Title: Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics | Shad's Blog
Headings: Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics
Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics
Content: In 1954 the Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education paved the way for desegregation in all public schools. Additionally, it undid the “separate but equal doctrine” established by an 1896 case, Plessy v. Fergusson, which enabled much of the institutional discrimination to persist in the South (Foner 903-904). President Johnson not only disliked injustice, he understood the international repercussions that came along with America’s perceived hypocrisy. In turn, he helped pass The Civil Rights Act of 1964 banned discrimination in public and many private accommodations. While it would not be accurate to say the civil rights movement happened because of the Cold War, the backdrop of the Cold War helped people to realize that aspects of American society were in contrast to the values we were professing to stand for and changes were needed. While cultural effects of the Cold War were primarily domestic, political battles between the Soviet Union and the United States were mostly fought on an international stage. Politically speaking, the United States and the Soviet Union were polar opposites at the end of WWII. Decolonialization by European countries and the withdrawal of Axis forces of occupied lands left a “vacuum of power” in Europe and around the globe (Fry). Both the Americans and the Soviets sought to influence new governments in these countries with the Americans being “the world’s foremost proponents of democratic representative government, and” the Soviets “the world’s foremost proponents of authoritarian communism” (Fry). At the end of WWII Soviet forces occupied much of Eastern Europe and they wanted to occupy those lands to provide a buffer zone against further invasions.