Europe and North America
Section 3
Changing Societies
Main Idea
The Cold War brought tremendous economic and social change
to North America, Western Europe, Eastern Europe and the
Soviet Union.
Content Statement: Analyze how the U.S.
and U.S.S.R. became superpowers and
competed for global influence.
Europe and North America
Europe Post WWII Section 3
Europe and North
America
NATO
VS WARSAW PACTSection 3
Europe and North America
Section 3
Europe and North America
Ch 15-3 vocabulary
Section 3
• Solidarity: an independent labor union founded
in Soviet-controlled Poland in 1980.
• Glasnost: “openness” refers to a new era of
media freedom in Soviet Union under Mikhail
Gorbachev in the 1980’s
• Perestroika: “restructuring”; restructuring of the
corrupt government bureaucracy in the
U.S.S.R. begun by Gorbachev
• Velvet Revolution: (1989) a quick, peaceful
revolution that swept Communists from power
in Czechoslovakia
Section 3
Europe and
North America
1) Postwar
Recovery/Western Europe
• Western Europe faced challenging future after World War II
• At end of war, much of Western Europe lay in ruins
• Property, farmland destroyed; national economies collapsed; millions
displaced from homes; seemed on brink of chaos
• Chaos did not come, thanks in large part to Marshall Plan
Economic Growth
• With American aid, Western
Europe’s factories produced
more in 1950s than before
war
Influx of Immigrants
• Availability of jobs attracted
immigrants from former
colonies
• Created strain as Europeans
• West Germany became major struggled to adapt to
economic power
newcomers, their cultures
• Growth strong in other
countries
Section 3
Europe and2)Alliances
North America
and Economic Unity
World War II had changed Europe’s place in the world. The continent was no
longer the center of world power; instead, the United States and the Soviet
Union were centers of power.
Alliances
• European nations
began to end
longstanding
rivalries, work for
common good
Economic Unity
• Many Western
European nations
moved toward
economic unity
Markets
• Broader efforts to
develop single
regional market, free
of trade barriers
• Goal to create single
• Cooperation
market to rival United
• NATO unified many
begun in coal,
States
nations in strong
steel industries,
military alliance with and development
U.S., Canada
of atomic energy
Section Market
3
and and
NorthEconomic
America Unity/The Common
2)Europe
Alliance
European Economic Community
• 1957, six European nations founded European Economic
Community; also known as Common Market
• 1960, seven other European countries formed rival European
Free Trade Association
• True economic unity in Europe still years in future
3) Page 493
Europe and North America
Section 3
3
Europe
and
North
America
4) Post
War
Soviet
Union /Eastern Europe and theSection
Soviet Union
The challenges facing the Soviet Union and the Eastern European nations
under its control were even more overwhelming than those facing Western
Europe. Like Western Europe, however, the region soon began to recover.
The Postwar Soviet Union
Command Economy
• Tens of millions killed in war
• Government controls all economic
decisions
• Heavy damage to cities and
farms
• Goods at prewar levels by 1953
under strict government control.
• Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin
determined to rebuild quickly
• Nikita Krushchev became leader of
Soviet Union, undertook effort to “deStalinize” Soviet Union
• Soviet Union had command
economy
• Tore down statues of Stalin and
renames streets and towns named
after Stalin.
Stalin-era economic and political restrictions loosened, but country remained
Communist. Individual freedoms limited, still hostile stance against the West.
Section 3
Europe and North
Americain Eastern Europe
5) Revolts
Many Changes
• Changes after Stalin’s death led
Eastern Europeans to hope for end
of Soviet domination
Solidarity
• Soviet crackdowns did not end
protests in Eastern Europe
• 1980, Polish electrician Lech Walesa
• Soviet leaders made it clear reforms
led hundreds of thousands of workers
were limited
in anti-government protest
movement, called Solidarity
• Used or threatened force to crush
public protests in many countries,
• Poland’s Communist government
assert control
used martial law to suppress
movement, could not destroy it
• Troops put down revolts in East
Germany (1953), Poland (1956),
Hungary (1956), Czechoslovakia
(1968)
Europe and North America
Europe Post WWII Section 3
Section 3
Europe and North
America and Perestroika
6)Glasnost
Soviet Economy Faltered
• Soviet economy performed well after war, began to falter in 1960s
• By 1980s, Soviet Union faced crisis; command economy system
inefficient
• Production goals made with little regard for wants, needs of
marketplace. Why bad?
Gorbachev
• Goals stressed heavy industry, neglecting needed consumer goods
• As result most sectors of Soviet economy ceased to grow
• 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, saw need for change
New Concepts
• Proposed two radical concepts—glasnost, perestroika
• Glasnost, “openness,” willingness to discuss Soviet problems openly.
New era of media freedom.
• Perestroika, “restructuring,” reform of Soviet economic, political
system
6)Reforms
Europe and North America
Section 3
• Gorbachev pushed through number of major reforms
• Aggressively pursued arms control agreements with U.S.
• Also reduced central planning of Soviet economy, introduced
some free market mechanisms. Moving from command to
market economy
6)Policy Reversal
• Gorbachev knew Soviet Union could not afford to prop up
Communist governments of Eastern Europe
• Began to pull Soviet troops out of region, urged local leaders to
adopt reforms
• Reversed decades of Soviet policy in Eastern Europe
Europe and North America
Section 3
Europe and North America
Section 3
Section 3
Europe and7)Revolutions
North America in Eastern Europe
• Eastern Europeans longed for freedom, did not wait for reform
• 1989, revolution spread; citizens overthrew Soviet-backed leaders
• Gorbachev, no longer wanting to control Eastern Europe, did not
interfere
• Most revolutions were peaceful
• Solidarity forced elections in Poland; Lech Walesa elected president
Czechoslovakia, Romania
• Czechoslovakia had Velvet
Revolution—so called
because it was peaceful
• Pushed communists out of
power
• Only bloodshed in Romania,
where some military forces
remained loyal to Communist
dictator
East Germany
• Most dramatic changes took
place in East Germany
• Berlin Wall opened November
1989
• Strongest symbol of Soviet
repression, Cold War, finally fell
• Less than year later, East, West
Germany reunified as single
nation
Europe and North America
Section 3