Europe

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EuropesNew Imperialism (1815-1914)
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What is Imperialism?

• The policy of extending a nations authority by
  territorial acquisition or by establishing an
  economic and political hegemony (domination) over
  other nations

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Background (1815-1870)

• European expansion goes back to the 15th century
• The Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, French, and
  British colonial empires followed one another for
  the next 400 years
• They are all western, maritime powers
• By the 1820s several countries lost their
  colonial connections without suffering
  economically
• By 1815 France lost most of her possessions in
  America and the east Spain her South American
  lands, and Britain had lost her 13 American
  colonies
• By 1822 Portugal lost Brazil

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• However, it is not necessary to cross sea, rather
  than land, to become an imperial power
• Russia, the only European power to continue its
  expansionist policy throughout the 19th century,
  made rapid advances into southern and central
  Asia
• They continued to move against the declining
  Ottoman Empire
• Moved into Central Asia and the Sea of Japan

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The 1870s

• During the 1870s, the European powers developed a
  new interest in overseas expansion, especially in
  Africa and Asia
• European states soon spread their control over 10
  million square acres and 150 million people
• 1/5 of the worlds land area
• 1/10 of the worlds population
• European expansion moved quickly, and it was soon
  regarded as a necessary action to become a great
  power

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What makes it new?

• The number of contestants for empires increased
• Many people believed that this was their nations
  last opportunity to build or enlarge an empire
• Advocates and opponents of colonial expansion
  felt the need to sway public opinion

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What were the reasons for Imperialism?

1. Economic Reasons
2. Cultural/Religious/Social Reasons
3. Strategy and Political Reasons
4. Irrational Reasons

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Reason 1 Economics

• Nations sought ways of finding markets beyond
  Europe, where tariffs caused economic barriers
  between nations
• There were demands for new sources of
  raw materials
• Manufacturers needed new markets for their goods
• British explorer Henry Stanley advised a group of
  Manchester manufacturers to target Africa, which
  contained 30 million people who all needed clothes

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Economic Analysts

• J.A. Hobson (1858-1940)
• In Imperialism A Study (1902), he attributed the
  colonial expansions to great financiers of
  western and central Europe who wanted to increase
  their wealth through overseas investment
• Usually taken to mean that the real impulse was
  always one of capitalistic greed for cheap raw
  materials, advantageous markets, good
  investments, and new areas of exploration
• Said excessive capital in search of investment
  was only possible due to the unequal distribution
  of wealth. He called for social reform and equal
  distribution
• If the consuming public in this country raised
  its standard of consumption to keep pace with
  every rise of productive powers, there could be
  no excess of goods or capital clamorous to use
  imperialism in order to find markets.

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• V. I. Lenin (1870-1924)
• Elaborated Hobsons argument in Imperialism
  the Last Stage of Capitalism
• Emphasized the finance capital rather than
  industrial. Financiers were the powers behind
  imperialistic policies
• Said Imperialism is the monopoly stage of
  capitalism, or the last stage of a dying system
• Saw imperialism as a direct continuation of the
  fundamental properties of capitalism in general,
  and that the war of 1914 was on both sides
  imperialist.
• This was a convenient and persuasive case for
  explaining WWI in economic terms

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Reason 2 Cultural/Religious/Social

• Social Darwinism
• Saw life as a constant struggle
  for survival, with the stronger
  peoples surviving at the expense of the
  weaker. Countries that failed to expand were seen
  as losing. Believed that the advanced white race
  had an obligation to civilize the less
  developed, backward peoples of the world.
• Your new-caught sullen peoples, half-devil and
  half-child. Rudyard Kipling, The White Mans
  Burden (1899)

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• Missionary Activity
• An upsurge in Christian missionary
  activity by Catholics and Protestants.
  They sought to make
  disciples of all nations and to
  bring the advantages of European civilization to
  those they regarded as heathens tragically
  ignorant of the teachings of God
• They demanded that Western governments give them
  political and even military support
• David Livingstone (Scottish) Originally an
  African medical missionary, he later returned
  under government auspices as an explore to open
  a path for commerce and Christianity. Died in
  Africa in 1873, his body sent under navel escort
  to be buried in Westminster Abbey as a national
  hero

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• Colonies as Source of Profit Econ. Security
• Argued that the empires profit would finance a
  program of domestic reform and welfare
• New Land
• The colonies would attract a European countrys
  surplus population
• However, most European emigrants went to areas
  NOT controlled by their countries
• North America
• South America
• Australia

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Reason 3 Strategy and Politics

• Strategic and political considerations
  were important in bringing on the
  New Imperialism. An example was
  the rush for African colonies in
  the 1880s.
• Britain sought control of the Suez Canal in order
  to protect her trade route to India as a result,
  she gained an interest in Egypt and the
  Anglo-Egyptian Sudan
• Germanys acquisition of the Cameroons and East
  Africa improved her diplomatic position
• France acquired Algeria in order to compete w/G.B
  and Tunisia to keep it from Italy. Also annexed
  much of West Africa, the Congo, and the island of
  Madagascar

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• Perhaps the greatest pressure to build colonies
  resulted from the tension between the great
  European powers
• Germany under Bismarcks guidance encouraged the
  French to build colonies in Africa, thinking that
  this might take their minds off their loss of
  Alsace-Lorraine. Soon afterwards, afraid they
  were being left out, they started to colonize.
• Rather than leading to European stability, it
  threatened to cause war. In 1905 and 1911, France
  and Germany almost went to war over a dispute
  concerning Morocco.

