic recovery.
● Sugar had been replaced by tourism.

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 The Mexican Revolution
● Madero challenges Diaz's power (1911-1913)
○ Diaz said in 1910 step down as president → Mexico is ready for a democracy
○ Madero gained popularity
■ promised democracy for peasants
■ limited foreign and economic changes for elites & foreigners
○ Diaz disrupted his campaign→ Imprisoned Madero
○ Diaz won the elections → fraud
○ Madero went to texas → Plan de san Luis de potosí
■ Aims
● political reform
● free elections
● no-reelection
● citizen rebellion against Diaz
■ Problems with the plan:
● Political freedom was not a priority in the lower classes
● Did not address the main problems → Land rights & labour
rights
● Peasants were already rebelling (Zapata)
■ Outcomes
● Madero returned → there was no army of rebels
● Joined Lucio Blanco, Orozco & Pancho villa (Northern Rebels)
→ 3000 men
○ Rebellion in the north and in the south
■ Orozco & Pancho villa
● Victory in Ciudad Juarez against Navarro
● Navarro did not want to turn in the Garrison→ Madero peace
terms
● Orozco & Pancho Villa Attacked it against madero's wishes →
Success
○ US weapons
○ food & supplies

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 ■ Zapata
● Revolution in the south: Morelos
○ The treaty of Ciudad Juarez → Diaz signed the treaty and went into exile
■ Resignation of Diaz and vice- president
■ reparations to foreigners
■ rebels disband and disarm
■ Francisco León de la Barra→ Provisional president.
■ In Six months elections
● Madero Takes office
○ Measures
■ Kept Diaz's men in power → Lost support of revolutionaries
● Porfiristas & conservatives in the cabinet
■ He thought democracy ment social & economic solutions
■ Treaty of ciudad Juarez
● Revolutionaries couldn't defend themselves
● No land or labour reform
○ Problems
■ Zapata was offended by Madero → Rebellion
● Plan Ayala
○ Return of stolen land
○ End with haciendas
■ Orozco offended by madero (Not named minister of war) → Rebellion
with Zapata (Chief of Revolution)
● Huerta named commander of Armed Forces → Huerta vs
Zapata
● Huerta went into Morelos leading the armed forces→ South
● Zapata escaped into the mountains (Guerilla warfare)
■ Villa loyal to M, named colonel of Federal Army→ Villa vs Orozco
● Villa was sent to put down orozco's rebellion→ North
● lacked experience → Put under the direction of Huertas
● Huerta disliked Villa → not a real soldier
■ Villa, argument over horse with officer. Villa esked Huerta if he could

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 take the horse. Argument → Villa vs Huerta
● Villa left the army
● Huerta arrested Villa & attempted to kill him
● Madero stepped in → Prevented villa's death
● Huerta felt M was choosing Villa over him→ 😡
● Huerta arrested Villa in another prison
○ Later he escaped
○ Returned to chiwawa
■ 7000 men
■ wanted a rebellion against M
○ Outcome
■ Madero lost his main support
● 😡Zapata→ no land reform
● 😡Orozco→ not minister of war
● 😡 Villa → arrested by Huerta & Madero did not release him
■ La decena trágica

What? Coup d'etat

Who? ● 4 generals→ Huerta, Díaz (Porfirio's nephew), Mondragón, Reyes (Rival en previous elections)
● Supported by Us Ambassador → Henry Lane Wilson

Where? Presidential palace in Mexico City

When? 15 months into Madero's presidency

Events ● Diaz & Reyes led rebels to fight for the palace
● Huerta's cunning
○ pretended to protect Madero
○ provided Diaz & Reyes with supplies to extend the battle & force negotiations
○ 10 days later→ overthrew Madero
■ Took hostage Madero's Brother
■ Forced Madero to resign as president and leave in exile → later killed

Outcome ● Huerta proclaimed himself provisional President of Mexico

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● Huerta seizes power (1913-14)
○ Measures→ Intimidation & federalism
■ Purge of opposition
● Power to the Federal Army → appointed trusted military
officials
● Demanded recognition from local governments → the ones
who didn't were thrown under a train
■ Encouraged Private armies in haciendas
○ Support
■ Church & foreign investors hoped to return to the prosperity of the
porfiriato
■ Foreign nations recognized Huerta → forced by Ambassadors
○ Opposition
■ USA did not recognize Huerta
● Wilson sent Lind to analyse the situation
● Lind proposed elections without Huerta's participation→
Huerta opposed offended 😡
● Tightened reign→ + purge of opposition
● Elections
○ didn't win → kept ruling
○ lost foreign and domestic support
● USA asked help for Carranza (constitutionalist) → He denied
opposed to US intervention
● USA lifted arms embargo to persuade Carranza, they didn't
succeed
● USA did not recognize Huerta's rule
■ Carranza→ resistance against huerta
● Plan de guadalupe
○ Call to arms
■ Northern rebels
■ Southern rebels
○ support Obregón

