Transcript Chapter 32 The Building of Global Empires 1899 advertisement from McClure’s Magazine The Idea of Imperialism     What does the term mean? Term dates from nineteenth century In.

Chapter 32
The Building of
Global Empires
1899 advertisement from McClure’s Magazine
1
The Idea of Imperialism
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What does the term mean?
Term dates from nineteenth
century
In popular discourse by
1880s
Military imperialism of late
19th-century

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Later, economic and cultural
varieties
U.S. imperialism
2
Motivations for Imperialism

Military
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Domestic Politics
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Overseas conquests take focus off domestic problems
Economic
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Conquest to bolster national prestige
European capitalism: hope that expansion would help to ease a
nation’s economic health through global cycles of boom and bust
Religious
Demographic
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Ease urban overcrowding
Shipping criminal populations and dissident populations overseas
3
Economic Exploitation
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Exploitation of natural resources: diamonds in gold in
sub-Saharan Africa; rubber in sub-Saharan Africa and
Southeast Asia; bananas and coffee in Latin America
Exploitation of cheap labor: Contracted laborers known
as “coolies” sent to colonies as cheap agricultural labor to
replace slaves
Expansion of markets: Colonies supposedly new markets
for mother country’s manufactured goods
 The extent that this happened was limited; the
colonized rarely had enough money to buy these goods.
4
Geopolitical Considerations

Strategic footholds
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Waterways: Panama and Suez Canals; city of Singapore
founded to control key strait between Indian and Pacific
Oceans
Supply Stations: Cape Town in South Africa used as a way
station for ships on their way to India and the East Indies;
Hawaiian Islands serve as base for U.S. naval presence in the
Pacific.
Imperial Rivalries: territory seized to check the power of
nearby areas controlled by imperial rivals across the globe:
German Southwest Africa and East Africa were territories
taken in the 1880s to counter British presence in South Africa
5
The “White Man’s Burden”

Rudyard Kipling (1864-1936)

1899 Poem excerpt:
Take up the White Man's burden-Send forth the best ye breed-Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild-Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.

French: mission civilisatrice
6
The “White
Man’s Burden”
French propaganda poster from
the late 1800s
7
Domestic Political Considerations
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Crises of industrialism and growing class
consciousess
Global capitalist crashes in the 1870s and 1890s
Pressure from nascent socialist movements, such
as in Germany
Imperial policies distract proletariat from
domestic politics

