Unit Introduction:

 

Unit 8: Imperialism and 19th Century Nationalism

 

Characteristic of the period 1750-1914, causally connected to industrialization, is the set of phenomena historians refer to as Imperialism, the establishment of political, economic, and social dominion over multiple nations by a core.  The Age of Imperialism is associated primarily with the establishment of European hegemony over the last remaining sovereign areas of the earth.  By 1914 westerners have influence, direct or indirect, on nearly all areas.  This dramatic and wide-reaching expansion of European influence was made possible by technological advances associated with industrialization; industrialization, however, became a major motivation for continued expansion.

 

Industrialization produced key transportation and communication technologies that resulted in a “shrinking” of time and distance, as well as military and health science innovations that provided for direct domination.  Steam locomotion on land and sea, combined with canals that drastically cut the transit time between core and periphery, allowed greater expansion of European power as well as greater control of existing colonial possessions.  Communication technologies, particularly underwater telegraph cables, provided quick communication allowing rapid response to local uprisings.  European response to perceived resistance, often violent, was made shockingly effective through killing technologies such as percussion caps, repeating rifles, and machine guns.  Grossly disproportional casualties characterized conflicts between European armies and poorly armed native forces.  Cinching European control was the adoption of quinine and sterile surgical procedures which drastically reduced casualty rates both of invading European armies and the colonists or entrepreneurs that followed.

 

Overall the pattern of European expansion seems to indicate the establishment not only of a truly global economy, but also an hierarchical world system with strictly defined roles.  Expanding to include areas such as Hawaii, westerners used military superiority to force colonies (“peripheral areas”) to remain producers of raw materials and to purchase manufactured goods from the core.  This resulted in differential industrialization and, increasingly, a division between developed vs. undeveloped, rich vs. poor.  The extended impact of differential industrialization has direct bearing on the world today.

 

Motives for imperialism ranged from economic (the desire to fuel industrialization) to political (competition between nations) to social (Social Darwinism) and religious.  The need for raw materials available only in tropical areas, areas for capitalist investment, and markets for European manufactured goods led to the establishment of a European-dominated world market.  England, Spain, Portugal, and other established states were joined by Germany and Italy in a competition for territory.  Each was fueled by an atmosphere of romantic patriotism.  A belief in Spencer’s misapplication of Darwinian Theory seemed to justify the domination of Europeans and imposition of their cultural mores; concurrently native culture suffered a decline in several areas of the world.  The “savages”, “barbarians”, and “half-civilized” of the world “deserved” to have the “gift” of European culture.  Along with the benefits of the west’s culture came its religion, Christianity, as evangelical organizations sought to “save the souls” of aboriginal peoples as it competed with the intensified spread of Islam.

 

Areas previously independent came under European influence, notably India, China, and Africa.  Local rebellions characterized India and China (the Sepoy Rebellion in India and the Taiping and Boxer Rebellions in China) and were used to justify further expansion of European control.  The responses of China versus Japan to western penetration played key roles in the fate of each as well as the degree to which industrialization (and hence military parity with Europeans) was possible.  “Free-Trade” imperialism, a “kinder, gentler” version of control, brought with it opium addiction for the Chinese as well as extensive European extraterritorial privileges.  Japan faired better but underwent dramatic political change as the last Shogun ended reign and an oligarchy took control of the country’s industrialization process.

 

 

Following the Congress of Berlin, the “Scramble for Africa” began, resulting in the final subjugation of the previously unconquered interior of the continent.  European map-makers, favoring negotiated territorial lines, planted the seed of later ethnic conflict and genocide.  Conflict between European powers for African territory (e.g. Morocco) was causal to WWI.  European control included new forms of unfree labor systems based on taxation schemes, brutal treatment (particularly in the Congo), and the spread of Christianity.

 

The period 1750-1914, was also characterized by nationalism, an idea whose birthplace in the European conflicts of the 100 years war and French Revolution would have wide-spread implications.  Within multi-national empires pan-ethnic movements such as that of the Slavs threatened to disrupt the conservative order established after the Age of Revolutions.  Later pan-Arabist and Zionist movements would have similar, though not identical, impact.  Two new European nations, Germany and Italy, sought to make their mark on the world while existing powers competed.  The multi-national empires, beginning with the Ottoman, went in to decline; as different nationalities attempted to break off from each, the other empires in turn sought to absorb them.   This would prove to have serious consequences in the Balkans.

 

Ultimately, the Age of Imperialism ended in global conflict.  Colonial conflicts, a rigid system of military alliances, jingoism (the willingness to confront problems militarily instead of diplomatically), and regional nationalist movements led to the worst bloodshed in human history.  Western hegemony, however, would continue despite international agreements supposedly designed to bring order and parity.

 

 

Objectives:

 

Students will:

  • Explain how imperialism impacts Periodization for 1750-1914
  • Describe the overall pattern of European hegemony within the context of a world system
  • Analyze key technologies resulting from industrialization and explain their impact on European imperialist success
  • Evaluate the benefits and drawbacks of European hegemony as a means to establish a global economic system
  • Describe the relationship between “core” and “periphery” in the world system from 1750-1914.
  • Analyze the political, economic, religious, and social motives for imperialism
  • Analyze the impact of nationalism on continental European politics, and expand the analysis to include peripheral areas.
  • Compare responses to European penetration in Asia and Africa.
  • Compare nationalism in China and Japan
  • Analyze and contrast forms of imperialism including colonialism and “free-trade”
  •  Explain the relationship between multi-national states and the nations within them, particularly in the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires
  • Explain the impact of changing European ideologies on colonial administrations
  • Describe how labor systems changed over time from the abolition of slavery through the revival of indentured servitude to the development of new un-free labor systems in Africa and Asia.

 

Readings in the text:

 

  • Chapter 26: Africa, India, and the New British Empire

Bulliet, Pages 658-671

  • Chapter 27: The Ottoman Empire and East Asia

Bulliet, Pages 674-695

  • Chapter 28: The New Power Balance

Bulliet, Pages 701-723

  • Chapter 29: The New Imperialism

Bulliet, Pages 726-749

Terms:

 

Zulu

Sokoto Caliphate

Modernization

Muhammad Ali

“legitimate” trade

Recaptives

Nawab

Sepoy

British raj

Sepoy Rebellion

Durbar

Indian Civil Service

Clipper ship

Contract of indenture

Janissaries

Serbia

Tanzimat

Crimean War

Percussion cap

Breech-loading rifle

Extraterritoriality

Opium War

Bannermen

Treaty of Nanking

Treaty ports

Most-favored nation status

Taiping Rebellion

Meiji Restoration

Steel

Electricity

Thomas Edison

Submarine telegraph cables

Railroads

Socialism

Labor unions

Karl Marx

Victorian Age

“separate spheres”

Nationalism

Liberalism

Otto von Bismarck

Charles Darwin

Empress Dowager Cixi

Yamagata Aritomo

Suez Canal

New Imperialism

Battle of Omdurman

Colonialism

“scramble” for Africa

Henry Morton Stanley

King Leopold II (Belgium)

Berlin Conference

Afrikaners

Cecil Rhodes

Asante

Emperor Menelik

Emilio Aguinaldo

Free-trade imperialism

Panama canal

World Systems Theory