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 ○ Rejected hureta
○ no reforms→ less support
● Huerta + Federal Army vs Carranza + Obregón
● Obregón & Villa supported Carranza
■ Zapata continued his o rebellion→ land reform
○ Outcome
■ Non USA recognition
■ Carranza & rebells
■ Obregón & west army
■ Villa North
■ Zapata South
1914 Huerta went into exile

● Carranza and Civil war 1914-1920

○ Obregón + Carranza vs Zapata + Villa
■ Obregon protected Mexico's seat of power for Carranza to take
■ Zapata sided with Villa → land reform
○ Villa & Obregón attempted to come to terms
■ Villa tried to kill obregón because Carranza had cut the Railways with
supplies
■ Obregon left hating Villa & distrusting carranza
○ Meeting of Aguascalientes

What? meeting to solve political vacuum: Zapata, Carranza, Villa

Who? ● Villistas→ willing to compromise

Groups ● Carrancistas→ attended to impress US but really wanted C as president
● Independents & Zapatistas→ land reform

● Obregón
Moderates
● Ángeles

Events of the ● Plan Ayala adopted → land reform Zapata

meeting ● Carranza and Villa asked to step down
● Carranza rejected→ rebellion

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 Constitutionalists Conventionalisms

Wanted the 1857 constitution Plan Ayala

Carranza leader Zapata & Villa
Obregón (Army) Gutierrez leader

Events of Civil war ● Clear views→ Hated Us intervention ● Villa promised to supply Zapata with weapons
● Gained followers ● Zapata promised to attack constitutionalists in the
● Obregon received new armaments from south
USA ● Didn't want national power → Zapata and Villa
wanted to control their own spheres of influence
○ Lack of political platform
○ No expansión
● Wakened relationship→ Villa vs Zapata
○ V gave Z old weapons
○ Maderistas (V's supporters) wanted to kill Z
○ Z left V alone to fight Obregón

How Did Cardenas 1. Obregon & army started going north

Win the War?
2. Villa (did not listen to Ángeles, his advisor) engaged him near his supplies (Celaya)
instead of extending Obregón further
3. Zapata Never cut the railway's With Obregon's supplies
4. Obregon defeated Villa in two battles of Celaya
5. Villa attempted one last fight → Lost vs Calles
6. Carranza won the war
● Offered amnesty to villistas generals
● Villa Fled

● Carranza as president
○ 1917 constitution
○ lost support of obregon
○ killed Zapata
1920 Carranza is murdered

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 ● The 1917 constitution
○ Aim→ legitimacy to Carranza's presidency
1916-1917 The constitutional conventions
○ Members ≠ opinions
■ Radicals
■ Moderates (Carranza)
■ Villa & Zapata not allowed
○ Two sides
■ Carranza's supporters backed the 1857 constitution
■ Progressive constitution
○ Outcome
■ Abolition of Carranza
■ Progressive constitution→ First Mexican socialist constitution ≠ liberal
○ Measures of the 1917 Constitution
■ Article 27 Land reform → redistribution of land
● Land in control of the state
● The state lends the land and it is allowed to expropriate if
needed
● State had all subsoil rights
● Issues with foreign ownership dealt in Mexican courts
■ Article 123 Labour reform→ Labour rights for workers & farmers
● Defend their interests through unionization
● Limited working hs
● Day off per week
● Fair pay
● Better working conditions
● No child labour
■ Articles 24 & 130 Church reform
● Freedom of religion (as long as no crime committed)
● The Church only owned lands for worship purposes
● Separation of church & state
● Limitations on the Church

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 ○ - nº Priests
○ No political rights for church officials
○ Official ceremonies now role of the state
○ No judiciary authority
■ Article 3 Education
● Compulsory
● Free
● Public
● State decided content→ Nationalist
■ Article 4 Women = under law
■ Articles 6 & 7 freedom of expression
5 February 1917 the constitution was signed
March 1917 Carranza called elections → Won (Because people liked the constitution)
○ Opposition
■ Church & catholics
■ Land owners
■ Foreign businesses

