"Wilson VS. Lenin" revisited: The contending ideas of a new world order
Author
Deniz, Mert
Advisor
Latimer, Paul
Date
2018-07Publisher
Bilkent University
Language
English
Type
ThesisItem Usage Stats
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Abstract
The Great War brought destruction and death when it got unleashed with the bullet
of an assassin in 1914. Yet, this was also the beginning of a New Order as much as being
the end of the Old Order. The forerunners of this New Era carne from two distinct corners
of the world, namely America and Russia when Thomas Woodrow Wilson and Vladimir
Ilyich "Lenin" Ulyanov proposed their peace formulae with the Fourteen Points of January
1918 and the Soviet Peace Decree of October 1917.
This study provides an analysis of the differences and parallels between these
formulae. In order to meet this objective, the individual biographies of Wilson and Lenin,
and the histories of the United States and Russia are examined in detail as it is argued that
the given features of these declarations were the consequences of the different personal
experiences and cultural backgrounds of these two leaders as well as the domestic issues
and histories of their countries.
The study is structured around the main argument that Wilson and Lenin recognized
the Great War as the ultimate crisis of the Old World with their parallel arguments. They
saw the end of the Imperial Era, and in this matter, they offered new military, diplomatic
and economic norms of the New World. Nevertheless, Wilson and Lenin had very different
reasons, methods and designs for the New Order. These different discourses were the
origins of both order and disorder of the New Era.