Transcript Document

The Reagan Revolution
Social Change and Foreign Policy
Study Guide Identifications
Supply side economics/Reaganomics
Carter Corollary
Reagan Doctrine
Operation Cyclone
Camp David Accords 1978
Feminization of Poverty
“New Right”
“Religious Right”
Sandanistas vs. Contras/“freedom fighters”
Renewed Cold war/Evil Empire
Mikhail Gorbachev/End of Soviet Union
Iran Contra Affair/Boland Amendments/NSC
Study Guide Questions
What was the legacy of the 1960’s?
What changes took place concerning identity
and women’s roles, or questions of women’s
roles?
What Characterized the “New Right”?
What was the Conservative Social Agenda?
What was foreign policy under Reagan?
Legacy of the 1960s Activism
Came to characterize American political life
Mass demonstrations - Protest advocacy tool.
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1980s - Clamshell alliance
 Against a nuclear reactor
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“Take Back the Night”
 Protest sexual assault and violence
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1995 Million Man March
 Campaign of social reconstruction in black communities
Mass demonstrations - lost power to attract
media
Women’s Roles
Ideas of domesticity
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Reality much different
Birth control pill - sexual behavior.
 Many women questioned gender based divisions in both
public and private sectors.
1970’s-80s activism
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Distribution of political power
Feminization of poverty
Women’s self-sufficiency
Group Identity
Increased emphasis on group identity as the
basis for social activism grew
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Cultural differences among Americans should be
affirmed rather than feared, celebrated rather
than simply tolerated.
Battles against discrimination and for cultural pride
continued
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African American
American Indian
Asian
Mexican
Homosexual Movements
Efforts to Reform American
Foreign Policy
Ford & Jimmy Carter Administrations in the
mid 1970s
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Cost of Vietnam – speed decline of U.S. as super
power
Salt I & II treaties with Soviet Union
 Negotiate strategic arms control & relative peace
Carter promise of commitment to Human
Rights
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Condemned policies that allowed the U.S. to
support right wing monarch and military dictators
in the name of anti-communism
Carter’s Reform Efforts
Reform CIA & discourage intervention and
covert action abroad
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Make the CIA act within the law, rather than
above the law
 Temporary changes
Camp David Accords
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1978 terms for peace in the Middle East
Negotiations between Israel, Egypt & Palestine
 Anwar el-Sadat (Egypt), Prime Minister Menachem Begin
(Israel), Arafat (PLO)
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Conflict since Israel established in 1948 by Balfour
Declaration following World War II
Panama, Nicaragua, Afghanistan
& Iran Under Carter
Negotiated return of Panama Canal
Zone to Panama by 2000
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following independence movement or
revolt against United States control
1979 Sandanista Movement overthrows
dictator and U.S. ally Anastasio Somoza
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Plea for U.S. support denied by Carter
Afghanistan Under Carter
Administration
1979 Soviet Occupation of Afghanistan
 Carter: "The Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan is the greatest threat to
peace since the Second World War".
30,000 troops sent to crush Islamic
independence movement against
Soviet influence and control
Carter argued that soviet presence
“posed a grave threat to the free
movement of Middle East oil”
Carter Corollary to the Monroe
Doctrine
Affirmed right of the military force to protect the
interests in the Persian Gulf
 Halted exports to Soviet Union
 Canceled U.S. participation in the Moscow
Olympics
 Supported Afghanistan Resistance against soviet
occupation
 In May 1985, the seven principal rebel
organizations formed the Seven Party
Mujahideen Alliance to coordinate their
military operations against the Soviet army.
 Operation Cyclone: CIA under Carter &
Reagan provided aid
 Armed the Afghan Mujahideen 1979 – 1989,
20 billion
 Increased military spending
Iran Hostage Crisis
November 4, 1979 Iranian fundamentalists
seized the US embassy in Tehran and held 52
American employees hostage for 444 days.
