Comparing WWI & WWII: Social, Economic, Political & Military - Essay Sample

Social

Socially, the First World War and Second World War were similar as they brought more cooperation in the decisions the Canadian society made to support them in war. For instance, due to the cooperation that people had socially, the Canadian Patriotic Fund raised funds to assist families whose breadwinners had been sent to war. This is a good gesture that showed the social cohesion that the Canadians had in the First World War. This was also evident in the Second World War, where members of the society took care of families who could not fend for themselves after their members had been killed in war or were at war and, therefore, could not provide for their families. Even though during the initial stages of the Second World War had conscription not be compulsory, the war progressed, and the country found it necessary to introduce voluntary military service for people that were eligible for which families acceptable cooperatively . The society did not resist much for their members of the family to enlist in war since they socially agreed that fighting the war will guarantee their survival in the country. The differences socially for Canadians during the two wars are that the social cohesion that existed during the First World War was much more cohesive than in the Second World War. Additionally, during the First World War, families willingly accepted mandatory military service as a form of social cohesion. However, in the Second World War, people were more individualistic and did not support the forceful recruitment of their family members to war.

Political

Politically, there was a similarity between the First World War and the Second World War since the government used its political powers to ensure that they had enough soldiers for the military. The politics of the country changed during the wars, with some faction using the war to divide their opponents using politics that could be enforced without opposition from their opponents. The other aspect that was similar to the politics of the World War One and World War Two was that during the two wars, there was divisive politics with new political parties emerging and other parties becoming irrelevant. Division in party politics during both wars made some existing parties to lose traction in terms of support while other new parties were garnering more support from members of older parties. The two wars fractured Canadian society along linguistic, regional, cultural, and class lines.

The difference politically is that party politics very easily manipulated Canadians during the First World War from the parties that had immense political power. For instance, the Liberal Party was easily broken into two wings when people were split between pro and anti-enlistment groups. The politics of the First World War were much more divisive more than the politics of the Second World War. The politics of World War One is one of the prominent aspects of Canadian society that split citizens along linguistic lines, specifically French-speaking Canadians and English speaking Canadians.

Economic

Economically, the military experiences for the country were similar at the beginning of the war because the economic situation in the country was not as bad as it was expected. During the First World War, the economy of Canada became better because of the munitions and war-related manufacturing industries that created employment for a large proportion of the population who were paid high wages. With about 600 factories making artillery and other war-related equipment, Canadians from rural areas flocked the cities to get employment and substitute their incomes from what they used to get from agricultural activities. Employment was increased from activities of factories in manufacturing fuses, artillery shells, naval vessels, explosives, and aircraft. This not only improved the incomes of the general population but also the economy of the country as well. Since the country entered the war when its economy was booming, and therefore the initial stages of the war were typified by a stable and robust economy for the country amid the chaos that war brings to a country. However, the economy of Canada was much better during the last stages of the First World War. Canada's economy was much worse than it was in the previous stages of the Second World War. In 1917 Canada found itself in an economic depression that was much worse than what it experienced at the last stages of the Second World War.

Military

From the point of the military experience of view, the experiences of soldiers in World War One and World War Two were similar due to the huge number of causalities in both wars. The battlefields in both wars were terrible and horrific, and this had both emotional and physical harm to the soldiers. The new forms of weapons that were used in both wars and the huge number of soldiers enlisted to fight made the war to be a dangerous ground with mass casualties reported in both wars. The experience of fighting in the cold, contracting diseases, and the heat from the sun made the military experiences of a soldier in both wars terrible. The military experience of the soldiers in both wars was also awful as it had a toll on their emotional health with some of the returning from the war, with mental illness that awe very difficult for them to cope with after the war. This also affected Canadians who have family members fighting in the wars.

One of the differences in military experience for the soldier who fought in the two wars was that in the First World War, frontline soldiers suffered much compared to frontline soldiers during the Second World War. The experience of Second World War soldiers was relatively better compared to soldiers in the First World War since they had improved weapons that could make the number of causalities to be kept low. The other difference between the experiences of the two wars is that in the First World War, soldiers were commanded to commit heinous acts to make the enemy surrenders, but this was different compared to the Second World War. The second world war was fought using clearly laid down international laws that governed combat. As such, not many soldiers experienced situations where they were forced to acts heinous acts such as attacking civilians populations and the vulnerable members of society. The other difference between the experience of soldiers during the First World War and the Second World War was that during the First World War, there was a lot of torture compared to the Second World War, where torture was termed as an international war crime.

Bibliography

Douglas Belshaw. Canadian History: Post-Confederation. Victoria: B.C.: BCcampus, 2016.

MacKenzie. David, Canada, and the First World War, Second Edition: Essays in Honour of Robert Craig Brown. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018.

David MacKenzie. Canada and the First World War, Second Edition: Essays in Honour of Robert Craig Brown. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018.

Paul Keery. Canada at War: A Graphic History of World War Two. Ottawa: Douglas & McIntyre, 2012.

Hugh Brewster. From Vimy to Victory: Canada's Fight to the Finish in World War I. Vancouver: Scholastic Canada Limited, 2014.

Tim Cook. Warlords: Borden Mackenzie King And Canada's World Wars. Quebec City: Penguin Canada, 2012. M09 25 - 416