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Imperial Expansion in Africa to 1880
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Imperial Expansion in Africa to 1880
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Partition of Africa, 1880 1914
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Partition of Africa, 1880 1914
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Reason 4 The Irrational Element

• The 1880s Scramble for Africa
• Germanys annexations started a wild scramble to
  acquire the rest of Africa. In 1875, less than
  1/10th of Africa had been turned into European
  colonies by 1895, only 1/10th remained
  unclaimed, even the areas that were neither
  profitable nor strategic. Soon, Spheres of
  Influence were set up all over Africa.
• Empire in the modern period was the product of
  European power its reward was power or the sense
  of power. D.K. Fieldhouse

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Criticism of Economic Motives

• Economic factors played a huge role in imperial
  developmentbut they were not the ONLY nor MOST
  important factors
• Some colonies had abundant raw materials, while
  others had few or none
• The poor people of African and Asia did not
  provide a sizeable market for European goods
• Some colonies had many opportunities for
  investment, while others did not
• In the race for colonies, the imperial powers
  appeared more interested in acquisition than in
  economic advantages

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Imperialism in China

• China became a center of imperialist activity in
  the 1890s as the Manchu dynasty became incapable
  of controlling the country
• Great Britain, already in control of Hong Kong,
  developed a sphere of influence in the Yangtze
  River valley
• The French focused on the Kwangsi
  and Kweichow provinces in the
  south, near Indochina

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Japanese Intervention

• 1894 Japan went to war with China, opening a
  new phase of imperialism
• Japans emergence as a major power was shocking,
  as they had isolated themselves from the outside
  world until 1854, when American Commodore Matthew
  Perry was able to get Japan to establish
  commercial relations
• In the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95, Japan easily
  won
• Fearing an advance of Japanese power in China,
  Russia, Germany, and France intervened
• The Germans and Russians took advantage of
  Japans setback, while France and Great Britain
  also expanded their interests in China

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Asia, 18801914
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Asia, 18801914
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The New American Empire

• The United States joins the ranks of imperialist
  powers
• Alaska is purchased from Russia in 1867
• 1878 the USA requires rights to a naval base
  in Pago Pago in the Samoan Islands in the South
  Pacific
• Growing American interests in Hawaii led to its
  annexation by the USA in 1898
• 1898 The Spanish-American War resulted in the
  acquisition of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the
  Philippine Islands.
• Cuba becomes, in effect, an American
  protectorate
• American focus their attention on the Pacific,
  as well as the Caribbean and Central America,
  still reluctant to get involved in European
  affairs (The Monroe Doctrine)

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What made it all Possible?

• Improved Technology!
• Steam boats allow river navigation
• Electric telegraph aids communication
• Quinine water prevents Malaria (The White Mans
  Grave)
• 1825 death rate in West Africa 77
• 1888 death rate in West Africa 7
• Advanced fire arms defeat natives
• Enfield Rifle (1853)
• Smith Wesson (1855) repeating rifle
• Winchester (1867)
• Maxim gun (1884)

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Important not to Forget

• The Brutality of Colonialism
• Huge numbers of Africans and Asians lost their
  lives in the European pursuit for empires
• Ex
• In the Congo, which the King of Belgium initially
  held as personal property, Belgian soldiers used
  to brag about being able to line up five Africans
  in such a way as that only one bullet was used to
  kill them. They cut off natives limbs for the
  slightest infraction of rules to terrorize the
  others into obeying.

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• Students Analyze patterns of global change in
  the era of New Imperialism in at least two of the
  following regions or countries Africa, Southeast
  Asia, China, India, Latin America, and the
  Philippines.
• Describe the rise of industrial economies and
  their link to imperialism and colonialism (e.g.,
  the role played by national security and
  strategic advantage moral issues raised by the
  search for national hegemony, Social Darwinism,
  and the missionary impulse material issues such
  as land, resources, and technology).
• 2. Discuss the locations of the colonial rule of
  such nations as England, France, Germany, Italy,
  Japan, the Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Portugal,
  and the United States.
• 3. Explain imperialism from the perspective of
  the colonizers and the colonized and the varied
  immediate and long-term responses by the people
  under colonial rule.
• 4. Describe the independence struggles of the
  colonized regions of the world, including the
  roles of leaders, such as Sun Yat-sen in China,
  and the roles of ideology and religion.

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• DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
• Discuss the development of the inequality in the
  global economy that resulted from the
  industrialization of Europe.
• Describe the development and growth of worldwide
  trade and the development of the world market.
• Discuss the opening of China and Japan to outside
  contact and trade with the European world.
• Describe the penetration of European civilization
  into Egypt and the resulting effects.
• Discuss the causes and consequences of the growth
  of the population of Europe in the pre-World War
  I era.
• Describe the type of people who emigrated from
  Europe, the major sources of emigration, and the
  causes for their emigration.
• Describe the type of people who emigrated from
  Asia, the major sources of emigration, the causes
  for their emigration, the resistance to Asian
  immigration.
• Discuss the growth and impact of the "new
  imperialism" upon the continent of Africa and its
  people.
• Describe the career of Cecil Rhodes and what his
  attitudes suggest about the causes of
  imperialism.
• Describe the growth of the "new imperialism" in
  Asia.
• Discuss the causes of the new age of imperialism
  in the late nineteenth century.
• Describe and discuss the criticism of the motives
  and effects of the new imperialism.
• Describe the general responses to the new
  imperialism by the governments and peoples of
  Africa and Asia.
• Describe the growth of the British domination of
  India and its effects.
• Describe the opening of Japan to Western
  civilization and the effects of that opening upon
  Japan and its people