● General Álvaro Obregón

1920 Carranza dies
○ Provisional government
■ De la Huerta→ Provisional president
■ Got rid of Pacho Villa
● Retirement deal (land, mony, generals)
● Obregón would have prefered to see him dead
○ Elections → Obregon won
○ Context in which obregón took office:
■ Economic issues
● WWI
● Revolution physically damaged agriculture
● Death & emigration → loss of population
■ The 1917 constitution

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○ Measures of his presidency
■ CROM→ Confederación Regional de Obreros Mexicanos
● Created by Carranza in 1918
● Leader Luis Morones
● Obregón used it as a base of support
● Regional leaders addressed the turmoil caused by the revolution
■ Military
● Regional bosses → Generals loyal because they fought with
him in the revolution
● Rotated military generals so that they didn't get too much
influence in one area
■ Labour
● CROM gave him political support to Obregón
● Few strikes
■ Agricultural Reform
● Obregon sat on the fence
○ Redistribution
■ Mostly in Morelos
■ Mostly crappy lands
○ Ejidos ≠ haciendas → community land, everyone gets a
specific portion
○ Land owners kept their lands
■ Economy
● Struggled→ recovery from revolution
○ Workforce dead
○ Commodities lost
○ Damaged infrastructure
● Obregón called old Porfiristas (good with economy) to help
● Petrol was the main source of income
■ Foreign recognition → The Bucareli Accords
● Article 27→ US wanted protection of its investments→ petrol
● Obregon raised taxed to improve Mexico's economy

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 ● USA got mad
● De la Huerta made a deal with the US
● Obregón felt De La Huerta sold out on mexico→ article not
retroactive
● US recognition was established
■ Education
● Achievements
● 1000 schools
● Unification of content
○ Nationalism
○ patriotic
○ Spanish
● Health education
● Cheap & free books
○ Presidential succession
■ Two options
● Calles → loyalty of the army
● de la Huerta → support from Villistas
■ Pancho Villa didn't want Calles to be president→ killed by Barraza
■ De la Huerta began a rebellion
■ Obregón won
● US recognition → armament
● Loyal army
● CROM base of allies
○ Elections → Calles won
● Calles and the Maximato (1924-1934)
○ CROM
■ Morones→ minister of Industry, comerce & labour
■ Measures at first
● Increased CROM membership
● 8 hs work day
● even less strikes

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 ■ Measures then
● CROM leaders gained influence & wealth
● wages did not increase (WSC)
● Less CROM members
● Lombardo formed anti CROM= CTM
○ Church
■ Secular education
■ Pressure on the church
■ No mediation with rome
■ The cristero rebellion
1926 Church Strike
● Calles closed catholic Schools
● Violence
● Bioshops left the country
1927 November Obregón was attacked
● Calles public execution of brothers (Including a priest)
● US worried about the south borders & supported Calles→
protection of lands and investments
● Morrow & US agreement→ subsoil rights were local concern
& rule in favor of US companies
● Morrow attempted to end the Cristero Rebellion
○ Presidential succession
■ Obregón won re-election
■ Killed by an artist in dinner party
■ Obregonistas were suspicious of Calles
■ Calles said he did not look forward to him stepping up as president →
Respect for obregonistas
■ Appointment of Puppet governments
1. Emilio Portes Gil (1928-1930)
○ Oil
■ agreement with US→ recognized right over oil
■ Granted access to extract, refine, trade

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 ○ Church
■ Meeting Portes Gil & church
■ Mediator → Morrow
June 30 1929 masses resumed
○ Creation of PNR Partido Nacional Revolucionario
○ Economy
■ WSC
■ No foreign investment
2. President Ortiz Rubio (1930-1932)
○ During economic depression
○ Economic survival
○ Dropped demand of commodities
○ Less money in circulation → silver coins
3. General Abelardo Rodríguez (1932-1934)
○ More independent from Calles than the other puppet governments
○ Set a minimum wage
○ Land distribution
○ Better working conditions
■ Holidays
■ Less working hs
● General Lázaro Cárdenas.
○ Road to elections
■ Cárdenas was supported by Calles & the PNR
■ Electoral campaign
● travelled → Big cities & rural villages
● PNR radio station → Info about his journey
● Cárdenas, Calles & PNR 6-year plan→ Capitalism that did not
exploit Mexico
○ Transportation
○ land redistribution
○ Agricultural infrastructure
○ education

