IB History Thematic Study 3: Authoritarian Rule Key Definitions

The catastrophic collapse in the value of the German mark in 1923, driven by the Ruhr occupation crisis, which destroyed the savings of much of the German middle class.

The joint invasion of Egypt by Britain, France, and Israel in October-November 1956 following Nasser's nationalisation of the Suez Canal, ending in a political victory for Egypt under international and US-Soviet pressure.

Early legal measures taken by Castro's government banning racial discrimination in employment and public life, though without dismantling deeper structural inequalities.

A nationwide mobilisation in which thousands of young volunteers were sent to teach reading and writing in rural Cuba, reducing illiteracy from around 23.6 percent to around 3.9 percent within a year.

Mass protests by workers and students in Helwan and Cairo in February 1968, triggered by lenient sentences given to military officers blamed for Egypt's defeat in the 1967 Six-Day War.

A Cuban law requiring both spouses to share household and childcare duties equally, intended to promote gender equality within the family alongside women's expanding workforce participation.

Cuba's formal socialist constitution, adopted in 1976, which established the Communist Party as the leading force in society and formalised the structures of one-party rule.

The revolutionary organization founded by Fidel Castro in 1955, named after the date of the failed Moncada Barracks attack. It led the guerrilla campaign against Batista from the Sierra Maestra mountains.

The annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in March 1938, uniting the two countries in violation of the Treaty of Versailles.

A mass political campaign launched by Mao Zedong in response to criticism expressed during the Hundred Flowers Campaign (1956–1957). When intellectuals, academics, and party members used the invitation to "let a hundred flowers bloom" to criticise the CCP's policies, Mao abruptly reversed course. An estimated 550,000 people were labelled "rightists", losing their jobs, being sent to labour camps, or suffering public denunciation. The campaign effectively silenced intellectual dissent in China for decades.

The single legal political party established by Nasser in 1962, intended to represent workers, peasants, and other social groups within a one-party socialist structure.

The forced transfer of Jewish-owned businesses and property to non-Jewish German ownership, typically at unfairly low prices, escalating sharply after the 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom.

A major hydroelectric and irrigation dam on the Nile, funded primarily by the Soviet Union after the US and Britain withdrew financing, completed in 1970 as a flagship project of Nasser's modernisation programme.

A system of government where power is concentrated in a single leader or small group, with limited political freedoms, restricted media, and little accountability to the population. In Egypt, authoritarian rule persisted from the 1952 Free Officers' coup through Nasser, Sadat and Mubarak, and was restored under el-Sisi after 2013.

Rural health workers given basic medical training from the late 1960s onward to bring healthcare to areas with no doctors, part of Mao's wider effort to extend welfare provision into the countryside.

The authoritarian government of Fulgencio Batista, established through a March 1952 coup, characterised by corruption, US business influence, and repression, ultimately overthrown by Castro's revolution.

The 1940 air campaign in which the Royal Air Force successfully defended Britain against the German Luftwaffe, preventing a planned German invasion and marking Hitler's first major military setback.

A prolonged and catastrophic battle on the Eastern Front, ending in the destruction of the German Sixth Army in early 1943, marking the definitive turning point of the war against Germany.

A failed CIA-backed invasion of Cuba in April 1961 by Cuban exiles attempting to overthrow Castro. Its failure strengthened Castro's position domestically and pushed Cuba closer to the Soviet Union.

Argentine revolutionary and close ally of Castro who fought in the Cuban Revolution and became a central figure in its propaganda and international image before his death in Bolivia in 1967.

A system introduced under Mao that formally classified every Chinese family according to its pre-1949 economic and social status, such as landlord, rich peasant, or poor peasant, determining access to education, employment, and political rights, often for generations.

An agricultural policy in which private farms are combined into large state-controlled or cooperative farms. In Vietnam, collectivization was imposed on the south after 1975, eliminating private land ownership and requiring farmers to work collectively under government direction.

The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, established in January 1949 to coordinate economic development within the Soviet bloc. COMECON standardised trade, technical norms, and production across member states, supplied Soviet energy to Eastern Europe at below-market prices, and integrated Eastern European economies in ways that served Soviet interests. It was dissolved in 1991.

Neighbourhood-level organizations established in 1960 to defend the revolution. CDRs organized community services (vaccination drives, blood donations, literacy programmes) but also monitored political loyalty and reported dissent. By the mid-1960s, around 80% of Cuba's adult population belonged to a CDR.