From the end of World War II in 1945 until the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990, the world was polarized by a global conflict between two wartime allies, the Soviet Union and the United States.
The Cold War was global in scope and created political divisions based on free world orientation, socialist orientation, and nonalignment.
Free World Orientation is generally associated with liberalism: democratic political systems and capitalist theories of development/economic progress.
Socialist Orientation is typically associated with totalitarian or communist political systems and Marxist theories of development/economic progress.
