|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Visual History of the World
(CONTENTS)
|
|
|
The Contemporary World
1945 to the present
|
After World War II, a new
world order came into being in which two superpowers, the United
States and the Soviet Union, played the leading roles. Their
ideological differences led to the arms race of the Cold War and
fears of a global nuclear conflict. The rest of the world was also
drawn into the bipolar bloc system, and very few nations were able
to remain truly non-aligned. The East-West conflict came to an end
in 1990 with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the consequent
downfall of the Eastern Bloc. Since that time, the world has been
driven by the globalization of worldwide economic and political
systems. The world has, however, remained divided: The rich nations
of Europe, North America, and East Asia stand in contrast to the
developing nations of the Third World.
|
The first moon landing made science-fiction dreams reality in the
year 1969.
Space technology has made considerable progress as the search for
new
possibilities of using space continues.
|
|
|
|
|
Contemporary History
since 1945
see also:
United Nations
member states
ART OF THE 20TH CENTURY
Artists
that Changed the World
Design and Posters
Photography
MODERNIST
LITERATURE
CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY
CLASSICAL MUSIC-The Modern Age
|
|
1 US nuclear test on the Bikini Atoll, 1952
2
Disarmament negotiations in Moscow, 1991
3 The Love Parade music festival, Berlin, 1997
|
|
The outcome of World War II in 1945 was devastating: Approximately 55
million deaths worldwide, some 20 million refugees, and wide swaths of
Europe and Asia destroyed. The mass murder of the European Jews by the
Nazi regime and its collaborators meant an upheaval in modern
civilization to an extent previously unknown. Many efforts of
international politics in the immediate postwar period were aimed at
preventing future catastrophes of this kind.
|
|
Between the East-West Conflict and Globalization
|
The world political situation between 1945 and 1989 was definitively
shaped by the East-West conflict. The new leading powers—the United
States and the Soviet Union—each attempted to leave their stamp on the
postwar order. Due to their opposing views of government and economics,
a fault line quickly became visible, and soon the world powers stood
opposite one another in a "Cold War." An increasing number of nations
became involved in the face-off and aligned themselves with one of the
two power blocs.
The competition expressed itself in an accelerating
arms race that meant a growing danger of global
1 nuclear annihilation.
To avoid being subsumed by the bloc system, many former colonies, the
majority of which gained independence after World War II, became part of
the Nonaligncd Movement.
|
4 West German border
guards at the Berlin Wall,
1978
|
The end of the Cold War came with the opening of the western Hungarian
border and the fall of the 4 Berlin Wall in 1989 and was
2 cemented in
1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Though the world did find
peace, the number of wars and conflicts between individual states—often
ethnically or religiously motivated—has increased and nuclear,
biological, and chemical weapons have come into even more hands.
In the meantime, world politics is now strongly defined by the process
of globalization. Europe, East Asia, and North America are the centers
of this development, but through the integration of the whole world into
an overarching economic and communication network, political and
economic decisions often have cross-border effects. Since 1945, as in no
other time period before, mankind has made progress in almost all areas
of knowledge. However, the fruits of this progress are unequally
distributed. It is mainly the Western industrialized nations that have
benefited from the wealth globalization has brought. The world political
conflict lines no longer run between East and West but between North and
South, between rich and poor. Another new source of conflict is
international terrorism. Combating it and its causes effectively is a
major challenge of the 21st century.
|
|
|
Lifestyle and Values
|
In the affluent countries of the world, lifestyle and general values
concepts have changed enormously in the last 50 years.
As the length of
education has increased, 3 youth, which was previously only a short
preliminary stage before adulthood, has lengthened to become a stage of
life in itself.
Tied to wealth and beauty, youth has become an ideal
that shapes economics, advertising, and everyday life. Since the 1960s,
a new leisure culture has emerged; vacations and travel have become
important elements of modern life and a booming industrial sector. Since
the 1960s, automation in almost all fields has meant that much of the
heavy physical labor of working life has been taken away. This has
opened up new jobs, particularly for women. These new jobs are often
found in the service sector, which has a high standing everywhere.
A development that has taken place very recently in the Western world is
a turn away from traditional Christianity combined with an intensified search for the meaning of life.
The orientation
toward esoteric or 5 East Asian lifestyles has increased, yet the search
for happiness has been subordinated to constantly changing fashions.
5 Yin and yang: Taoist symbol
showing the balance between opposites
On
the other hand, at the turn of the millennium, religious fundamentalism,
particularly in Islam and Christianity, has strengthened in
6
opposition, sometimes violently expressed, to the new Western lifestyle
characterized by unchecked worldliness and secularism that has spread
throughout the world as a standard.
|
|
The Mass Market of Culture and Knowledge
|
Cultural trends today circulate ever faster and wider and are
increasingly subordinated to the laws of the marketplace. While, for
example, music in the 1940s was limited to recreational and free-time
entertainment, since the 1970s it has accompanied people wherever they
go. Thus popular music has gained significance in comparison to
classical music. Pop music exceeds itself in the rapid development and
displacement of separate fashions and styles to satisfy the demand for
easily consumed entertainment.
"High culture" has become more diverse and complex.
|
10 Streifenbild IV by
Sigmar Polke, 1968
|
New styles and
trends, such as 10 abstract painting, have established themselves
worldwide.
By the 1970s at the latest, talk of phases and movements was
almost impossible, and one can now talk at most of schools. Distinctions
between different art forms arc no longer as clear-cut as they once
were.
The developmental acceleration since 194s also characterizes science.
Never before have there been so many scientists, never before has
research advanced so rapidly, and never before was there such a strong
differentiation between research areas. English has asserted itself as
the universal language of science.
Newspapers present research findings
quicker than books can, but the fastest and simplest form of knowledge
communication today is the 7 Internet, to which an increasing number of
people have access.
see also:
Sigmar Polke
|
|
|
Successes and Dangers of Progress
|
The scientific and technological successes of the last 60 years have
been astounding. Cars, airplanes, radio, television, mainframe and
personal computers, and the Internet have made the world smaller.
In
1969 the first humans stood on the 9 moon, and after 1987, the space
station Mir made prolonged life in space possible.
9 First moon landing by the
United States, July 20, 1969
Medicine has made
such progress that fear of epidemics such as cholera and polio no longer
defines life, although new epidemics such as AIDS continue to emerge. At
the turn of the millennium, telecommunication became mobile. Almost all
the knowledge of mankind is available and can be accessed anytime,
anywhere.
Even at the pinnacle of the belief in progress, however, the downside to
the "always more, always further" motto became obvious. With the 1970s
oil crisis, an end to the oil supply became conceivable, and the
consequences this could have worldwide became foreseeable.
Global damage
to the environment and the advanced destruction of the
8 Earth's
atmosphere have emerged as the downside of industrial progress.
|
|
Even the
supposedly clean nuclear energy has, after the nuclear reactor
catastrophe of 11 Chernobyl, left damage that will continue to have an
effect for centuries.
In a globalized world, the protection of the
environment can. like the struggle against poverty and the containment
of violence, perhaps only be achieved through agreements on a global
scale, between states. These are the challenges with which the world is
faced in the 21st century.
11 Baby malformed by the effects
of the Chernobyl disaster, 1986
|
|
|
6
Demonstration against "un-lslamic" clothing, Iran, 2004
7 Buddhist monks
surf the Internet, 2005
8
Ozone hole (dark blue) over the Antarctic, 2000
|
|
|
|
|
