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In politics, a red–green alliance or red–green coalition is an alliance of "red" (often social-democratic or democratic socialist) parties with "green" (often green and/or occasionally agrarian) parties. The alliance is often based on common left political views, especially a shared distrust of corporate or capitalist institutions. While the "red" social-democratic parties tend to focus on the effects of capitalism on the working class, the "green" environmentalist parties tend to focus on the environmental effects of capitalism.
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USA vs USSR Fight! The Cold War: Crash Course World History #39
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War and Nation Building in Latin America: Crash Course World History 225
Transcription
Hi, I’m John Green, This is Crash Course World History and today we’re gonna talk about the Cold War, which actually lasted into my lifetime, which means that I can bore you with stories from my past like your grandpa does. When I was a kid, they made us practice hiding under our desks in the event of a nuclear attack, because, you know, school desks are super good at repelling radiation. [formica is magical stuff] Mr. Green, Mr. Green! Right, remember in elementary school there was this special guest who’d defected from the Soviet Union, and he had-- --Like this crazy Russian accent and he kept going on and on about how-- Reagan should spit in Gorbachev’s face instead of signing treaties with him. And I was like, whoa dude calm down. You’re in a room full of third graders. And then for like months afterward on the playground, we’d play Reagan:Gorbachev and spit in each other’s faces. Those were the days. Sometimes I forget that you’re me, Me from the Past. [ahhh… so sweet!] Yeah, it’s just really nice to talk to you and feel like you’re lis— You’re boring. Cue the intro. [ah ha! there it is.] [BEST] [intro music] [intro music] [intro music] [intro music] [intro music] [EVER!] So the Cold War was a rivalry between the USSR and the USA that played out globally. We’ve tried to shy away from calling conflicts ideological or civilizational here on Crash Course, but in this case, the “clash of civilizations” model really does apply. Socialism, at least as Marx constructed it, wanted to take over the world, and many Soviets saw themselves in a conflict with bourgeois capitalism itself. And the Soviets saw American rebuilding efforts in Europe and Japan as the U.S. trying to expand its markets, which, by the way, is exactly what we were doing. So the U.S. feared that the USSR wanted to destroy democratic and capitalist institutions. And the Soviets feared that the US wanted to use its money and power to dominate Europe and eventually destroy the Soviet system. And both parties were right to be worried. It’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you. [tinfoil hats, always in season] Now of course we’ve seen a lot of geopolitical struggles between major world powers here on Crash Course, but this time there was the special added bonus that war could lead to the destruction of the human species. That was new for world history, and it’s worth remembering: It’s still new. Here’s the period of time we’ve discussed on Crash Course. And this is how long we’ve had the technological capability to exterminate ourselves. So that’s worrisome. Immediately after World War II, the Soviets created a sphere of influence in eastern Europe, dominating the countries where the Red Army had pushed back the Nazis, which is why Winston Churchill famously said in 1946 that an “Iron Curtain” had descended across Europe. While the dates of the Cold War are usually given between 1945 and 1990, a number of historians will tell you that it actually started during World War II. Stalin’s distrust of the U.S. and Britain kept growing as they refused to invade Europe and open up a second front against the Nazis. And some even say that the decision to drop the first Atomic Bombs on Japan was motivated in part by a desire to intimidate the Soviets. That sort of worked, but only insofar as it motivated the Soviets to develop atomic bombs of their own— they successfully tested their first one in 1949. From the beginning, the U.S had the advantage because it had more money and power and could provide Europe protection what with its army and one of a kind nuclear arsenal while Europe rebuilt. The USSR had to rebuild itself, and also they had the significant disadvantage of being controlled by noted asshat Joseph Stalin. I will remind you, it’s not cursing if he’s wearing an ass for a hat. [way to hang your asshat on a technicality] Oh, I guess it’s time for the open letter. [professionally propels toward prop like a perfectly poised & practiced projectile] An Open Letter to Joseph Stalin. But first, let’s see what’s in the secret compartment today. Oh, it’s silly putty. Silly putty: the thing that won the Cold War. [gotta be a Reagan joke in there somewhere] This is exactly the kind of useless consumer good that would never have been produced in the Soviet Union. And it is because we had so much more consumer spending, on stuff like silly putty, that we won the Cold War. Go team! Dear Joseph Stalin, You really sucked. There was a great moment in your life, at your first wife’s funeral, when you said, “I don’t think I shall ever love again.” And then later, you had that wife’s whole family killed. [solid case for NOT putting a ring on it] Putting aside the fact that you’re