The impact of the regional factor in the democratic transition A comparative study between the experiences of Spain 1975 and Iraq 2003

Author(s):  
Luqman Raheem ◽  
Nasir Durid

The regional factor has always played an important role in the political developments of various countries and political experiences, as this factor constituted the role of the direct incubator for all the successful and failed experiences of political development throughout our time. The process of democratization is considered one of the most important political experiments of our time, which gained wide momentum after the Second World War. Especially after the peoples of the world realized the importance and preference of this system compared to the rest of the political systems. After the end of the Cold War, the world witnessed a remarkable trend towards liberal democracy, exhilarated by the euphoria of the victory of the Western camp led by the United States of America over its eastern historical opponent (led by the Soviet Union). Liberal democracy and its sovereignty over the world, rather they unleashed an unbridled optimism that says: ""The peoples and societies of the world are moving towards adopting the model of liberal democracy, because it is the model most responsive to the aspirations of human freedom and the release of his energies.

Worldview ◽  
1959 ◽  
Vol 2 (11) ◽  
pp. 3-6
Author(s):  
E. Raymond Platig

Many well-intentioned people have long recognized the absence in our century of any effective international law, government and mores. They have also wasted a lot of time attempting to conjure up constitutional governments for the world, to codify, revise and extend international law, and to call forth a mostly non-existent world public opinion. In a world rent by such basic ideological and cultural splits as is ours, these efforts are foredoomed to failure.The much more relevant question for one interested in peace in this nuclear-missile’ age is whether or not the United States and the Soviet Union can settle through negotiation some of the political problems of the Cold War. If they cannot agree to “live and let live” as sovereign states in a world of sovereign states, on what basis can we expect that they will engage in that much more intimate collaboration out of which mores, law and government can grow?


2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-31
Author(s):  
Jakub Majkowski

This essay will firstly address the extent of Stalin’s achievements in leading the course for domestic policy of the Soviet Union and its contribution towards maintaining the country’s supremacy in the world, for example the rapid post-war recovery of industry and agriculture, and secondly, the foreign policy including ambiguous relations with Communist governments of countries forming the Eastern Bloc, upkeeping frail alliances and growing antagonism towards western powers, especially the United States of America.   The actions and influence of Stalin’s closest associates in the Communist Party and the effect of Soviet propaganda on the society are also reviewed. This investigation will cover the period from 1945 to 1953. Additionally, other factors such as the impact of post-war worldwide economic situation and attitude of the society of Soviet Union will be discussed.    


2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Herf

Israel's Moment is a major new account of how a Jewish state came to be forged in the shadow of World War Two and the Holocaust and the onset of the Cold War. Drawing on new research in government, public and private archives, Jeffrey Herf exposes the political realities that underpinned support for and opposition to Zionist aspirations in Palestine. In an unprecedented international account, he explores the role of the United States, the Arab States, the Palestine Arabs, the Zionists, and key European governments from Britain and France to the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia and Poland. His findings reveal a spectrum of support and opposition that stood in sharp contrast to the political coordinates that emerged during the Cold War, shedding new light on how and why the state of Israel was established in 1948 and challenging conventional associations of left and right, imperialism and anti-imperialism, and racism and anti-racism.


Arthur Szyk ◽  
2004 ◽  
pp. 217-232
Author(s):  
Joseph P. Ansell

This chapter encompasses Arthur Szyk's final years. It shows his continued dedication to freedom struggles around the world even as it contemplates on the dwindling number of exhibitions he held during this period. During this time, the United States was also turning inward after the Second World War. This attitude was one which Szyk did not share and which his work, with its liberal and international themes, did not support. Moreover, the chapter reveals his growing sympathy towards the Soviet Union, which was so evident in the political cartoons and related works from the years of alliance during the Second World War. It also shows that, by the early years of the Cold War, his health was somewhat precarious, forcing him to choose his activities carefully.


Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent

This chapter examines how the United States and the Soviet Union sought to win the hearts and minds of people in various parts of the world as empires began to collapse during the period 1953–1963. It begins with a discussion of the end of the French Empire, taking into account the loss of French Indo-China and the start of American involvement in Vietnam, along with the collapse of French rule in Morocco and Tunisia. It then considers the crises in the Congo, Angola, and the Middle East, focusing on the zenith of the Cold War in Black Africa, Britain’s declining power, and the Suez crisis. It concludes by looking at the end of the British Empire in Africa.


Author(s):  
Andrew Preston

The modern era was the American century, but it was also very much the communist century. Between them, the United States and the Soviet Union held the fate of the world in their hands. If there was to be a just and durable peace after 1945, an understanding between Washington and Moscow would have to be its foundation. Instead, in a conflict quickly dubbed “the Cold War,” the world suffered through four decades of existential tension between the Soviets and the Americans. ‘Superpower’ explains why the Soviets and Americans moved from cooperating in a world war to resisting each other in the Cold War, before exploring the events and ending of the Cold War in the 1980s.


2002 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 23-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey Roberts

The German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 and the ensuing conflict witnessed the political rehabilitation of the former People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Maksim Litvinov. After serving as ambassador to the United States from 1941 to 1943, Litvinov returned to the Soviet Union and played a key role in charting Moscow's wartime Grand Alliance strategy. He urged So-viet leaders to convene a joint Anglo-Soviet-American commission to discuss military-political questions, and he helped organize the October 1943 foreign ministers'conference in Moscow. As the war drew to a close, Litvinov argued for a postwar settlement dividing the world into security zones. His realist conception of foreign policy suggested a more moderate alternative o Josif Stalin's reliance on confrontation with the West. Although Litvinov faded again from public view after his retirement in 1946, his belief that the Grand Alliance could continue suggests that the rapid, postwar descent into the Cold War might have been averted had it not been for Stalin.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Julia Zapariy

Referring to the preparation of Soviet diplomacy for the 3rd session of the UN General Assembly, this article examines the process behind the development of the political line of the Soviet delegation, as well as the principles of covering the “UN” theme by the press, informing the population and shaping public opinion on major international problems. On the basis of specific material, the author demonstrates the principles of Soviet diplomats’ work on the preparation of analytical materials, the development of recommendations, and the implementation of propaganda measures at the UN in response to the changing international situation. Archival materials allow us to understand the attitude of the Soviet political elite to multilateral diplomacy and reconstruct the USSR’s assessment of the effectiveness of the organisation’s activities both in the field of maintaining international security and in the non-political sphere. Referring to the analysis of materials from the Russian Foreign Policy Archive (AVP RF) and the Russian State Social and Political Archive (RGASPI), the author reconstructs the rationale behind the propaganda campaign in the Soviet press against Trygve Lie, the first UN Secretary-General, in connection with the publication of the annual report on the organisation’s work between 1947 and 1948. Coordinated criticism of the world’s highest-ranking diplomat became an integral part of the political game in connection with the settlement of the Berlin crisis, as well as an important element in the strategy of a massive propaganda offensive against the United States, aimed at portraying the Truman administration as the culprit of the imminent split in Europe and Germany.


Author(s):  
Elizabeth Schmidt

This chapter examines the impact of the Cold War on Africa. It explains that while Africa is the least-known Cold War battleground, the United States, the Soviet Union, China, and Cuba became embroiled in the internal affairs of countless African countries. The chapter analyzes the ideologies, practices, and interests of these main external actors and describes the four major arenas of conflict that are representative of broad trends in Cold War intervention in Africa. It also discusses how the Cold War altered the dynamics of local struggles, created unprecedented levels of destruction and widespread instability, and contributed to many of the problems that plague Africa today.


Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent

This chapter examines how the United States and the Soviet Union sought to win the hearts and minds of people in various parts of the world as empires began to collapse during the period 1953–63. It begins with a discussion of the end of the French Empire, taking into account the loss of French Indo-China and the start of American involvement in Vietnam, along with the collapse of French rule in Morocco and Tunisia. It then considers the crises in the Congo, Angola, and the Middle East, focusing on the zenith of the Cold War in Black Africa, Britain’s declining power, and the Suez Crisis. It concludes by looking at the end of the British Empire in Africa.


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