Colonialism, World Wars, Cold War, decolonisation, Revolutions (American, French, Russian), major international institutions — complete GS-1 coverage for UPSC Civil Services
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Origin | Britain first (1760–1840); then spread to Western Europe, USA, Japan |
| Preconditions (Britain) | Agricultural Revolution (enclosures → surplus labour); mercantile capitalism; colonial raw materials + markets; Protestant work ethic; Glorious Revolution (1688) → stable property rights; coal + iron reserves |
| Key Inventions | Steam engine (James Watt, 1769); Spinning Jenny (James Hargreaves, 1764); Power Loom (Edmund Cartwright, 1785); Steam Locomotive (George Stephenson — Rocket, 1829); Telegraph (Samuel Morse) |
| Phases | First (1760–1840): Textiles, steam, coal, iron; Second (1870–1914): Steel, electricity, chemicals, petroleum, telephone |
| Social Impact | Urbanisation; rise of working class (proletariat); child labour; poor conditions → labour movements; trade unions; women in factories; Luddite movement (machine-breaking) |
| Ideological Impact | Capitalism solidified; Socialist/Marxist critique emerged (Marx — Das Kapital 1867); Utopian Socialism (Owen, Saint-Simon); Anarchism; Liberal free-trade ideology |
| Global Impact | European industrial supremacy → imperialism; colonisation of Asia/Africa for raw materials and markets; widening gap between industrial and agrarian societies |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Causes | "No taxation without representation" — British taxes (Stamp Act 1765, Townshend Acts 1767, Tea Act 1773); Enlightenment ideas (Locke — natural rights); Boston Massacre (1770); Boston Tea Party (1773) |
| Key Events | First Continental Congress (1774); Battles of Lexington and Concord (1775 — "shot heard around the world"); Declaration of Independence: July 4, 1776 (Thomas Jefferson); Valley Forge winter 1777–78; Battle of Yorktown (1781 — British surrender) |
| Declaration of Independence | "All men are created equal; endowed with unalienable Rights — Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness"; Enlightenment ideals; Locke's influence; anti-colonial manifesto |
| Outcome | Treaty of Paris (1783) — British recognised USA independence; US Constitution (1787); Bill of Rights (1791); Federal republic; separation of powers (Montesquieu influence) |
| Global Significance | First successful colonial independence movement; inspired French Revolution; template for later independence movements including India; republican model spread |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Causes | Financial crisis (American war debt); Estates General inequality (Third Estate 97% population, no vote parity); Enlightenment ideas; bread scarcity; Ancien Régime's rigid hierarchy; Weak king Louis XVI |
| Phases | Constitutional Monarchy (1789–92) → First Republic (1792) → Reign of Terror (1793–94, Robespierre) → Thermidorian Reaction (1794) → Directory (1795–99) → Napoleon's coup (1799) |
| Key Events | Storming of Bastille: July 14, 1789 (French national day); Declaration of the Rights of Man (Aug 1789); Women's March on Versailles; Louis XVI guillotined (Jan 1793); Reign of Terror (17,000+ executed) |
| Ideology | Liberty, Equality, Fraternity (Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité); sovereignty of the people; end of feudalism; church lands nationalised; metric system introduced |
| Napoleon Bonaparte | 1799: First Consul; 1804: Emperor; Napoleonic Code (1804) — equality before law, property rights, secular state; European wars; Continental System (blockade of Britain); Grand Army; defeated at Waterloo (1815) |
| Legacy | Nationalism spread across Europe; end of absolute monarchy as norm; women's rights inspired; Haitian Revolution (1791–1804, first successful Black republic); inspired Latin American independence |
| Country | Major Colonies | Key Features |
|---|---|---|