responsible for tens of millions of deaths, I don’t like you because of the way that you treated your son, Yakov. I mean, you were really mean to him and then he shot himself and he didn’t die and you said, “He can’t even shoot straight.” And then later, when he was captured during World War II, you had a chance to exchange prisoners for him, but you declined. And then he died in a prison camp. You were a terrible leader, a terrible person, and a terrible father. Best wishes, John Green Alright, let’s go to the Thought Bubble. Europe was the first battleground of the Cold War, especially Germany, which was divided into 2 parts with the former capital, Berlin, also divided into 2 parts. and yes, I know the western part was divided into smaller occupation zones, but I’m simplifying. In 1948, the Soviets tried to cut off West Berlin, by closing the main road that led into the city, but the Berlin airlift stopped them. And then in 1961, the Soviets tried again and this time they were much more successful building a wall around West Berlin, although it’s worth noting that the thing was up for less than 30 years. I mean, Meatloaf’s career has lasted longer than the Berlin Wall did.[Oh y-- NOOO!!] The U.S. response to the Soviets was a policy called containment; it basically involved stopping the spread of communism by standing up to the Soviets wherever they seemed to want to expand. In Europe this meant spending a lot of money. First the Marshall Plan spent $13 billion on re-building western Europe with grants and credits that Europeans would spend on American consumer goods and on construction. Capitalism’s cheap food and plentiful stuff, it was hoped, would stop the spread of communism. The US also tried to slow the spread of communism by founding NATO and with CIA interventions in elections [looked better on paper] where communists had a chance, as in Italy. But despite all the great spy novels and shaken not stirred martinis, the Cold War never did heat up in Europe. Probably the most important part of the Cold War that people just don’t remember these days is the nuclear arms race. Both sides developed nuclear arsenals, the Soviets initially with the help of spies who stole American secrets. Eventually the nuclear arsenals were so big that the U.S. and USSR agreed on a strategy appropriately called MAD, which stood for “mutually assured destruction.” Thanks Thought Bubble. And yes, nuclear weapons were, and are, capable of destroying humanity many times over. [regardless of Iran's access to Photoshop] But only once or twice did we get close to nuclear war: during the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and then again in 1983, when we forgot to give the Russians the heads up that we were doing some war games, which made it look like we had launched a first strike. OUR BAD! [closer to ultimate fail than epic fail] But even though mutually assured destruction prevented direct conflict, there was plenty of hot war in the Cold War. The Korean War saw lots of fighting between communists and capitalists, as did the Vietnam War. I mean, these days we remember “the domino effect” as silly paranoia, but after Korea and especially China became communist, Vietnam’s movement toward communism seemed very much a threat to Japan, which the U.S. had helped re-make into a vibrant capitalist ally. So the US got bogged down in one of its longest wars while the Soviets assisted the North Vietnamese army in the Viet Cong. But then we paid them back by supporting the anti-communist mujaheddin after the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979. Of course, as we now know, nobody conquers Afghanistan …unless you are the mongols. [The tune of truly tendering terror to tons of tearfully troubled tribes] So after 10 disastrous years, the Soviets finally abandoned Afghanistan. Some of those mujahedeen later became members of the Taliban, though, so it’s difficult to say that anyone won that war. But it wasn’t just Asia: In Nicaragua, the US supported rebels to overthrow the leftist government; in El Salvador, the US bolstered authoritarian regimes that were threatened by left-wing guerrillas. The United States ended up supporting a lot of awful governments, like the one in Guatemala, which held onto power through the use of death squads. [like i said, looked better on paper] Frankly, all our attempts to stabilize governments in Latin America led to some very unstable Latin American governments, and quite a lot of violence. And then there were the luke-warm conflicts, like The Suez Crisis where British and French paratroopers were sent in to try to stop Egypt from nationalizing the Suez canal. Or all the American covert operations to keep various countries from “falling” to communism. These included the famous CIA-engineered coup to overthrow Iran’s democratically elected prime minister Mohammed Mossadeq after his government attempted to nationalize Iran’s oil industry. And the CIA helping Chile’s General Augusto Pinochet overthrow democratically elected Marxist president Salvador Allende in 1973. And lest we think the Americans were the only bad guys in this, the Soviets used force to crush popular uprisings in Hungary in 1956 and in Czechoslovakia in 1968. So, you may have noticed that our discussion of the Cold War has branched out from Europe to include Asia, and the Middle East, and Latin America. And in fact, almost every part of the globe was involved in some way with the planet being divided into three “worlds.” The first world was the U.S., Western Europe