Cecil Rhodes: imperialism alternative to civil war
8
Technology and Imperialism
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Transportation
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Steamships: Quick transport of personnel and goods
Railroads: Allow quick deployment of troops to quell
uprisings
Infrastructure
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Suez Canal (1859-1869)
Panama Canal (1904-1914)
Both waterways strategically important to respective
empires (British & American)
9
Weaponry
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Old muzzle-loading muskets take a long time
to reload between each shot.
Mid-century: breechloading rifles
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Reduce reloading time
Repeating breech-loading rifle;
U.S., 1850s – 1860s
1880s: Refinement of the
machine gun
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Maxim Gun: American-born
Hiram Maxim invents a gun
that can fire 11 rounds per
second for the British
Maxim Gun; England, 1884
10
The Military Advantage
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Battle of Omdurman (near Khartoum on Nile),
1898
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Five hours of fighting
British: six gunboats,
twenty machine guns
British force lost a few
hundred men; thousands
of Sudanese killed
11
Communications
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Correspondence
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1830 Britain-India: A letter could take two years
After Suez Canal: A letter would arrive in two weeks
Telegraph
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Experiments with submarine cables begin in 1850s
Britain-to-India cables are connected in 1870; it then
takes five hours for a message to make its way from
London to Calcutta by relays
12
British Empire in India
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East India Company founded in 1600
Obtains a monopoly on India trade
Originally needed permission from the Mughal
emperors to trade
The Mughal empire begins to declines after death
of Aurangzeb in 1707
The company begins to assert its own power with
a private army and government
13
British Conquest
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East India Company: Protects its
economic interests through
political and military conquest
“Doctrine of lapse”: Between 1848
and 1856, any Indian princely state
would be annexed by the company
if its ruler died without a heir or
was judged incompetent.
British use Indian mercenaries who become known as
sepoys; they are paid poorly and treated poorly
14
Sepoy Revolt, 1857
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Newly issued rifles had cartridges in wax paper
greased with animal fat
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Problem for Hindus: beef
Problem for Muslims: pork
Small-scale rebellion ignites a general anti-British
revolution
Company loses control of much of its holdings,
but British troops at gain upper hand in late 1857
15
British Imperial Rule
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In response to the rebellion, Britain:
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Abolishes Mughal empire
Exiles emperor to Burma
Abolishes the East India Company
Establishes direct rule of India by British government
Queen Victoria adds “Empress of India” to her many
titles
16
British Imperial Rule
Queen Victoria, Empress of India, in 1887
17
British Rule in India
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Organization of agriculture
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Indian cricket team that toured
England in 1886
Cash Crops: Tea, coffee, opium
replace sustenance crops, leading to horrific famines
Stamp of British culture on Indian environment
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Common language of English imposed on a land of
over 400 different languages
British education system helps to create a class of
lower-level Indian civil servants; top tiers of
government still occupied by British
British game of cricket becomes a huge Indian pastime
18
Imperialism in Central Asia
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British, French, Russians compete for influence in
central Asia
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France drops out after Napoleon falls from power
Russia active after 1860s in Tashkent, Bokhara, Samarkand; and
approached India through its machinations in independent Afghanistan
The “Great Game”: Russian vs. British intrigue
inside Afghanistan
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British feared Russians using Afghanistan to stage an invasion of India, the
“Crown Jewel” of the empire.
Britain fought two costly wars to bring the nominally independent Afghans
in line and check Russian influence: First Anglo-Afghan War (1838-1842)
and Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878-1880).
Rudyard Kipling’s vivid novel Kim (1901), about an poor orphan son of an
Irish soldier in India, uses the “Great Game” as its backdrop.
19
Imperialism in Southeast Asia
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Spanish: The Philippines
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Spanish colonization of these islands began with the Legzapi
expedition in 1565; founded Manila in 1571. Ruled from Mexico
City until 1821, and then directly from Madrid after that.
Dutch: Indonesia (Dutch East Indies)
British establish presence from 1820s
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Had conflict with kings of Burma (Myanmar) in
the 1820s; established colonial authority by 1880s
Thomas Stamford Raffles founds Singapore for trade in Strait of
Melaka
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Sir Thomas
Raffles
(1781-1826)
Base of British colonization in Malaysia, 1870s-1880s
French: Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, 1859-1893
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Encouraged conversion to Christianity
20
Imperialism in Asia, ca. 1914
21
The Scramble for Africa (1875-1900)
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French, Portuguese, Belgians, and English competing
for “the dark continent”
Conrad’s Heart of Darkness (1899): promulgates
negative stereotypes of the Congo but also a savage
critique of imperialism
Britain establishes strong presence in Egypt, South
Africa, and Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe and Zambia)
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Suez Canal accounts for strategic interest in Egypt
Rhodesia: Cecil Rhodes consolidates diamond mines in
1870s and 1880s
22
Rewriting African History
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Ancient African history is purposefully erased to
portray sub-Saharan Africans as “uncivilized”/“savage”
Justification of imperialist rule: bringing “civilization”
European “discovery” of great river sources (Nile,
Niger, Congo, Zambesi) becomes a near mania
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Information on interior of Africa comes from explorers like
David Livingstone, who sought the source of the Nile
King Leopold II of Belgium creates his personal fiefdom, the
“Congo Free State” in 1885, along the Congo River, opening up
the area to commercial ventures, like rubber cultivation. Slavelike labor conditions and abuses lead Belgian government to take
control of colony in 1908, and renamed it Belgian Congo
23
Rewriting African History
“Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”
Welsh journalist and
explorer Henry Morton Stanley
(1841-1904) was paid by the
New York Herald to find the
Scottish explorer and
missionary, David Livingstone
(1813-1873), who had been in
the African interior for years
without being heard from.
Stanley found him near near
Lake Tanganyika in present-day
Tanzania in November 1871.
Newspaper accounts of the
meeting in 1872 disseminated
the famous question, which was
likely journalistic fabrication.
24
Colonizing South Africa
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Dutch East India
Company establishes
the colony of Cape
Town in 1652
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Farmers (Boers) follow
to settle territory fertile
farmlands, later call themselves Afrikaners
Competition and conflict with indigenous Khoikhoi and
Xhosa peoples as Boers push eastward (Nelson Mandela
is an ethnic Xhosa)
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South African (Boer) War 1899-1902
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British take over the Cape Colony in 1806
British ban slavery in 1833; this causes a conflict with
Afrikaners who rely heavily on slavery
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Afrikaners migrate north-eastward in the Great Trek in the 1830s
and 1840s, overpower Ndebele and Zulu resistance with superior
firepower; known as “Voortrekkers”
Establish independent republics
British tolerate Boer republics until “mineral revolution” of
1870s: gold and diamonds discovered and mined
White-white conflict, black soldiers and laborers
Afrikaners concede in 1902; 1910, their republics are
integrated into Union of South Africa
26
South African (Boer) War 1899-1902
South Africa in the late 1800s, before the
outbreak of the Boer War
27
The Berlin West Africa Conference
(1884-1885)
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Fourteen European states and the United States
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No African states present
Rules of colonization: any European state can take
“unoccupied” territory after informing other European
powers
European firepower dominates Africa
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Exceptions: Ethiopia fights off Italy (1896); Liberia
protected by the U.S.
28
Imperialism in Africa, ca. 1914
29
Systems of Colonial Rule
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Concessionary companies
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Private companies get large tracts of land to exploit
natural resources
Companies get freedom to tax, recruit labor: horrible
abuses
Profit margin minimal
Direct rule: France
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“Civilizing mission”
Chronic shortage of European personnel; language and
cultural barriers
French West Africa: 3,600 Europeans rule 9 million
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Indirect Rule
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Frederick D. Lugard (Britain, 1858-1945)
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The Dual Mandate in British Tropical
Africa (1922)
Argues for the use of existing indigenous
institutions to consolidate and maintain
power: co-opt local leaders into colonial rule.
Legacy of Colonizers: Europeans had difficulty in
establishing tribal categories, they imposed arbitrary
boundaries, and exaggerated or inflamed ethnic tensions to
their advantage.

