With the end of Second World War, the world had been irreversibly transformed, with the imperial system that had ruled the globe for a century bankrupt, a eurocentric world economy ravaged and questioned, and a globe deeply scarred by genocide and nearly a decade of total war. The question remained for many in 1945, what would the new world order look like, and how would it be constructed from the ashes of fascists and imperialists? Would it be a capitalist system centered in Washington, an American economic empire enforced by atomic power? Would it be the system of the Soviets, centered in Moscow and projected by Soviet manpower? Or would it be a global moment of decolonization, independence and self-determination finally realized with the overthrow of empires? Through analyzing primary and secondary sources, this course will examine these fundamental questions that resulted in the “Cold War” (1947-1991), a period of global tension between these nation-states, animated by bloody decolonial wars in Africa and Asia and a technological, cultural and societal acceleration that culminated in an “Americanization” in government, culture, economy, and social relations over vast swaths of the planet; systems of inter-economic and intercultural relations that the world continues to grapple with well after the end of the Cold War in the 1990s.