and any place that embraced capitalism and a more or less democratic form of government. The Second World was the Soviet Union and its satellites, mostly the Warsaw Pact nations, China and Cuba. The Third World was everyone else and we don’t use this term anymore because it lumps together a hugely diverse range of countries. We’ll talk more about the specific economic and development challenges faced by the so-called “Third World countries,” but the big one in terms of the Cold War, was that neither the U.S. nor the Soviets wanted any of these countries to remain neutral. Every nation was supposed to pick sides, either capitalist or communist, and while it seems like an easy choice now, in the 50s and 60s, it wasn’t nearly so clear. I mean, for a little while, it seemed like the Soviets might come out ahead, at least in the Third World. For a while, capitalism, and especially the United States, seemed to lose some of its luster. The US propped up dictatorships, had a poor civil rights record, we sucked at women’s gymnastics. Plus, the Soviets were the first to put a satellite, a man, and a dog into space. Plus, Marxists just seemed cooler, which is why you never see Milton Friedman t-shirts... until now available at DFTBA.com. I like that, Stan, but I’m more of a centrist. Can I get a Keynes shirt? Yes. That, now that’s hot. But Soviet socialism did not finally prove to be a viable alternative to industrial capitalism. Over time, state-run economies just generally don’t fare as well as private enterprise, and people like living in a world where they can have more stuff. More importantly, Soviet policies were just bad: collectivized agriculture stymied production and led to famine; suppression of dissent and traditional cultures made people angry; and no one likes suffering the humiliation of driving a Yugo. But why the Cold War ended when it did is one of the most interesting questions of the 20th century. It probably wasn’t Ronald Reagan bankrupting the Soviets, despite what some politicians believe. The USSR had more satellite states that it needed to spend more to prop up than the U.S. had to invest in its Allies. And the Soviet system could never keep up with economic growth in the West. But, probably the individual most responsible for the end of the Cold War was Mikhail Baryshnikov. [Um...] No? Mikhail Gorbachev? Well, that’s boring. [and far less lycra-clad] I always thought the Soviets danced their way to freedom. No? It was Glasnost and Perestroika? [not the cultural resonance of White Nights?] Alright. but Gorbachev’s Perestroika and Glosnost opened up the Soviet political and economic systems with contested local elections, less restricted civil society groups, less censorship, more autonomy for the Soviet Republics, more non-state-run businesses and more autonomy for state-run farms. Glasnost or “openness” led to more information from the west and less censorship led to a flood of criticism as people realized how much poorer the second world was than the first. And one by one, often quite suddenly, former communist states collapsed. In Germany, the Berlin Wall came down in 1989 [pulled down with the Gipper's own hands] and East and West Germany were reunited in 1990. In Poland, the Gdansk dockworker’s union Solidarity turned into a mass political movement and won 99 of the 100 seats it was allowed to contest in the 1989 election. Hungary held multiparty elections in 1990. The same year, mass demonstrations led to elections in Czechoslovakia. In 1993, that country split up into Slovakia and the Czech Republic, the happiest and most mutually beneficial divorce since Cher left Sonny. Of course sometimes the transition away from communism was violent and painful. In Romania, for instance, the communist dictator Ceaucescu held onto power until he was tried and put before a firing squad at the end of 1989. And it took until 1996 for a non-communist government to take power there. And in Yugoslavia, well, not so great. And in Russia, it’s a little bit Putin-ey. Ah! Putin. But just twenty years later, it’s hard to believe that the world was once dominated by two super powers held in check mutually assured destruction. [sure didn't work for Harry & Voldemort] What’s really amazing to me, though, is that until the late 1980s, it felt like the Cold War was gonna go on forever. Time seems to slow as it approaches us, & living in the post-Cold War nuclear age, we should remember that the past feels distant even when it’s near, and that the future seems assured— even though it isn’t. Thanks for watching. I’ll see you next week. [don't ask. you try & corral the talent when they're a NYT best-selling author] Crash Course is produced and directed by Stan Muller. Our script supervisor is Meredith Danko. Our associate producer is Danica Johnson. The show is written by my high school history teacher Raoul Meyer and myself. And our graphics team is Thought Bubble. [where time may be cold, but not too war-y] Last week’s phrase of the week was "Justin Bieber" [Johnny Bookwriter is a full-on Belieber] Thanks for that suggestion. [he said, sincerely] If you’d like to suggest future phrases of the week, you can do so in comments where you can also ask questions about today’s video that will be answered by our team of historians. [or fought out amongst yourselves with varying degrees of merit and clarity] Thanks for watching Crash Course and as we say in my hometown, don’t forget Folly and Desperation Are Ofttimes Hard to Tell Apart.” [Did you know John is a triple threat?] Ow.