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 ■ Cádenas won the election by 2 million votes
1934 Cárdenas took office
○ Widening his support base
■ Empathy with Poor peasants
● Cárdenas decided to live in a normal house
● cut his salary in half
■ Spent 500 days on the road visiting the people of Mexico
● Personal relationship
● Support outside calles
○ Problems
■ Split congress
● Cardenistas → Young people
● Callista's→ Old people
■ Strife→ workers vs managers
● Cárdenas wanted to solve this problem
● Calles disagreed → disturbance to economic prosperity
○ Measures to reduce Calles influence
■ Purge of the PNR → to eliminate split congress
■ Called labour unions outside CROM
● CROM supported Calles
● Corruption in CROM's leaders
● Cárdenas created more trade unions
■ Pledge of loyalty
● army
● ministers
● congressmen
■ Placed loyal army generals → if there was a problem he trusted the
army
■ Rise for the army
April 1936 Calles and leaders of the Maximato flown to Texas
○ Socio-Economic Policies
■ Economic improvement → stable commodities

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 ● Silver
● Oil
1934-1935 Growth of GNP (25%)
■ Growth of Government Expenses → $ for social improvement
● education
● land
● labour
○ Education
■ Basic free education
■ 4000 schools built
■ New curriculum & teacher's training
■ Content
● Nationalism & socialism → Future generations socialist
thinking
● Class struggle between peasants & capitalists/foreigners
● Revolutionary heroes→ Zapata
● farming techniques
● Scientific & secular content
● Health
○ sex education ≠ church
○ vaccination
○ anti-alcohol
○ Land reform
■ Land redistribution
■ Banco de Crédito ejidal → Agricultural Bank
● Loans to work the lands
● assistance & training
■ Ejidos
● Increase the agricultural output
● Raise the standard of living
● feed the nation
● Political support from peasants

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 ○ labour
■ Cárdenas dissolved the CROM
■ CTM under Lombardo
● 940.000 members at its peak
● leading organization for workers
■ Strikes increased in all labour sectors
● Cárdenas nationalized railways
● Bad outcome
● Lesson for Cárdenas
1937 Financial crisis → as a populist leader
■ Problems
● Inflation
● wages fell
● low food supply
■ First solutions → wheat board
○ Oil and labour unrest
1935 Expropriation law (indemnity paid at fiscal value)
1937 Labour unrest
● Industry had high profits
● No improvement in wages nor working conditions
■ CTM & trade unions striked
● better wages
● better working conditions
■ Strikes were an economic threat to royalties → Government
intervention
● Cárdenas called a commision to evaluate if the foreign
businesses of the oil industry could pay the rise
● Yes! They could pay the rise
● Companies refused
● Supreme courts backed the trade unions
● Companies still refused
○ Outside hate→ more support for cárdenas

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1938 Used the expropriation law
■ Fiscal value 40 M
■ Companies demanded 450 M
■ Agreement → 130 M
Cardenas nationalized the oil industry Creating the state owned company → PEMEX, succes

87
 Argentina and Raúl Alfonsín
● Historical context → Causes of Democracy
1976- 1983 Military dictatorship 'proceso de Reorganización Nacional'
○ Economy
■ High inflation
■ devaluation of peso
■ unemployment
○ Political:
■ Malvinas War
● Cohesion among the population to create a foreign enemy (UK)
● Post → Political blow on the dictatorship
1981 Multi Partidarias (Political parties combined to restore democracy)
○ Social:
■ due to the loss of the war→ less self-censorship from media
● Violation to human rights→ Opposition from human rights
organisms
● Bitterness towards the dictatorship
■ Hope for democracy
■ No freedom of expression
● Road to presidency
1982-83 Bignone was the transitional president before elections

88
 ○ Political Campaign

UCR PJ

Members Alfonsín Luder

● Good Speaker Bitel
● Lawyer → Signed on 'desaparecidos'
Victor Martinez

Campaign ● Revision of doings during the Dictatorship Disadvantajes

● Judgement of Guerilla Groups (ERP & Montoneros) & ● Isabel → Caused Military
Armed forces dictatorship
● No autoritarism ● Burning the Coffin
● Pacific transition to democracy
'Con democracia se cura, se educa y se come' → Believed that
democracy would solve all of Argentina's problems

