Rich Romans lived a comfortable and luxurious life, while many poor ones were begging, stealing, and urinating on the streets. The Roman mindset was not based on cruelty, but much of what they did was inevitably cruel because the acts of bloodiness were just a normal part of their lives. […]
It’s amazing how just a few items—coffee, tea, sugar, tobacco, and spices—completely changed the focus of the global economy, especially as they’re all entirely superfluous. […]
In 1512, Cardinal Giovanni and Giulio de’ Medici set out from Rome with a Spanish mercenary army. They besieged Florence’s neighboring city, Prato, hoping it would make Florence surrender, which it did. […]
The computer market has many pieces and Japanese corporations have managed to successfully lead in some specific fields. But this doesn’t mean that Japan is a leading country in all things computer-related. […]
After WWII, Japanese corporations thrived by focusing on cooperation and group loyalty. Prime minister Nakasone Yasuhiro believed that Japan needed to be adventurous and support individual leadership. […]
Leonid Brezhnev’s standing in party circles rose after Stalin’s death in 1953. The Brezhnev era was one of the most stable eras in USSR history. However, the country did have its economic problems. […]
Following the deaths of several senior party officials, 52-year-old Mikhail Gorbachev was chosen to lead the Soviet Union. He initiated a restructuring of the Soviets’ centrally planned economy and removed the rigid limitations of state censorship. […]
In May 1990—two months after Mikhail Gorbachev had been named president of the Soviet Union—Boris Yeltsin was elected president of the Russian Republic, the state’s largest political entity. And if the two men had ever been allies, they weren’t any longer. […]
After his appointment, Vladimir Putin made himself into the non-Yeltsin. He used separatist violence that rattled the Caucasus as an excuse to increase a broader regional tendency toward authoritarian rule. […]
In the 1950s and 1960s, the Japanese government supported the country’s auto industry financially in a direct way. They also helped the industry get access to critical materials. […]
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