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Pahlavi Royal family as the shah of Iran in 1953
 millions of dollars into the economy and armed military.
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In 1979 a revolution led by the Islamic leader
Ayatollah Tuhollah Khomenini had overthrown the
Shah.
 Carter allowed the Shah to seek refuge in California
 retaliated by taking American staff as hostages.
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Attempts to return the hostages failed.
Election of 1980
Walter Mondale & Geraldine Ferraro
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Emphasized growing deficit, raise in taxes, called
attention to the citizens denied prosperity in
America
Ronald Reagan and former CIA director and
Texas Oil executive H.W. Bush.
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Choice between a (D) “government of pessimism,
fear and limits” or his own based on “Hope,
Confidence and growth.”
 Reagan began with an inauguration that cost millions of
dollars, Nancy’s wardrobe cost $25,000
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Began a show and celebration of wealth and power that
would prevail
His election interpreted by supporters as a mandate for
conservatism that had been growing since the Nixon years
Reagan’s Political Objectives
Limit state support for welfare and social services
Expand state power to enforce law and order
Championed anti-communism
Tapped the resentment over rising property taxes & high
inflation
Backlash against
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Anti-war movement
counterculture
Women’s liberation
Urban uprisings
Emphasized “family issues”
 Opposed sex education, abortion rights, gay liberation
 Opposed the passage of the Equal Rights Amendment
c. Emergence of “New Right”
Backlash against liberalism of 1960s
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Framed goals in terms of emphasis of “Moral Values”
Largest component of movement were evangelical or born
again protestants
Opposed re-treat from anti-communist foreign policy &
domestic programs that addressed poverty and equality
Religious right
 Protestants, fundamentalists, Evangelical
churches.
 Battled to prevent the IRS from denying tax-exempt
status to private Christian colleges that opposed racial
integration
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Roe Vs. Wade
 mobilized fundamentalists and evangelical
leaders joined with the Catholic conservatives
in opposing abortion.
Conservative Social Agenda
National Conservative Political Action Committee, the
Conservative Caucus, the Moral Majority
 No separation of church & state
 Defending family values - by opposing abortion
and “degenerate” life styles
 The Male-headed nuclear family needs
protection from moral wrongs of homosexuals
and feminists.
 Education : New ideas such as multiculturalism
and feminism dangerous
 Movement towards reinterpreting history from
a multicultural non-traditional perspective is
under fire.
Reagan Revolution
Rejected the activist welfare states legacy of
the New Deal Era
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Rejected Keynesian economics
 traditionally favored moderate tax cuts and increases in
government spending to stimulate the economy and
reduce unemployment, by putting money in peoples
pockets, greater consumer demand would lead to
economic expansion.
Supply-siders or Reaganomics
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called for simultaneous tax cuts and reductions in
public spending, this would give private
entrepreneurs and investors greater incentives to
start business, take risks, invest capital and create
new wealth and jobs.
Supply Side Economics
Reaganomics
The Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981
 benefited the richest fraction of the
population that derives most of its income
from rent, dividends and interest instead of
from wages.
The Omnibus Reconciliation Act of 1981
 cut social and cultural programs, hardest
hit areas included education, environment,
health, housing, urban aid, food stamps,
research on synthetic fuels and the arts
Greatly increased the defense budget
Anti organized labor –
 13,000 federal employees all members of
the Professional Air Traffic Controllers
Organization went who went on strike in
1981, he fired all of them. By 1990 15% of
workers belonged to a labor union
Deregulation
 weakened rules that governed
environmental protection, workplace
safety, consumer protection to increase the
efficiency and productivity of business.
 Large corporations, wall street stock
brokerages, investment banking houses,
savings and loan industry were allowed to
operate with a much freer hand than ever
before.
George Gilder, conservative author of Wealth and
Poverty (1988)
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summarized this economic theory: “ A
successful economy depends on the
proliferation of the rich.”
 Politically supply-siders look to reward the
most loyal republican constituencies , the
affluent and business community.
