Totalitarianism

• Governments had increased control during WWI• Rejected liberalism • Will of the masses dominated over the individual• Obedience & participation• Often radically nationalistic

• Could be far right (fascists) or far left (communists)• Technologically savvy

Italy1919: verge of bankruptcy • high inflation & unemployment• unhappy with terms of Versailles

Mussolini’s Fascio di Combattimento appealed to veterans; used brute force & nationalistic rhetoric

1922: march on Rome w/ his Black Shirts

Il Duce

Fascism in ItalyNationalistic ideology• Militarization• Rampant sexism

Education; massive indoctrination & propaganda

Loyal to landowners & industrialists; NOT the lower classes

Secret Police; censorship

Lateran Accords

Fascist YouthFascist Youth

State “Corporatism”1926: National Council of Corporations created

• Guilds of employers & employees established to manage the economy

• Supported by small capitalists & the middle class; all felt threatened by the rise of Socialists

• Goal harmonize the interests of workers, managers and the state by abolishing class warfare.

• Reality This system hampered technological progress and destroyed workers’ rights.

Weimar Germany1919-24:• Versailles’ punishments• Ruhr, hyperinflation & unemployment• National Socialism• Beer Hall Putsch

1924-29:• stability & prosperity• Nazis organize & plan

1929-33:• The Great Depression• Nazis come to power Hyperinflation in Germany

The GermanMark

The GermanMark

1923 - Ruhr Valley Fiasco1923 - Ruhr Valley Fiasco

Weimar Republic PoliticsWeimar Republic Politics

Unemployment during the Great DepressionUnemployment during the Great Depression

The Great DepressionThe Great Depression

Spanish Civil War

1931: King Alfonso XIII abdicated; a Popular Front formed

1936-39: Spanish Civil War• Nationalists vs. Republicans• Franco’s Nationalists win• “dress rehearsal for WWII” • Picasso’s Guernica

Republican At the Instant of Death

Picasso’s GuernicaPicasso’s Guernica

The Democracies & Depression

France:

1920s: Raymond Poincare• Ruhr Valley fiasco• Cartel of the Left

1936: Leon Blum’s Popular Front; “France’s New Deal”

Great Britain:• massive unemployment• Keynesian Economics

Massive Unemployment

Culture Between the Wars

Mass Media: radio & cinema• BBC • Goebbels’ The Triumph of Will

Art: surrealism & modern art• Dali’s Persistence of Memory• Dadaism

Literature: “stream of consciousness”

Dali’s Persistence of Memory