SYLLABUS OUTLINE

Term 1

Causes of International Conflict:

1) Ideological
• Korean War, Cold War
2) Nationalism
• Secession: Nigerian Civil War - Biafra
• Irredentism: Sudetenland, Greece-Cyprus enosis
3) Territorial
• Spratly Islands
4) Historical
• Arab-Israeli
• Rwandan Civil War

Arab-Israeli: Causes of the conflict

1) Colonial legacy
• McMahon Letters, Balfour Declaration
2) Conflicting religious claims
• Jews: god-given land
• Arabs: Dome of the Rock
3) Arab and Israel nationalism
• Zionism vs Pan-Arabism

Arab-Israeli: Involvement of the Superpowers

1) Suez War, 1956
• USSR: Czechoslovakia arms deal (1955)
• US: cancel grant of 46 million dollars - dam, Eisenhower Doctrine (1957)
2) Six Day War, 1967
• USSR: supplied weaponry, encouraged Egypt and Syria, anti-Israeli propaganda
• US: gave tacit support to Israel (Dean Rusk and Abba Eban) - lack of moderating influence
3) Yom Kippur War, 1973
• US: pressured Israel, ceasefire - as USSR advisors expelled

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 Arab-Israeli: Peace Efforts
1) Camp David Treaty, 1978
• Israel return Sinai to Egypt
• autonomy to Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza
• Egypt supply Israel with oil
• Anwar Sadat assassinated
2) Madrid Peace Conference, 1991
• Israeli govt refused to stop settlements in West Bank
• public failure
3) Oslo Accords, 1993
• Israel and PLO recognized each other
• PLO promised to give up terrorism
• Palestinians given limited self-rule in Jericho and part of Gaza
• Yitzak Rabin assassinated

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 ASEAN:
1) Security Challenge: Spillover Effect of Domestic Conflicts
• refugees from Aceh to Malaysia
• Sabah providing support to Moro separatists (Philippines)
• Thailand suspicious over Malaysia’s sympathy for Muslim separatists in S. Thailand
• pursuit by Myanmar military of 100,000 Karen refugees fleeing to Thailand
2) Security Challenge: Territorial Disputes
• Malaysia-Singapore: Pedra Branca
• Malaysia-Indonesia: Sipadan and Litigan
• Malaysia-Thai: common border
• Malaysia-Brunei: Limbang
• Malaysia-Philippines: Sabah
• Thai-Cambodia: Preah Vihear
• Spratly Islands
3) Security Challenge: Lingering Animosities
• Singapore and Malaysia: Israel President’s visit to Singapore in 1986
• Malaysia’s suspension of bilateral exercises with S’pore: discovered spy ring
• Singapore-Philippines: execution of Filipino maid (1995) - withdrawal of ambassadors
4) Economic Cooperation: Lack of Intra-ASEAN Trade
• harmful effects of regional integration on natl ec. devt.
• undermine competitiveness of ASEAN economies
• formation of AFTA (1992)
5) Economic Cooperation: Collective Bargaining
• secure better commodity prices (Japan: price of natural rubber)
• secure better market access for ASEAN products
• maintain united position at Tokyo and Uruguay rounds of GATT
6) Economic Cooperation: NETs
• natural economic territories - market-driven approach
• Singapore-Johor-Riau (SIJORI)
• Indonesia-Malaysia-Thailand Growth Triangle (IMT-GT)
• straddle disputed territory: more positive climate for bil. relations
• subject to interstate security relations: e.g. Indonesia refuse to attend BIMP-EAGA meeting - East Timor
• unequal distribution of benefits: Singapore in SIJORI
7) Defence Cooperation
• bilateral: threat-oriented cooperation as unduly provocative
• Thai invitation for multilateral exercise fell through