| Britain | India, Australia, Canada, South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Egypt, Malaya, Singapore, Hong Kong | "Empire on which the sun never sets"; indirect rule where possible; deindustrialisation of India; 1/4 of world's land; free trade imperialism |
| France | Algeria, Morocco, West Africa, Indochina, Syria, Madagascar | Mission civilisatrice (civilising mission); direct assimilation model; Algerian war (1954–62) |
| Portugal | Brazil (until 1822), Angola, Mozambique, Goa (until 1961) | Oldest colonial empire; Goa held until Indian police action 1961 |
| Netherlands | Indonesia (Dutch East Indies), Suriname, South Africa (originally) | VOC (Dutch East India Company) pioneered corporate colonialism |
| Belgium | Congo | Leopold II's Congo Free State — rubber slavery, atrocities; 10 million deaths estimated |
| Germany | Namibia, Tanzania, Cameroon, Togo, New Guinea | Lost all colonies after WWI (Treaty of Versailles) |
| Japan | Korea (1910–45), Taiwan (1895), Manchuria, SE Asia (WWII) | Non-Western imperialist; Meiji Restoration (1868) → industrialisation → imperialism |
| USA | Philippines (1898–1946), Puerto Rico, Guam, Panama Canal Zone | Post-Spanish-American War (1898); Monroe Doctrine (1823) — Latin America as US sphere; neo-colonialism in 20th c. |
| Theorist | Theory |
|---|---|
| J.A. Hobson (1902) | Imperialism driven by capitalist need for overseas investment; surplus capital seeks returns in underdeveloped world; inspired Lenin |
| Lenin (1916) | "Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism"; monopoly capital, finance capital exports; imperialism as inevitable outcome of capitalism; inter-imperialist wars inevitable |
| Kipling | "White Man's Burden" (1899) — racist justification: European duty to civilise non-white peoples; cultural imperialism rationale |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| MAIN Causes | Militarism (arms race); Alliances (Triple Entente vs Triple Alliance); Imperialism (competition for colonies); Nationalism (Pan-Slavism, Serbian nationalism, German nationalism) |
| Trigger | Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (heir to Austro-Hungarian throne) by Gavrilo Princip (Black Hand, Serbian nationalist) at Sarajevo, Bosnia — June 28, 1914 |
| Alliances | Allied/Entente Powers: France, Russia, Britain, Italy (1915), USA (1917), Japan; Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire, Bulgaria |
| Key Events | Schlieffen Plan (German quick western knockout); trench warfare on Western Front; Gallipoli (1915 — British failure, Anzac sacrifice); Battle of Somme (1916 — 57,000 British casualties on day 1); Battle of Verdun; US enters 1917 (Zimmermann Telegram + unrestricted submarine warfare); Russian withdrawal (Treaty of Brest-Litovsk 1918) |
| New Weapons | Poison gas (mustard gas), tanks (British, 1916), aircraft (reconnaissance + bombing), submarines (U-boats), machine guns, artillery — industrialised killing |
| End | Armistice: November 11, 1918; 20 million dead; Treaty of Versailles (June 1919) |
| Treaty of Versailles (1919) | Germany: war guilt clause (Article 231); ₹6.6 billion reparations; loss of 13% territory (Alsace-Lorraine to France; Polish Corridor; colonies); army limited to 100,000; humiliation → Hitler's rise |
| League of Nations | Woodrow Wilson's 14 Points; collective security; no US membership (Senate refused); no USSR initially; no teeth — Germany, Japan withdrew; failed to prevent WWII |
| India in WWI | 1.5 million Indian soldiers; Mesopotamia, Gallipoli, Western Front; Home Rule League (1916 — Tilak, Besant); Lucknow Pact (1916); Montagu-Chelmsford reforms (1919) |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Background | Autocratic Tsarist rule; 1905 Revolution (Bloody Sunday — peaceful protesters shot); Russo-Japanese War defeat (1905); agrarian backwardness; intelligentsia radicalism; Marxist parties |
| February Revolution 1917 | Food shortages + WWI deaths → Petrograd strikes + army mutiny; Tsar Nicholas II abdicated; Provisional Government (Kerensky) formed; continued war — fatal mistake |