October 1983 Presidential Elections

○ Raúl Alfonsín won the elections with 52% of votes. (PJ 40%)
● Measures
○ Economic policies
■ Context
1981 devaluation of $
● Inflation
● Fiscal deficit
● External debt → Dictatorship took private businesses' debts
1982 Political instability (Malvinas)
● More Inflation
■ Plan Grinspun (1983-85)
● Kept printing money
● The goal was to consolidate democracy
■ Plan Austral (1985-88)

89
 ● Change of currency
● No printing of money
● Fixed prices and salaries
● Short term→ Stops infaltion. Economic estabilization
● Long term→ Hyperinflation
■ Plan Primavera (1988-89)
● Attempted to control economy before Presidential elections
● Privatization of public companies
● Hyperinflation & devaluation
○ Social policies
■ Primavera Alfonsinista → Basic freedoms
● Freedom of expression
○ End of censorship in films (La patagonia rebelde)
○ Freedom in school (eg. Long hair allowed)
○ Academic freedom in universities
● Basic Needs
○ PNA (Plan Nacional de alfabetización)
○ PAN (Plan Alimentario Nacional)
● Gender equality
○ contraceptives allowed
○ Divorce
○ Shared custody → Patria potestad compartida
1983 Teoría de los dos demonios
● Justice
● Punishment for crimes against humanity
● Removed Judges from dictatorship
○ Political developments
October 1983 Presidential Election
■ UCR 52%
■ PJ 40%
November 1985 Legislative and presidential
■ UCR → won because of de Positive social impact of 'Primavera

90
 Alfonsinista'
1987 Presidential & Legislative elections
■ UCR 37 % . Lost…
● because of economic failure (Plan Austral)
● because failure military uprisings
■ PJ 45%
○ Military measures
1. Reduction of the Armed forces
■ Reduced almost 50% of the budget
■ Reduced conscription by 54%
■ Ships were allowed 2 days of navigation per year (Before 90)
■ 80% of tanks were out of service
2. Empowerment to the Ministry of Defence
1983 Ley de Ministros
■ supreme authority in armed forces in the hands of a civil
■ This used to be the role of a military member
■ Gives less power to the Armed Forces
3. Executive & legislative control over promotions
■ If a military was to be promoted (high charges)
● The Armed forces proposed it to the PEN
● After PEN's acceptance, it was supervised by congress
4. Modification of norms
1983 Ley de Defensa Nacional
■ Armed forces banned from internal security
■ That is why in 'La Tablada' they didn't attack the guerilla rebellion
5. Solving border issues
■ Chile→ real issue
1984 Peace treaty with Chile
■ Brazil → Hypothetical issue
● Creation of mercosur
6. Empowerment to functional rivals of the armed forces
■ The ministry of defense controlled:

91
 ● Prefectura Naval Arg.
● Gendarmería Nacional Arg.
● Policia Aeronautica
■ These used to be controlled by the armed forces
○ Military policies
■ Promised trials
● Judged the tree 'Juntas'
● Judged emblematic cases → nuns & kiss abuelas plaza de mayo
● Judge lower range officials
■ Ley de Punto final
● deadline for the prosecution
● However, many trails appeared
■ Consequences
1987-88 'Carapintadas Uprising'
1. Abril 1987 (Easter Week) Campo de Mayo
■ Aim → Demanded not to judge nor investigate the guilty for crimes
against humanity during the dictatorship.
■ Consequences
● Alfonsín went to the garrison unarmed to come to terms.
● Plaza de Mayo. 'La casa está en orden'
June 1987 (Three months after the uprising) → Ley de obediencia debida
● Alfonsin had secretly negotiated with the 'Carapintadas'
2. Enero 1988 Monte Caseros
3. Diciembre 1988 Villa Martelli

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 ○ Opposition

Church Why?
● Shared custody
● Divorce
● Legalization of contraceptives

establishment Who & Why?

económico
● FMI → Alfonsín couldn't pay the international debt
● Local & transnational businesses (Eg. YPF)→ Made fiscal deficit & Bad service

CGT & PJ Why?

● PJ rejected Plan Austral
● With the failure of the plan austral → CGT 13 strikes

Armed Forces Why?

● No money for Armed forces
● against CONADEP, Punto Final, trial against armed forces.
What?
● Uprisings

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