 Reparations and war debts made international trade, capital investment, and day to day business difficult  Dawes Plans- American money flowed through Europe  After Stock Market Crash 1929 U.S money stopped  1931 Hoover put a year long moratorium on payments of international debt (huge blow to French Economy  Lausanne Conferences effectively ended all payment of reparations  Problems in agricultural commodities during this time also brought about a downturn in production and trade

 Ramsay McDonald formed a coalition ministry, National Government, which consisted of Labour, Conservative, and Liberal ministers  The national government balanced its budget by raising taxes, cut insurance benefits to unemployed and elderly, and lowered government salaries  Went off the gold standard in 1931 and passed Import Duties Bill in 1932  This bill placed a 10% tax on imports except those from British Empire  These policies helped Great Britain avoid Banking crisis other countries experienced

 Economic stagnation began later than it did in most countries  Fallout included the election of a Radical Coalition government in 1932  Various Right-wing groups became more active during this period ◦ Some wanted monarchy; others favored military rule, ◦ France was hostile to parliamentary government, socialism, and communism

 July 1935 the Popular Front of all left wing parties in France was formed as a means of pressing social and political reform.  In 1936 these parties gained control of the cabinet and Leon Blum assumed premiership.  Blum’s pursuit of Socialist reform gave improved rights to workers, but he was replaced the a Radical ministry  The Republic was in dire political and economic straits by the end of the 1930s

 Hitler Consolidated his control almost as soon as he took office: ◦ By crushing alternative political groups ◦ Purging his rivals in the Nazi party, ◦ Capturing full legal authority of Germany  Hitler quickly outlawed other political parties and arrested leaders of offices, banks, and the newspapers of free trade unions  He effectively removed all institutions of opposition  Began moving against the governments of individual federal states in Germany

 Hitler and key SA leaders murdered to gain support from the German Army corps  After the Death of Hindenburg, Hitler combined the position of Chancellor and president ◦ Became the head of state and head of government

 Hitler oversaw the control Germany as a police state  Police Surveillance units known as SS (Schutzstaffel) terrorized much of Germany and focused its hatred against German Jews  The Nazis based their anti-Semitic views on biological and racial theories rather than on religious discrimination  Jews were robbed of their citizenship, their opportunities to earn a living, their civil liberties  They were repeatedly persecuted and harassed  The were killed because of Hitler’s efforts to eliminate Jews (6 million)

 Hitler effectively handled the German economic problem by subordinated all economic enterprise to the goals of the state  He instituted massive program of spending and public works  Most projects related to rearmament  In 1935 Hitler renounced the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles ◦ began open rearmament to prepare for his next aggression

 Fascist pursued a policy of corporatism designed to appease socialism and liberal lassiez-faire economies  Major industries were organized into syndicates that represented labor and management  Any disputes were settled by government arbitration  These methods was intended to forces both groups to seek productive for the nation over individual concerns

 The Soviet Union under Stalin achieved impressive economic growth in the 1930s at the cost of millions of lives  A drive for rapid industrialization in 1928 marked major departure from the NEP (New Economic Policy) advanced by Lenin  The rapid industrialization was complicated but it generated the first large factory labor force Russia had ever seen

 Labourers’ working and living conditions were appalling  The government and the Communist party waged a sweeping propaganda campaign that praised the new factories and plants and urged the recruitment of industrial workers from rural areas  Recruitment succeed despite factories failing to undertake new production at promised levels

 Stalin decided to collectivize agriculture to prevent farmers from holding the government hostage by withholding crops for better prices  Many peasants were killed in the resistance: numbers unknown but most likely well into the millions  In 1928 more than 98% of Russian farmland consisted of peasant holdings  By 1938 more than 90% of Russian land had been collectivized and government controlled the food supply  By 1934 Stalin feared aggression from Nazi Germany and reversed the Comitern policy

 Stalin initiated the Great Purges in 1933 a series of arrests and party expulsions of Communists leaders  Hundreds of thousands were executed without due process  Interrogations, Imprisonments, and expulsions numbered into the millions  The communists party leadership began to consume oneself as Stalin became distrustful of the central party elite.  These purges created a new party structure completely subservient to Stalin