 They reduce the flow of federal dollars to two
core democratic constituencies: the recipients
and professional providers of health and
welfare programs.
Promise & Reality
Promise to balance the budget
Reality National debt tripled from 914
billion (1980) to 2.7 Trillion (1989)
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Fiscal crisis became a structural problem
 Supply side economics ultimately reversed
America from being the leading creditor nation
in the world to a debtor nation (340 Billion)
Best & Worst Time, Reagan and
American popular culture
Popular culture
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Celebration of wealth, money making and
entrepreneurship
Dominated 1980s to present
Greater Inequality
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Middle class shrinking, poverty rising
Promise of Middle class status
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Fewer able to improve living standards or reach
the middle class
Reagan’s Promise to Restore
World Supremacy
Increased military spending
Foreign policy
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Revival of cold war patriotism
Championed U.S. Interventionism
 Intervened in Caribbean, Latin and South America
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Anti-communist Rhetoric centerpiece for foreign
policy
 Labeled the Soviet Union as the “Evil Empire… the focus
of evil in the modern world”
 Though soviets dismantling & retreat from arms race and
empire building made cold war framework of
international affairs irrelevant by 1980s
Arms Race Nuclear Power
70% of Americans favored nuclear freeze
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1982 750,000 people demonstrated, NY
 Halt on spending on and deployment of nuclear weapons
1982 Regan announced the SDI initiative
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Star Wars or the Strategic Defense Initiative
 Estimated 27 Billion, spent 17 billion
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Meaningful arms control undermined
Soviet-U.S. relations deteriorated
Foreign Policy & the “Reagan
Doctrine”
Reasserted America’s right to intervene
anywhere in the world to “roll back”
communism by supplying overt and covert aid
to “anti-communist resistance movements”
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Assumed that political instability resulted from
soviet influence
 1983 invaded Grenada, Nicaragua, El Salvador
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1983 Grenada, Socialist leader assassinated & installed a
friendly government.
CIA Covert Action
Aided anticommunist forces in
Afghanistan and the Contras in
Nicaragua
Waged a renewed cold war to support
anticommunist governments that
“supported democracy” to constrain the
soviets sphere of influence.
“Freedom Fighters”
El Salvador
Aided a repressive regime (proAmerican)
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1983 right wing death squads tortured and
assassinated 1,000’s of opposition leaders
 Bloody Civil war left 54,000 dead
Reagan looked to Nicaragua
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Sandanista government “posed an unusual
and extraordinary threat to national
security”
Nicaragua
Nicaragua
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Sandanista Party
1984 Reagan escalated the undeclared war
against the Sandanistas
 US augmented its military forces in neighboring
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Honduras
Conducted training exercises throughout the region
Stepped up economic pressure
Launched a psychological offensive to discredit the
Sandanistas.
Trained and equipped an opposition military force of
Nicaraguans or Contras.
Supported murderous dictatorships in nearby
El Salvador and Guatamala
U.S. Intervention in Nicaragua
1909 - 1933 Taft coup on President Zalaya
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Trans isthmus Canal
Nationalization of land
1936 Guardia Nacional – Coup
Somoza Regime 1937 – 47, 1950-56
1962 the FSLN, Liberation Front, Sandanistas
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Oppose regime of Anastasio somoza
Nationalized banking
Somoza Regime 1967-72, 1974-1979
Public Criticism
U. S. backed regimes were clearly implicated in
human-rights abuses
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Nuns, journalists, humanitarian aid workers included
Brutality and corruption among the contras or so
called freedom fighters brought growing public
criticism.