Rwandan Genocide of the 1990s: Belgian colonizers in what is now
Rwanda favored the Tutsi ethnic group over the Hutus, creating
animosity that fed the Rwandan genocide: the government-sponsored
massacre of Tutsis by the Hutu groups.
31
European Imperialism in Australia
and New Zealand
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English use Australia as a penal colony from 1788
Voluntary migrants follow; gold discovered 1851
Smallpox, measles devastate natives
Territory called terra nullius: “land belonging to
no one”
New Zealand: natives forced to sign Treaty of
Waitangi (1840), placing New Zealand under
British “protection”
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European and Native Population in
Australia and New Zealand
33
European Imperialism in the Pacific
Islands
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Commercial outposts
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Whalers seeking port
Merchants seeking sandalwood and sea slugs for sale in
China
Missionaries seeking souls
British, French, German, American powers carve
up Pacific islands
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Tonga remains independent, but relies on Britain
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Imperialism in Oceania, ca. 1914
35
U.S. Imperialism
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President James Monroe warns
Europeans not to engage in
imperialism in western hemisphere (1823)
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The Monroe Doctrine: All Americas a U.S. protectorate
1867 purchased Alaska from Russia (“Seward’s
Folly”)
1875 established protectorate over Hawai`i
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Locals overthrow queen in 1893, persuade U.S. to
acquire islands in 1898
36
Spanish-Cuban-American War
(1898-1899)
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U.S. declares war in Spain after battleship Maine
sunk in Havana harbor, 1898
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U.S. takes possession of Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam,
Philippines
U.S. intervenes in other Caribbean, Central American
lands; occupies Dominican Republic, Nicaragua,
Honduras, Haiti
Filipinos revolt against Spanish rule, later against
U.S. rule, under leader Emiliano Aguinaldo
37
Spanish-Cuban-American War
(1898-1899)
Lithograph of the U.S.S. Maine explosion
in Havana harbor, 1898
Filipino leader Emiliano Aguinaldo
around 1900
38
The Panama Canal
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President Theodore Roosevelt (in
office 1901-1909) supports
insurrection against Colombia (1903);
Roosevelt thinks the Colombian price
is to high for the land
Rebels establish state of Panama
U.S. gains territory to build canal,
Panama Canal Zone
Roosevelt Corollary of Monroe
Doctrine

