The World Transformed 1945 to the Present

by H. Hunt, Michael

• ISBN13: 9780199372348
• ISBN10: 0199372349
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2013-11-15
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Oxford University Press is pleased to be the new publisher of Michael Hunt's The World Transformed: 1945 to the Present. A second edition of The World Transformed will be available in Spring 2015.

Through its lively and accessible narrative, The World Transformed provides students with an account of the political, socio-economic and cultural developments that have shaped global events since 1945. The book's focus on three central and profoundly interconnected stories--the unfolding of the Cold War, the growth of the international economy, and the developing world's quest for political and economic independence--offers students a framework for understanding the past and making sense of the present. Attentive to overarching themes, individual historical figures, and diverse nations, The World Transformed will find an enthusiastic reception in courses on post-1945 world history, international relations, or global topics.

Author Biography

Michael Hunt is the Everett H. Emerson Professor of History Emeritus at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A leading specialist on international history, Hunt is the author of several prize-winning books, including The Making of a Special Relationship: The United States and China to 1914 (Columbia, 1983. His long-term concern with U.S. foreign relations is reflected in several broad interpretive, historiographical, and methodological works, notably Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy (Yale, 1987); and Crises in U.S. Foreign Policy: An International History Reader (Yale, 1996). He has also cultivated an interest in modern East Asia, resulting in The Genesis of Chinese Communist Foreign Policy (Columbia, 1996), based on new sources, and Lyndon Johnson's War: America's Cold War Crusade in Vietnam, 1945-1968 (Hill and Wang, 1996).

Table of Contents

Preface
Introduction: The 1945 Watershed
International Politics Reconfigured
Wilson and Lenin as Rival Visionaries
World War II and the Onset of the Cold War
The Role of Nationalism
The Global Economy in Transition
The First Phase of Globalization Begins, 1870s-1914
Globalization Reborn, 1945 to the Present
The Colonial System on the Brink
Vulnerabilities of Empire
The Appearance of the "Third World"

PART I. HOPES AND FEARS CONTEND, 1945-1953

1. The Cold War: Toward Soviet-American Confrontation
Origins of the Rivalry
From Cooperation to Conflict
U.S. Policy in Transition
Stalin's Pursuit of Territory and Security
Stalin and the Postwar Settlement
From Europe to the Periphery
Drawing the Line in Europe
The Nuclear Arms Race Accelerates
Opening a Front in the Third World
Limited War in Korea
Superpower Societies in an Unquiet Time
Soviet Society under Stress
The U.S. Anti-Communist Consensus
Conclusion

2. The International Economy: Out of the Ruins
Anglo-American Remedies for an Ailing System
Keynesian Economics and a Design for Prosperity
The Bretton Woods Agreements
The U.S. Rescue Operation
Occupation and Recovery in Japan
Recovery in Western Europe
The American Economic Powerhouse
Good Times Return
Disney and the U.S. Economic Edge
"Coca-colonization" and the Mass Consumption Model
European Resistance to "Americanization"
Conclusion

3. The Third World: First Tremors in Asia
The Appeal of Revolution and the Strong State
The Chinese Communist Triumph
Vietnam's Revolutionary Struggle
New States under Conservative Elites
India's Status-quo Independence
The Collaborative Impulse in the Philippines
Conclusion

PART II. THE COLD WAR SYSTEM UNDER STRESS, 1953-1968

4. The Cold War: A Tenuous Accommodation
The Beginnings of Coexistence
Khrushchev under Pressure
Crosscurrents in American Policy
Crisis Points
To the Nuclear Brink in Cuba
The Vietnam Quagmire
The Quake of '68
The American Epicenter
The Ground Shifts Abroad
Conclusion

5. Abundance and Discontent in the Developed World
America at the Apogee
Triumphant at Home and Abroad
Warning Signs of Economic Troubles
Recovery in Western Europe and Japan
The Old World's New Course
Fiat and Europe's Corporate Aristocracy
The Second Japanese Miracle
Voices of Discontent
The New Environmentalism
The Feminist Upsurge
Critics of Global Economic Inequalities
Conclusion

6. Third-World Hopes at High Tide
Revolutionary Trajectories in East Asia
The Maoist Experiment in China
Vietnam's Fight for the South
The Caribbean Basin: Between Reaction and Revolution
Guatemala's "Ten Years of Spring"
Cuba and the Revolution that Survived
Decolonization in Sub-Saharan Africa
Ghana and Nkrumah's African Socialism
Colonial Legacies in Ghana and Beyond
Remaking the Middle East and North Africa
Economic Nationalism in Iran
A New Order for Egypt and the Region
Colonial Crisis in Algeria
Conclusion

PART III. FROM COLD WAR TO GLOBALIZATION, 1968-1991

7. The Cold War comes to a Close
The Rise and Fall of Détente
The Nixon Policy Turnaround
The Breshnev Era
Western Europe and Détente
The U.S. Retreat from Détente
The Gorbachev Initiatives
Glasnost, Perestroika, and a New Foreign Policy
The Demise of the Soviet System
Explaining the Cold War Outcome
The Role of Leaders
Impersonal Forces
Conclusion

8. Global Markets: One System, Three Centers
The United States and the North American Bloc
The Erosion of U.S. Dominance
The Free Market Faith
The Rise of an East Asian Bloc
Japan Stays on Course
The Rise of the "Little Dragons"
Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics
Vietnam in China's Footsteps
Revived Bloc Building in Europe
Renewed Integration and the E.U.
Social and Cultural Developments
Post-'89 and the Opening to the East
Conclusion

9. Divergent Paths in the Third World
The Changing Face of Revolution
Cambodia's Genocidal Revolution
Religious Challenge in Iran
Revolutionary Aftershock in the Middle East
Opposition to Settler Colonialism
South African Apartheid under Siege
Conflict over Palestine
Repression and Resistance in Guatemala
Dreams of Development in Disarray
Stalemated Economies
The Population Explosion
Women and Development
Conclusion

Conclusion: Globalization Ascendant, The 1990s and Beyond
The Perils and Possibilities of Globalization
Environmental Stresses
One World or Two?
An Emerging International Regime
Globalization as U.S. Hegemony?
"The American Century"
Playing the Global Policeman
Resistance Abroad

Notes
Index