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 Term 2

Causes of Sino-Soviet Split

1) Ideological Differences
• Peaceful co-existence
• Revisionist vs Warmonger
• Atom bomb: paper tiger
2) De-Stalinization
• Mao supported Stalin ideologically and politically
• Peaceful co-existence threatened Mao’s ‘lean-to-one-side’
• USSR retreating ideologically and militarily
• no longer guaranteeing support to China in a Sino-American War
3) Rivalry over Leadership
• China took efforts to elevate Mao’s status as an equal with Stalin
• Anna Louis Strong: Dawn Out of China
• 1995 Bandung Conference
• Hungarian Revolt
• extended influence beyond Asia, provided alternative voice to USSR
4) USSR’s lack of support for China’s military conflicts
• 1958: China attacked Quemoy, Khrushchev waited 20 days
• 1959: China-Indian border dispute - India a ‘bourgeois democracy’
5) Building of long-wave radio stations and setting up of joint fleet
• 1958: USSR proposed long-wave radio stations in China, assume 70% of cost
• China asked for aid for its newly-built navy, USSR invited China to set up joint fleet
• Mao - despised by USSR, ‘subject 10k kilometer coastline to USSR’s military protection’

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 Reasons for Sino-American Detente:
1) China’s Security Threat: Border
• 1969: Zhen Bao island, Ussuri River
• increasing US military involvement in Vietnam
• possible repeat of Korean War, liable to be attacked on two fronts
2) China’s Security Threat: Soviet Policy of Containment
• 1969: Alexei Kosygin visited India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, NK, Mongolia, Burma, Laos, Cambodia, Japan
• proposed regional economic group, collective security plan
• criticized Mao for imposing a new slavery around young nations
3) China’s Economic Needs
• any devt of military strength required firm industrial capacity
• can only be generated from closer trade with US
4) US: Strengthen hand against USSR
• more favourable attitude towards China, convince her of feasibility of forming new relationship
• USSR mutual threat
• greater bargaining leverage against USSR
5) US: Vietnam War
• honorable withdrawal from Vietnam

Results of Sino-American Detente:

1) Taiwan Issue
• mid-1977: Gallup poll
• 1979: US withdrew recognition of ROC
2) Trade
• trade balance in US favour
• resolve American balance-of-payment problem
3) Triangular Relations
• leverage over USSR
• 3 months after China visit, signed SALT agreement
4) China’s International Status
• 1971: gained entry into UN
• leader of Third World countries

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 Causes of Sino-Japanese Tensions:
1) Security
• China’s fear over Japan’s possible remilitarization
• Japanese fear over China’s naval hegemony, nuclear capability
2) Historical
• textbook controversy - Japanese has not issued apology
• collective amnesia
• PM Hashimoto
• medical experiments Unit 731, comfort women
3) Territorial
• Senkaku Islands - 1978 and 2010

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 Term 3

Reasons for the Boom (1920s):

1) Impact of WWI
• one-way trade, enable US to take over European markets
• increased demand for products like explosives - range of by-products
• little competition from European businesses
2) Republican Policy: Laissez-Faire
• allow businesses to operate with little regulation
• allow forces of free market to influence supply and consumption patterns
3) Republican Policy: High Tariffs
• 1922: Fordney-McCumber Act
• guaranteed market
4) Republican Policy: Tax Reductions
• 1924, 1926, 1928: Andrew Mellon - $3.5b
• allow them to expand businesses even more, offset any loss of govt revenue
5) Government Support of Trusts
• US Steel, Standard Oil, Middle West Utilities
• By 1929, the largest 200 corporations controlled 20% of the nation’s wealth
• able to dominate industry - benefit from e.o.s.
• benefit from discount purchasing, engage specialists, R&D
• dominate industry - manufacture cheaply yet sustain profits - increased demand, more jobs, more employment, more demand
6) Technological Advances
• mass-based production
• motor vehicle industry, electronic consumer goods industry

