Democracy During The Interwar Years

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After World War One, there were many types of new government that emerged from the chaos of the war. But, the two major governments were dictatorships and democracies. In Germany, Italy and Russia, the dictators Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini and Josef Stalin came to power after the fall of democracy in each country. There were many reasons for the change to dictatorship, including inflation, unemployment and a lost sense of trust in democracy. These dictatorships ruled for many years during the interwar period. There were also many democracies across Europe and Asia during the interwar years. In India, democracy was used to unify the nation against the British. In China and Eastern Europe, there was also democracy that proved to be more successful …show more content…
Thus, during the interwar years, there were both powerful democracies and dictatorships, but countries used this time period to learn about these forms of government and decide which would be best for their nation in the future. There were many reasons that the nations Russia, Italy and Germany chose dictatorship during the interwar years, but they mostly focused on democracy’s ineffectiveness, inflation/unemployment and the desire for political stability. In Russia, the economy was greatly weakened after World War One. The nation laid in ruin, and a provisional government was set up. This provisional democracy was very weak. In November 1917, the Bolsheviks, a group looking for power in Russia, stormed the Winter Palace and arrested members of the provisional government. Eventually, the Bolsheviks gained complete control in Russia, especially after their Red Army won the Russian Civil War. Lenin was the original leader of the Bolsheviks, and he established the Soviet Union. This union was comprised of individual “soviets”-communist governments that ruled over certain areas of Russia. But, in 1928, Josef Stalin seized total …show more content…
In Russia, the only reason the democracy was abolished was due to the immense post-war problems that the democracy inherited. Although the provisional government was very weak and did not address these problems, Stalin and the USSR only created more problems in Russia, which were much more long term than the problems of the Provisional Democracy. Russia learned that dictatorship will usually become corrupt and not have the people’s best interest in mind, whereas democracy has the ability to solve problems from the perspective of the people. Dictatorships also usually put the most ruthless, power-hungry people in charge, and democracies elect people who represent the general public’s beliefs. In Italy, Mussolini’s rise laid the framework for all future dictators. He was ruthless, as his criticism of Italy’s government sparked violence between fascists and communists/socialists. This is another example of how dictatorships usually create chaos and do not lead to unity in nations. The biggest example of how we can learn from dictatorship comes from Germany. Hitler made the Germans think that he was the best option for the nation, saying he would be a powerful, strong leader, which is what Germany needed. However, Hitler was one of the most evil men this world has ever seen. He killed millions of innocent people. In a democracy, a man like this would never come to power, and would be

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