| October Revolution 1917 | Bolsheviks under Lenin ("Peace, Land, Bread"); stormed Winter Palace; Provisional Government overthrown; Soviet (council) power; November 7, 1917 (Old Style: October) |
| Lenin's Innovations | Vanguard party of professional revolutionaries (What Is To Be Done? 1902); Soviets (workers councils) as state power; immediate peace (Treaty of Brest-Litovsk — gave up Ukraine, Poland, Baltic states); land redistribution; War Communism (1918–21); NEP (New Economic Policy 1921 — tactical retreat) |
| Civil War (1918–21) | Reds (Bolsheviks) vs. Whites (counter-revolutionaries + Allied forces); Reds won with Trotsky's leadership; Red Army; famines |
| Stalin's Rise | Lenin died 1924; Stalin vs. Trotsky; Stalin won; Five Year Plans (rapid industrialisation); collectivisation (forced — millions died); Gulag system; Great Purge (1936–38 — millions imprisoned/shot); cult of personality |
| Impact on India | Inspired Indian communists (CPI founded 1920); Bhagat Singh's socialism; Nehru's socialist ideas; Non-Aligned Movement later shaped by Cold War rivalry |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Causes | Versailles humiliation → German grievances; Great Depression (1929) → political radicalisation; Rise of Fascism (Hitler, Mussolini); Appeasement (Munich Agreement 1938 — Neville Chamberlain); Japanese expansionism; Soviet-Nazi Pact (Molotov-Ribbentrop, 1939) |
| Hitler's Rise | Nazi Party (National Socialist German Workers' Party); Mein Kampf; anti-Semitism, pan-German nationalism, anti-Communism; appointed Chancellor 1933; Third Reich; rearmament (violated Versailles) |
| Timeline | Sept 1, 1939: Germany invades Poland → Britain, France declare war; May 1940: Fall of France (Dunkirk evacuation); Battle of Britain (RAF vs. Luftwaffe); June 1941: Operation Barbarossa (Germany invades USSR); Dec 1941: Pearl Harbor → USA enters; 1942–43: Battle of Stalingrad (turning point on Eastern Front); June 6, 1944: D-Day (Normandy landing); May 8, 1945: VE Day (Germany surrenders); Aug 6, 9: Atomic bombs on Hiroshima, Nagasaki; Sept 2, 1945: VJ Day |
| Allies | USA, USSR, UK, France, China (Nationalist), India (British India); The Big Three: Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchill |
| Axis Powers | Germany (Hitler), Italy (Mussolini), Japan (Hirohito/Tojo); Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis (1936) |
| Holocaust | Systematic genocide of 6 million Jews + millions of Roma, disabled, Soviet POWs, homosexuals; Auschwitz, Treblinka, Sobibor death camps; Nuremberg Laws (1935); Kristallnacht (1938); Final Solution (Wannsee Conference 1942) |
| Atomic Bombs | Manhattan Project (USA — Oppenheimer); Hiroshima (Aug 6, 1945 — "Little Boy"); Nagasaki (Aug 9, 1945 — "Fat Man"); ~200,000 deaths; Japan surrendered; nuclear age began; Cold War arms race |
| Conferences | Tehran (1943); Yalta (Feb 1945 — post-war order); Potsdam (July 1945 — after Germany's surrender) |
| Post-War Order | UN founded (1945); Bretton Woods (IMF, World Bank); Marshall Plan; Nuremberg Trials; Partition of Germany; Iron Curtain; Cold War beginning |
| India in WWII | 3 million+ Indian soldiers; Bengal Famine 1943 (3 million deaths; Churchill's diversion of food); INA (Subhas Chandra Bose, Azad Hind Fauj, with Japan); Quit India Movement 1942 |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Definition | Ideological and geopolitical rivalry between USA (capitalism, democracy) and USSR (communism, one-party state) without direct military confrontation; proxy wars; arms race; space race |
| Origins | Ideological incompatibility; post-WWII power vacuum; Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe; Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech (1946); Truman Doctrine (1947) |
| Year | Event | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| 1947 | Truman Doctrine; Marshall Plan; India/Pakistan independence | Containment policy; US aid to Europe to resist communism |