Red–green coalition governments
There have been a number of red–green governments in Europe since the 1990s.
- In Germany, a red–green coalition of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and Alliance '90/The Greens led by Chancellor Gerhard Schröder formed the federal government from September 1998 to September 2005.
- In France, the 'Plural Left' coalition of the Socialist Party (PS), The Greens, French Communist Party and allies governed from 1997 until 2002. The Ayrault government which governed from May 2012 until March 2014 had ministers affiliated with the PS, Radical Party of the Left (PRG) and Europe Ecology – The Greens. The second Valls government (August 2014 to December 2016) and Cazeneuve Government (December 2016 to May 2017) were both formed of ministers from the PS, PRG and Ecologist Party.
- In Finland, Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen's first and second cabinets contained ministers from the Social Democratic Party of Finland (SDP), including Lipponen himself, and the Green League. The Green League participated in government from April 1995 until May 2002. The Rinne Cabinet formed in June 2019 is formed by the SDP as largest party, in coalition with the Green League, agrarian Centre Party, Swedish People's Party and Left Alliance.
- In Norway, the Red-Green Coalition of the Labour Party, Socialist Left Party and Centre Party governed Norway as a majority government from the 2005 general election until 2013. The 'green' element was the Centre Party, an agrarian party with green as its official color.
- In Iceland, the First and Second Cabinets of Prime Minister Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir were formed from a coalition of the Social Democratic Alliance and Left-Green Movement, governing from February 2009 to May 2013.
- In Italy, from 1996 to 2001 and 2006–2008, the Prodi I, D'Alema I, D'Alema II, Amato II and Prodi II Cabinets included the social-democratic Democrats of the Left (later to become the Democratic Party) as the largest party, with the Federation of the Greens receiving at least one ministry. However, unlike a straightforward red–green alliance, these centre-left cabinets involved a broad range of political parties that were Catholic-inspired Christian left, social-liberal and even communist backgrounds.
- In Denmark, the Thorning-Schmidt government, which governed from October 2011 to February 2014, contained the Social Democrats as the largest party in coalition with the Social Liberals and Socialist People's Party, the latter being a green party and member of the European Green Party and Global Greens.
- In Sweden, the Löfven I Cabinet established on 3 October 2014 was a minority government coalition of the Social Democratic Party and Greens. This coalition was renewed on 21 January 2019 as the Löfven II Cabinet and 9 July 2021 as the Löfven III Cabinet, before being replaced on 30 November 2021 by the Andersson Cabinet, formed by the Social Democrats alone with external support from the Greens, Left Party and agrarian Centre Party.
- In Portugal, the First António Costa Cabinet established on 26 November 2015 was a minority government led by the Socialist Party with external support from the Left Bloc, Portuguese Communist Party and The Greens, which governed until 26 October 2019.
Red–red–green coalition
A red–red–green coalition or red–green–red coalition is a left-wing alliance of two "red" social democratic, democratic socialist, or socialist parties with one "green" environmentalist party. In France, Jean-Luc Mélenchon's New Ecologic and Social People's Union is an example of a left–green alliance.[1][2]
Radical red–green alliances
Political parties or joint electoral lists have been formed over the years, most often between socialists and left-oriented greens. Example include:
- GreenLeft of the Netherlands: a political party that began in 1989 as a political alliance comprising the Communist Party of the Netherlands, Pacifist Socialist Party and the Christian left parties Evangelical People's Party and Political Party of Radicals. The alliance had been known as Rainbow for the 1989 European elections.
- Unity List – The Red–Greens of Denmark: a political party, originally a political alliance, formed in 1989 by the Left Socialists (VS), Communist Party of Denmark (DKP) and Socialist Workers Party (SAP).
- The Nordic Green Left Alliance was a European political alliance formed by the Left Alliance (Finland), the Left-Green Movement (Iceland), the Left Party (Sweden), the Socialist Left Party (Norway) and the Socialist People's Party (Denmark). The MEPs of the NGLA sat in the European United Left–Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) group in the European Parliament, although the MEPs of the Socialist People's Party sat in The Greens–European Free Alliance (G/EFA) group and later joined the European Green Party.
- Left Ecology Freedom (SEL): a former political party in Italy that was initially formed as a political alliance comprising socialists, greens and social democrats. The political alliance was itself a partial successor to the short-lived The Left – The Rainbow electoral alliance which had existed in Italy from December 2007 until May 2008 comprising the Federation of the Greens (FdV), the Communist Refoundation Party, Party of Italian Communists and the Democratic Left (SD). In 2022 a new alliance, Greens and Left Alliance, composed of the successor of SEL and SD Italian Left and the successor of FdV Green Europe, was formed.
