12.3 The Great Depression

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Explain the causes of the Great Depression
• Describe the immediate effects of the Great Depression on the economies of industrialized and developing nations
• Describe how industrialized nations responded to citizens’ needs during the Great Depression
• Explain the attractions of communism to people in industrialized nations during the Great Depression
• Analyze the similarities and differences among fascist Italy, Nazi Germany, and Stalin’s Soviet Union

The decade of the 1930s was marked by economic collapse around the world. The Great Depression gripped numerous countries, causing widespread unemployment, immense poverty, and financial collapse. There were no easy solutions for any government trying to combat the misery, and different countries adopted different methods to alleviate the suffering of their people. The inability of capitalist countries to fully solve their economic problems made ideologies such as communism more attractive. The Great Depression developed out of a perfect storm of problems, and only the economic stimulation of the onset of World War II brought the world closer to a return of prosperity.