| 1948–49 | Berlin Blockade + Airlift | USSR blocked W. Berlin; US/UK airlifted supplies; first Berlin crisis |
| 1949 | NATO formed; China becomes Communist (Mao Zedong); USSR tests atom bomb | Military alliances; communism spreads; nuclear balance |
| 1950–53 | Korean War | USA/UN vs. North Korea+China; ended in armistice; Korea divided at 38th parallel still |
| 1955 | Warsaw Pact; Bandung Conference (Non-Alignment) | Soviet military alliance; 29 Asian/African nations form Third World bloc |
| 1957 | Sputnik (USSR — first satellite) | Space race began; US felt technological vulnerability |
| 1961 | Berlin Wall built; Bay of Pigs (Cuba) | Division of Germany solidified; failed US-backed Cuban exile invasion |
| 1962 | Cuban Missile Crisis (Oct 1962) | USSR placed nuclear missiles in Cuba; 13-day standoff; Kennedy vs. Khrushchev; closest to nuclear war; resolved diplomatically (US no Cuba invasion pledge; Soviets remove missiles) |
| 1963 | Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (PTBT) | No atmospheric, underwater, outer space tests; first arms control agreement |
| 1969 | Moon Landing (Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong) | USA wins space race milestone; Nixon's détente with China begins |
| 1972 | Nixon visits China; SALT-I (arms control) | Triangular diplomacy; Sino-Soviet split exploited; détente period |
| 1979 | Soviet invasion of Afghanistan | USSR quagmire ("Soviet Vietnam"); US funded Mujahideen; Reagan Doctrine; USSR drained |
| 1985 | Gorbachev — Glasnost & Perestroika | Openness + restructuring → unintended opening; led to USSR dissolution |
| 1989 | Berlin Wall falls (Nov 9, 1989); Eastern European revolutions | Symbolic end of Cold War; Germany reunified (1990) |
| 1991 | USSR dissolved (Dec 25, 1991) | 15 successor states; Russia as heir; USA as sole superpower; End of Cold War |
| Doctrine | Country | Content |
|---|---|---|
| Truman Doctrine (1947) | USA | USA will support free peoples resisting subjugation by armed minorities or outside pressures; Greece, Turkey aid; containment begins |
| Marshall Plan (1948) | USA | $13 billion economic aid to rebuild Western Europe; prevent communist takeover; George Marshall |
| Eisenhower Doctrine (1957) | USA | US will intervene militarily to protect Middle Eastern nations from communist aggression |
| Nixon Doctrine (1969) | USA | US will provide military aid but expects Asian nations to handle own defence; reduced troops in Asia |
| Carter Doctrine (1980) | USA | Persian Gulf vital to US interests; US will use military force to repel Soviet moves in Gulf |
| Reagan Doctrine (1985) | USA | Support anti-communist guerrillas worldwide (Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Angola) to roll back Soviet-supported regimes |
| Brezhnev Doctrine (1968) | USSR | Once a country becomes socialist, it must remain so; USSR may intervene if socialism threatened (justified Czechoslovakia 1968) |
| Region/Country | Year of Independence | Colonial Power | Key Features |
|---|---|---|---|
| India | 1947 | Britain | Partition; Congress-Muslim League; Gandhi; Nehru; non-violent but violent partition |
| Indonesia | 1945/49 | Netherlands | Sukarno declared independence 1945; Dutch returned; war; independence 1949; Bandung Conference 1955 |
| Vietnam | 1954/1975 | France → USA | Ho Chi Minh; Dien Bien Phu 1954 (French defeat); Geneva Accords; division at 17th parallel; Vietnam War (US 1965–75); reunification 1975 |
| Ghana | 1957 | Britain | First sub-Saharan African country; Kwame Nkrumah; Pan-Africanism; "Ghana's independence is meaningless unless linked to total liberation of Africa" |
| Algeria | 1962 | France | Brutal war of independence (1954–62); FLN vs. France; 1 million Algerians died; Fanon — Wretched of the Earth |
| Congo | 1960 | Belgium | Patrice Lumumba (assassinated with US-Belgian complicity); Mobutu coup; Cold War proxy |
