The End of the Cold War
Driving Question: Was there a “winner” in the Cold War?
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the world’s sole remaining superpower—reshaping the global economic and political landscape in the process. For some, this changed landscape resulted in increased freedom; for others, particularly in the former Soviet republics, it resulted in economic uncertainty and gave rise to ethnic violence.
Learning Objectives
- Explain the causes of the end of the Cold War.
- Create and support arguments with historical evidence to evaluate the interconnection between decolonization and the Cold War in two regions of the world.
Vocab Terms:
- autonomy
- buffer
- communism
- economic stagnation
- ethnic
- repression
Use evidence to assess the most effective means of achieving independence and how these movements relate to the world today.
You can turn Who Is Winning the Cold War? into a card game! Read this thread on the Community Forum and download this OER Project teacher’s card game!
Was the Cold War a conflict that could be “won”? And if so, who was “winning” at various points in the conflict’s history?
How did one of the biggest and most powerful nations on earth collapse? And how did that collapse help end the Cold War?
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Guiding Questions
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Before you read
Preview the questions below, and then skim the article. Be sure to look at the section headings and any images.
While you read
Look for answers to these questions:
- How does this author argue that the Soviet empire was different from other European empires?
- How does the author say that the Soviet model of empire led to its collapse?
- What was Soviet control like in Eastern Europe?
- Who opened up Soviet society? How did they do this?
After you read
Respond to the following questions:
- Using evidence from this article, explain the causes of the end of the Cold War.
- This article mentions that people debate whether the Soviet Union had an informal empire. How was Soviet control of Eastern Europe different from the informal colonialism of the United States in the Caribbean? How was it similar?
This unit focuses on the AP themes of governance, economic systems, and social interactions and organization. Be sure to remind your students to look back at their responses from the first Themes Notebook activity of the unit to see how their understanding has changed.
You’ve learned a lot in this unit about the Cold War and decolonization—how much has your thinking changed since the beginning of the unit?