- The Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA), a Greek party formed by the merger of a broad set of left-wing and eco-socialist parties, many of which were themselves formerly red–green alliances, such as the Coalition of Left, of Movements and Ecology (Synaspismos), Renewing Communist Ecological Left (AKOA), and Ecosocialists of Greece. The SYRIZA-led cabinet of Alexis Tsipras contains ones junior minister, Giannis Tsironis, from the Ecologist Greens.
- Green–Left Coalition of Croatia: formed by the We can! and Green Alternative – Sustainable Development of Croatia and by the left-wing New Left and Workers' Front (the latter left the alliance).
- Green Left of Hungary: was a merger of Alliance of Green Democrats and the Workers' Party of Hungary 2006.
Red–green alliances with centre-left parties
There are also red/green political alliances and/or electoral agreements between social-democratic or liberal parties cooperate with green parties
- In Canada, the term red–green alliance has been used to describe the limited co-operation between the Liberal Party of Canada which uses red as its colour, and the Green Party of Canada,[3] which is centre-left but not seen as being as radical as many of its overseas sister parties and take a more moderate stance than New Democratic Party.
- A red–green alliance of sorts occurred during the campaign leading up to the 2008 London mayoral election. Incumbent mayor Ken Livingstone, candidate for the Labour Party, formed an electoral pact with the Green Party mayoral candidate Siân Berry via the supplementary voting system, in which Labour voters were encouraged to place the Green candidate as their second preference, and vice versa.[4]
- In Italy, The Olive Tree and The Union coalitions comprised the Federation of the Greens along with social-democratic, social Christian, centrist and other parties in a broad heterogenous centre-left alliance. The successor party to the Olive Tree, the Democratic Party, maintains an internal faction of greens called the Democratic Ecologists.
- In Australia, the term red–green alliance has been used to describe the co-operation between the centre-left Australian Labor Party and the Australian Greens. The Greens supported Labor to form the minority government in 2010. As the Greens is the third party in the Australian Senate which hold the balance power from crossbench, the Labor minority government needed to rely support from the Greens from 2010 to 2013.
- In New Zealand, after the 2017 general election, the Labour and the Greens signed a memorandum of understanding.[5] This formed a loose relationship between the two parties with the goal of working together when possible to unseat the incumbent National Government. Later, the two parties also agreed to a set of budget responsibility rules, committing both parties to sustainable surpluses and capping debt, amongst other rules.[6] Following the 2020 election, a Labour majority government was formed, supported by the Greens through a confidence and supply arrangement.
- In Hungary, Unity comprised the social democratic Hungarian Socialist Party and Democratic Coalition and the green Dialogue for Hungary alongside smaller liberal parties.
- In France, New Ecological and Social People's Union includes the left-wing La France Insoumise and French Communist Party, the centre-left Socialist Party and the green Ecologist Pole.
- In the Netherlands, GreenLeft and the Labour Party formed an alliance during the 2021-2022 cabinet formation, vowing to only join a government coalition together. In 2023, the parliamentary groups in the Senate merged following a joint election campaign. In the 2023 snap election, the two parties ran on a joint list, after members of both parties voted in favour.
See also
- Black-red-green coalition
- Eco-socialism
- German governing coalition
- Green ban — a strike undertaken to advance environmentalist or conservationist goals
- Green Left (disambiguation)
- Greens and Left Alliance
- Green socialist (disambiguation)
- Jamaica coalition (politics)
- Red–green–brown alliance
- Red–red–green coalition
- Social Movement Unionism
- Traffic light coalition
References
- ^ "France elections: Macron to meet rival parties after losing majority". BBC. 21 June 2022. Retrieved 21 June 2022.
- ^ Mallet, Victor (20 June 2022). "French left threatens vote of no confidence against Macron's government". Financial Times. Archived from the original on 2022-12-10. Retrieved 22 June 2022.
- ^ TheStar.com | News | Could the 'red-green coalition' be revived?
- ^ Taylor, Matthew (19 March 2008). "Greens and Livingstone join forces against Johnson". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2017-11-28.
- ^ "Labour, Greens to work to change govt". Radio New Zealand. 2016-05-31. Retrieved 2017-06-07.
- ^ Small, Vernon (2017-03-24). "Labour-Greens have signed up to a joint position on surpluses, cutting debt". Stuff.co.nz. Retrieved 2017-06-07.