# data[].attributes.headline
Economic, Social, and Political Policies & Impact

# data[].attributes.subject
Economic, Social, and Political Policies & Impact

# data[].attributes.body
After 1959, Castro moved quickly to carry out earlier promises to help the poorer sections of society by redistributing wealth and resources. In May 1959, the Agrarian Reform Act gave confiscated land to landless and poor peasants.

Castro nationalized public utilities in March 1959, and after foreign oil companies refused to process Soviet crude oil the refineries were nationalized in June 1960.

Castro and his team wanted rapid industrialization and diversification in agriculture. In February 1961, Guevara became minister of industries, and a central plan was quickly drawn up.

During the years 1963-4, a more Soviet style of economic planning was adopted. This increased after 1968 and, in July 1972, Cuba joined the Soviet bloc's Comecon. From 1972 to 1982, Cuba experienced real growth during what became known as the 'Brezhnev Years.'

From the late 1970s, increasing problems led to a rising trade debt. By 1986, Castro launched a 'rectification' campaign.

The collapse of the regimes of Eastern Europe and then the Soviet Union in the years 1989-91 led to great economic problems. In January 1990, Castro announced the start of the Special Period.

In the early years, Castro moved quickly to push through many social policy reforms. Priority was given to expanding health care. In 1961, a successful mass literacy campaign was launched.

At the same time, moves were started to equalize educational access, pay and employment opportunities for women. Policies to end discrimination against, and improve resources and opportunities for, black people also began from the start of Castro's regime.

The government was slower to tackle the discrimination and inequalities affecting gay men and lesbians. Until the 1970s, the government itself treated such people unfairly.

In 1976, a new constitution was brought in to achieve Poder Popular, or People's Power. This constitution was amended in 1992, establishing direct elections to all three legislative tiers.

As regards to religion, the state at first moved to reduce the wealth and influence of the Catholic Church and, in 1976, formally declared Cuba to be atheist. However, the constitution was amended, with 'secular' replacing the term 'atheist

# data[].attributes.body
After 1959, Castro began to create a politically centralized one-party state with political, social, and economic decision-making concentrated in his hands and those of his Fidelista élite.

From as early as April 1959, when Castro announced the suspension of elections, relations with the U.S. became more and more strained. By January 1960, the U.S. had drawn up a plan to overthrow Castro.

During 1959, Castro began to establish a situation of dual power by creating alternative organizations that increasingly bypassed the government.

Castro also began to move against liberals opposed to his more radical policies. By July, Urrutia had been forced to resign and other liberals and anti-communists resigned or were gradually removed over the following months.

In 1960, Cuba made several trade agreements with the Soviet Union, East European states and China. As a result of increasing U.S. economic restrictions, Castro nationalized American oil companies operating in Cuba.

In April 1961, Castro made the first announcement of Cuba's move to socialism. This was reinforced by the Bay of Pigs incident, which boosted his popularity. Over the next few years, Cuba moved closer to the Soviet Union - and to a Soviet-style economy and state.

Between 1961 and 1965 the July 26th Movement, the DR and PSP were merged to form the Communist Party of Cuba - taking action in 1962 against Escalante for attempting to promote his own supporters.

In 1965, the numbers of Cubans leaving Castro's Cuba increased in what became the first large 'exodus' - this Camarioca Exodus and two others (the Mariel Boatlift in 1980 and the Malecón Exodus in 1994) effectively 'exported' potential oppositionists.

From 1968, internal opposition also emerged within the PCC and from groups of intellectuals (such as the Varela Project): first it was against the growing ties with the Soviet Union; then in the late 1980s opposition developed in response to Gorbachev's liberal reforms in the Soviet Union; and later, in the 1990s, it emerged during the Special Period.

Castro was forced to resign his leadership posts due to illness on February 18, 2008. His brother Raúl succeeded him.

# data[].attributes.body
Before 1902, Cuba was a Spanish colony. Nationalist Cubans fought two Wars of Independence against Spain - from 1868 to 1878 and from 1895 to 1898. Following four years of U.S. control, Cuba became independent in 1902. However, the Platt Amendment of 1901, which the 1902 Cuban Constitution had to include, gave the U.S. powers of supervision and intervention.

Cuban politics were corrupt and in the 1920s, students and others launched radical protest movements. From 1927, Cuba was ruled by the dictator Gerardo Machado, but the protests and general strikes in 1933 forced him to flee.

Machado's successor to power was Fulgencio Batista. From 1934 to 1959, Batista ruled directly or through a series of puppet presidents. In 1953, Fidel Castro launched an unsuccessful attack on the army barracks at Moncada. In Mexico, his July 26th Movement planned Batista's overthrow.

Before 1959, Castro's ideology was a radical mix, influenced by Cuban radical nationalists such as Jose Martí and the leaders of the resistance in the 1920s and 30s. The main aims of his ideology were for fairness, social welfare, modernization, and independence from U.S. interference.

Also important was the idea of cubiana, but there was little traditional socialism in the various manifestos published by his July 26th Movement between 1953 and 1959. This meant that the Cuban communists did not support him until after the Caracas Pact of July 1958.

In 1956, Castro landed in Cuba with a small group of revolutionaries, including Che Guevara. By 1959, their guerrilla war had forced Batista from power.

# data[].attributes.headline
Economic, Social, and Political Policies & Impact

# data[].attributes.subject
Economic, Social, and Political Policies & Impact

# data[].attributes.body
Nazi domestic and social policy was widely influenced by a belief in the national community, Volksgemeineschaft.

Nazi economic policy was incoherent and, despite having an ideological basis, was moulded by circumstances.

The Nazis attempted to control the Churches through the Catholic Concordat and a separate Reich Protestant Church. However, neither was ever fully brought into line and attempts to spread an alternative pagan faith met with limited success.

Young people were the focus of intense indoctrination through the education system and Hitler Youth.

The experimental, modernist Weimar culture wars was rejected in favor of a controlled and conservative approach to the arts, which demanded that the arts should glorify Nazi values.

Nazi policy towards women was conservative, aiming to keep women 'in the home,' but it was inconsistent since women were encouraged back to the workplace in the war years.

# data[].attributes.body
Without removing the old structures entirely, Hitler nevertheless ensured that the Nazi Party gained control over government at both the central and local.

Hitler's personality and the extensive use of propaganda helped to promote dictatorship. Hitler effectively swayed public opinion in believing they had been betrayed by the November Criminals and that they would restore greatness to Germany.

The Nazi government combined state and party institutions and relied heavily on the SS to ensure the repression of dissident voices.

Before 1939, there was little opposition to Nazi rule but beneath, political, ideological, and religious hostility remained and an element of dissension continued in some groups of young people.

Foreign policy successes such as the remilitarization of the Rhineland, the Axis Alliance with Italy, anti-Comintern Pact with Japan, Anschluss with Austria, and the Munich Agreement added to Hitler's popularity and power.

# data[].attributes.body
After the conclusion of WWI, the German Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated the throne and the Weimar Republic replaced the monarchy. The Weimar constitution created a semi-presidential system in which power was divided between the president, a cabinet and a parliament. The office of the chancellor was appointed by the president and was essentially the chairman of the Reichstag.

The global war left Germany with no option other than to pay war reparations to Allies, surrendering considerable territory, and had to accept the "war guilt" clause.

The parliamentary structure did not prevent partisan conflict. Right-wing extremists used their political power to oppose any democratic system.