Although the West had emerged from World War I relatively intact, its political and social foundations and its self-confidence had been severely undermined.

Within Europe, doubts about the viability of Western civilization were widespread, especially among the intellectual elite.

These doubts were quick to reach perceptive observers in Asia and Africa and contributed to a rising tide of unrest against Western political domination throughout the colonial and semi colonial world.

That unrest took various forms but was most evident in increasing worker activism, rural protests, and a rising national fervor among anti-colonialist intellectuals.

In areas of Asia, Africa, and Latin America where independent states had successfully resisted the Western onslaught, the discontent fostered by the war and later by the Great Depression led to a loss of confidence in democratic institutions and the rise of political dictatorships.