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 Impact of the Boom (1920s):
1) Uneven Distribution: Industries
• new industries can benefit from mass based pdn
• old industries - uncompetitive
• farming industry: overproduction, tariffs
2) Uneven Distribution: Region
• new industries set up in North East and Far West (per capita income of $8-900)
• south east: leargely agrarian-based (less than 50% of that)
3) Dominance of Big Business
• Holding companies and cartels -- keep prices high, wages low
• Insull - 111 subsidiaries
4) Instability of Employment
• Women still in menial labour, expected homemaking
• 85% still lived in the South - poorest

Reasons for the Great Depression (1920s-30s):

1) Speculation
• est 10% of all households
• buy on the margin - pay only 10%
• prosperity driven by state of mind - bull run could only sustain as long as people believed prices will keep rising
2) Weakness of the Banking System
• Federal Reserve Board - own interests
• did not curb speculation, pursued policies which encouraged speculation
• reduced rediscount rate from 4% to 3.5%
• bought govt securities - gave banks more money to lend to risky ventures
3) Domestic Overproduction and Maldistribution of Income
• bottom 40% of population received 12.5% of wealth
• industrialists did not increase wages - wage only increased by 1.4% real terms
• est: a family needed to earn $2000 a year but 60% of families earning less than that
• inequitable distribution of wealth meant that a pattern of underconsumption was bound to set in
• glut of consumer goods
4) Falling Demand for Exports
• other countries cannot afford American goods due to Fordney-McCumber tariff
• retaliatory tariffs

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 Reasons for McCarthyism (1950s):
1) US Containment Policy
• renewed fear of communist expansion
• fear of USSR spreading their influence among Americans living within the country
• cases such as the Rosenberg (atom bomb) and Alger Hiss - government susceptible to infiltration
• Federal Employee Loyalty Program already in place - investigated 3 mil federal employees, 200 resigned
• House Un-American Activities Committee
2) Party Politics
• Democrats dominated since 1933
• government allied with USSR
• Truman continued Roosevelt’s liberal social welfare policies
3) Public Sentiment
• assurance that government was doing something against the Red Menace
• US public did not feel the US was doing well in the cold war, esp Korea
• Catholic church, Poles
4) Joseph McCarthy
• 205 communist party members in State Department
• chairman of GCOS
• used his committee was a weapon to increase his own position
• bullying, false accusations
• over 100 lecturers fired

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 Martin Luther King, Jr’s Role in the Civil Rights Movement (1960s):
1) Means of Non-violent Protest
• only realistic strategy: any other would have resulted in more violent backlash
• in theory, they already had equal civil & political rights - Civil War amendments
• shame America into recognizing the fact
• use of media, link to Decl. of Indp. & Constitution - occupy higher moral and political ground
• speech at Lincoln Memorial - over 250,000 supporters - leader and conscience of the civil rights movement
2) SCLC
• trained civil rights activists in techniques of non-violent protest
• umbrella organization to unite and provide direction to other civil rights groups
• from 1957-1965: unofficial leader of the CRM
• SCLC provided inspiration to other organizations (e.g. Greensboro sit-ins 1960 - formed SNCC)
• coordinated with the activities of local organizations like the Montgomery Improvement Association
• affiliation with churches and advocacy of nonviolence - frame the struggle in moral terms
3) Link between CRM and Government
• met Kennedy twice
• Robert Kennedy helped get King out of an Atlanta jail
• forged link between Kennedy administration and Robert Kennedy - Attorney General
• Robert Kennedy intervened on a number of occasions to help the cause of educational integration
4) Counter: nonviolent tactics ineffective
• left results dictated by opponents
• when faced with shrewd opponents like Laurie Pritchett in Albany - refused to use violence - did not work
• black nationalists like Malcolm X and Nation of Islam felt that force was justified
• King had to compromise during the march in Selma due to attacks (Bloody Sunday)
5) Counter: Area of influence in South only
• in the North, marginal role - failed several times
• campaign for increased voter registration (1958-60) had no impact
• King went to Chicago to lead demonstration - hostile reaction from Polish Americans - stoned his march
• SNCC and CORE also became detached from King, became more radical (Stokely Carmichael)

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