| Kenya | 1963 | Britain | Mau Mau uprising (1952–60); Jomo Kenyatta; independence under Commonwealth |
| Angola/Mozambique | 1975 | Portugal | Carnation Revolution in Portugal (1974) → colonies freed; civil wars followed |
| Zimbabwe (Rhodesia) | 1980 | Britain/White minority | UDI (1965); guerrilla war; Lancaster House Agreement; Mugabe's ZANU |
| Namibia | 1990 | South Africa (German earlier) | SWAPO; UN supervised; last African colony to gain independence; Sam Nujoma |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Origin | Bandung Conference (1955, Indonesia) — 29 Asian/African nations; 5 founders: Nehru (India), Nasser (Egypt), Sukarno (Indonesia), Tito (Yugoslavia), Nkrumah (Ghana) |
| 1st NAM Summit | Belgrade 1961; 25 founding members; Cold War middle path |
| Principles | Non-alignment with military blocs; opposition to colonialism/imperialism; sovereignty; peaceful coexistence; anti-racism (apartheid) |
| Relevance Today | 120 members (largest grouping after UN); post-Cold War relevance debated; India's "strategic autonomy" seen as modern NAM; Ukraine war — India abstained |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Background | Qing dynasty collapsed (1912); Republic under Sun Yat-sen; warlordism; Japanese invasion (1937); Civil War between CPC (Mao Zedong) and KMT (Chiang Kai-shek) |
| Long March (1934–35) | CPC retreat (6,000+ miles); Mao's leadership consolidated; source of Communist Party legitimacy myth |
| People's Republic | Oct 1, 1949 — Mao proclaimed PRC; KMT fled to Taiwan; US refused recognition for decades; UN seat disputed (China vs. Taiwan) until 1971 |
| Great Leap Forward (1958–62) | Forced collectivisation; backyard steel furnaces; agricultural disaster; ~30–45 million deaths (Great Chinese Famine); economic setback |
| Cultural Revolution (1966–76) | Red Guards; destroy "Four Olds"; intellectuals persecuted; Deng Xiaoping purged twice; ~1 million deaths; Gang of Four; Mao's radical phase |
| Deng Xiaoping (1978–) | "Reform and Opening Up"; Four Modernisations (agriculture, industry, S&T, defence); Special Economic Zones; Tiananmen Square (1989 — crackdown on pro-democracy protests); "One country, two systems" for HK/Macau |
| Sino-Soviet Split (1960) | Ideological differences (Khrushchev's de-Stalinisation); territorial disputes; both competing for communist leadership; China aligned with Third World; India sought to exploit but 1962 war changed equation |
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Apartheid | Afrikaans for "separateness"; policy of racial segregation by National Party (1948–1994); Blacks, Coloureds, Indians separated from Whites; pass laws; bantustans (homelands); separate amenities |
| Resistance | ANC (African National Congress, 1912); Nelson Mandela (Umkhonto we Sizwe — armed wing); Sharpeville Massacre (1960 — 69 killed, ANC banned); Mandela imprisoned (1964–1990, Robben Island) |
| International Pressure | UN sanctions; sports boycott; divestment campaigns; NAM solidarity; India first country to impose sanctions (1946); Cuba sent troops to Angola |
| End of Apartheid | F.W. de Klerk unbanned ANC (1990); Mandela released Feb 1990; negotiations; first multiracial election April 1994; Mandela elected President; Truth and Reconciliation Commission (Archbishop Desmond Tutu) |
| Event | Year | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm) | 1991 | Iraq invaded Kuwait (1990); US-led coalition expelled Iraq; US military supremacy demonstrated; "New World Order" (Bush Sr.) |
| Rwandan Genocide | 1994 | 800,000 Tutsis killed in 100 days; UN failed to intervene; "Never Again" failure; led to UN reform on R2P (Responsibility to Protect) |
| 9/11 Attacks | 2001 | Al-Qaeda attacked USA (WTC, Pentagon); Bush declared "War on Terror"; Afghanistan invasion (Oct 2001); Iraq War (2003 — WMD pretext, now discredited) |