U.S. right to intervene in domestic
affairs of other nations if U.S.
investments threatened
Panama Canal under
construction in 1907
39
The Panama Canal
1909 cartoon from
Puck Magazine
making fun of
Teddy Roosevelt’s
imperialist tendencies
40
Early Japanese Expansion
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Resentment over unequal treaties of 1860s
In the 1870s, Japan colonizes northern regions in
Hokkaido and Kurile Islands; also southern
Okinawa, and Ryukyu Islands as well
1876, Japanese purchase warships from Britain,
dominate Korea
Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895) over Korea
results in Japanese victory
Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) also ends in
Japanese victory
41
Early Japanese Expansion
Japanese woodblock illustration of Russo-Japanese War naval battle
42
Economic Legacies of Imperialism
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Colonized states encouraged to exploit natural resources
rather than build manufacturing centers
Encouraged dependency on imperial power for
manufactured goods made from native raw product
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Indian and Egyptian cotton
Iron ore and tin in Southeast Asia
Introduction of new crops
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Tea in Ceylon
Coffee in South America
Rubber in Malaysia, French Indochina, and the Congo
Cocoa in Sub-Saharan Africa: Gold Coast (now Ghana), Nigeria
and the Ivory Coast
43
Labor Migrations

Europeans move to temperate lands
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Work as free cultivators, industrial laborers
32 million to the U.S., 1800-1914
Africans, Asians, and Pacific islanders move to
tropical/subtropical lands
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Indentured laborers and manual laborers
2.5 million between 1820 and 1914
Chinese laborers in the Caribbean
44
Imperialism and Migration during the
Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century
45
Colonial Conflict
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Many insurrections against colonial rule
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Example: Tanganyika Maji Maji rebellion against German colonial
forces(1905-1906)—Rebels sprinkle selves with magic water (maji-maji)
as protection against modern weapons; 75,000 killed.
“Scientific” racism developed
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Count Joseph Arthur de Gobineau (1816-1882): French diplomat (who was
not really a noble) published An Essay on the Inequality of the Human
Races in 1850s, which argued for the superiority of northern Europeans.
Actually against imperialism since he thought it would lead to race-mixing
Herbert Spencer (1820-1902) combines classical liberalism with theories of
Charles Darwin (1809-1882) to form pernicious doctrine of “Social
Darwinism”: “survival of fittest.” Darwin was too careful of a scientist to
apply his theories of evolution to human society.
46
Nationalism and Anticolonial
Movements
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Ram Mohan Roy (1772-1883)
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Bengali often called “father of modern India”
Sought to eliminate Hindi practices of sati, caste rigidity, polygamy, and
child marriages, which the British used as evidence of European moral
superiority
Reformers call for self-government and adoption of selected
British practices; looks to Enlightenment thought/Deism
Indian National Congress formed 1885

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Founded to discuss ways for educated Indians to obtain a greater share
in government; not initially opposed to British rule and even contained
British members
Congress joins with All-India Muslim League in 1916
47
Nationalism and Anticolonial
Movements
Indian National Congress in 1885
48