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American grass roots opposition
Sister city projects offered humanitarian & technical
assistance to Nicaraguan communities
1984 Boland Amendments
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Congress ban on arms sales
Forbade government agencies from supporting “directly or
indirectly military or para-military operations” in Nicaragua
Iran-contra affair
Denied funding my congress,
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Reagan turned to the National Security Council to
find a way to keep the contra war going
 1984 – 1986 raised 37 million in aid from foreign
countries and private contributors, largest mercenary
army in the hemispheric history
1986 sold arms to Pro-Iranian Islamic
Radicals in a secret deal to secure the
release of American hostages of Muslim
militants
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Sold arms to Iran to channel profits to the contra
forces
 circumvented Boland Amendments
Cover – up & American Amnesia
National Security Council
advisors Robert McFarlane and Admiral John
Poindexter
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sold weapons and missiles to Iranians using Israel and the
go between.
North and Poindexter lied to congress , shredded
evidence and refused to keep the president fully
informed to guaranteed his “plausible deniability”
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convicted as felons,
1992 H.W. Bush granted pardons to 6 key players in the
scandal.
End of the Soviet Union &
Collapse of Communism
Mikhail Gorbachev (General Secretary of the
communist party in 1985)
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Policy of Glasnost (openness) & Perestroika
(economic liberalization)
1987 signed a major Arms Treaty that reduced
each nations supply of range missiles
He declared and end to the cold war
Soviet sphere of influence and the union itself
would cease to exist
Consequences of Reaganomics
National debt tripled to 2.7 Trillion 1989
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The fiscal crisis became a structural
problem with profound & long lasting
implications for the American economy
Became indebted to foreign nations
(340 billion)
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Post WWII the leading creditor, now the
biggest debtor
Greater Inequality
Average weekly and hourly earnings
dropped between 1980-1992
Share of Total Net Worth of American
Families
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Richest 1% 31% 1983 – 37% 1989
Next Richest 9% 35% to 31% 1989
Remaining 90% 33% to 32%
Environmental De-regulation
Sagebrush Rebellion
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Sympathetic to western movement of
citizens who wanted vast federal land
holdings in the west transferred to the
states for less environmental protection
and more rapid economic use
 Trees – timber companies
 Expanded offshore oil drilling
 Expedited exploration for minerals
Greater Inequality
Number of Poor, Rate of Poverty and
Poverty Line 1979-92
Millions of poor 26.1 to 36.9 million in
1992
Rate increased from 11.7% to 15%
Poverty Line increased from $7,412 to
%14,335
Crisis for Organized Labor
Republican offensive against labor unions
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(Air Traffic Controllers Organization)
Other companies followed suit leading to the
decline of union membership and blue collar jobs
 Hormel
 Phelps-Dodge
 National labor Relations Board and other federal
agencies weakened collective bargaining by their
interpretation of labor management relations
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Workers accepted a roll back in wages and loss of other
benefits to be able to keep their jobs
Job Creation
Low wage jobs were created at a
growth rate of 50%
Middle wage jobs at 31.7%
High wage jobs at 11.9%
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Deindustrialization and blue collar job
destruction led to loss of standard of living
achieved in the 1950s and 1960s
Median Family Income by race
All races combined median income
increased by $1,000 between 1980 and
1992
Income for Whites increased by $1,600
Income for Blacks decreased by
$450.00
Income for Hispanics decreased by
$1000.00
Feminization of Poverty
Experience of poverty became the experience of
predominately women and children
Jobs available decreased for women with children &
were lower paying
Took financial support of a male breadwinner to keep
a family out of poverty
Courts sided on behalf of fathers in court
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Loss of alimony
Middle class women pushed into poverty
Majority of men defaulted on child support payments
Divorced men increased standard of living
Divorce women decreased standard of living
Female Headed Households,
1992
13.7 million people
Accounted for 37% of the nations poor
Number of black women as heads of
household increased from 30% in 1970
to 47% in 1980
Gender & Economic Contradictions
Social and economic pressure to fulfill
traditional roles
Vs
The need for women to work
Wage Gap
1980s Women made 60 cents on the
male earned dollar
2003 women made 75 cents
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EXPLAINED
 Decline of earning among men
 Better educated women finding better jobs