| Arab Spring | 2010–12 | Popular uprisings across Arab world (Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Bahrain); Ben Ali, Mubarak, Gaddafi fell; Syria descended into civil war; ISIS rose from Iraq/Syria chaos |
| Ukraine Crisis | 2014/2022 | Russia annexed Crimea (2014); Russia invaded Ukraine (Feb 24, 2022); NATO-Russia tensions; global food/energy crisis; India's strategic autonomy tested; UNSC paralysed (Russian veto) |
| Rise of China | 2000s–present | GDP 2nd largest (2010); BRI (2013); AIIB (2015); South China Sea disputes; 2030 target to be largest economy; US-China rivalry defining 21st century geopolitics |
| Brexit | 2016/2020 | UK voted to leave EU (52:48); Article 50 triggered; UK left EU Jan 2020; Ireland/Scotland implications; UK-EU trade deal; implications for multilateralism |
| COVID-19 Pandemic | 2020–22 | Wuhan, China (Dec 2019); global pandemic; 7 million+ deaths; India's Vaccine Maitri; supply chain disruption; vaccine nationalism; WHO reform debate |
| Gaza War | 2023– | Hamas attack Oct 7, 2023; Israeli response; 40,000+ Palestinian deaths; ICJ case (South Africa vs. Israel); UN ceasefire resolutions vetoed by US; India's balancing act |
| Institution | Founded | HQ | India's Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| United Nations (UN) | 1945 (51 founding members; now 193) | New York | Founding member; largest peacekeeping contributor; UNSC reform bid |
| IMF | 1944 (Bretton Woods) | Washington DC | India borrower historically; SDR allocation; calls for quota reform |
| World Bank (IBRD) | 1944 | Washington DC | Largest multilateral lender to India; infrastructure, education, health projects |
| GATT → WTO | 1947 (GATT); WTO 1995 | Geneva | India active negotiator; food security waiver; TRIPS flexibilities for pharma |
| NATO | 1949 | Brussels | India not member; NATO expansion debate (Ukraine); India watches carefully |
| SEATO/CENTO | 1954/1955 | — | US Cold War alliances; India rejected; Pakistan joined SEATO and CENTO |
| Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) | 1968 | — | India NOT signatory; 2008 NSG waiver; Article VI (disarmament) India cites |
| UNFCCC (Paris Agreement) | 1992 (UNFCCC); 2015 (Paris) | Bonn, Germany | NDC commitments; solar alliance; CDRI; net zero by 2070; common but differentiated responsibilities |
| ICC (International Criminal Court) | 2002 (Rome Statute 1998) | The Hague | India NOT a signatory; issued warrant for Putin (2023) |
| Philosophy | Core Tenets | Key Thinkers | Historical Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capitalism | Private ownership; free market; profit motive; limited government; individual freedom; comparative advantage | Adam Smith (Wealth of Nations, 1776); Milton Friedman; Hayek | USA, UK, post-war Western Europe |
| Socialism | Social ownership of means of production; planned/mixed economy; redistribution; welfare state; collective responsibility | Marx, Engels (Communist Manifesto 1848); Proudhon; Fabian Society (Shaw, Webb) | Scandinavian model; post-independence India (mixed economy) |
| Communism | No private property; classless society; state withers away (Marx); vanguard party (Lenin); centralised state control in practice | Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Lenin, Mao, Gramsci | USSR, China, Cuba, North Korea, Vietnam |
| Fascism | Ultranationalism; totalitarianism; single-party state; cult of leader; anti-communism; corporatist economy; glorification of violence/war | Benito Mussolini (coined term 1919); Georges Sorel; Schmitt | Italy (Mussolini 1922–43); Germany (Nazism, Hitler 1933–45); Spain (Franco) |
| Liberalism | Individual rights; civil liberties; democracy; rule of law; free trade; separation of powers; social contract | Locke, Mill, Tocqueville, Rawls, Berlin (positive/negative liberty) | USA constitution; UK parliamentary model; EU |
| Anarchism | No state; voluntary cooperation; anti-hierarchical; direct action; property is theft (Proudhon) | Proudhon, Bakunin, Kropotkin, Emma Goldman | Paris Commune (1871); Spanish Civil War Anarchist factions |