Lesson 17

1. ImperialismTheme: How imperialistic nations were able to expand their power and control at the expense of weaker nations Lesson 17

2. Imperialism • Imperialism is a term associated with the expansion of the European powers, and later the US and Japan, and their conquest and colonization of African and Asian societies, mainly from the 16th through the 19th Centuries • Was effected not just through the force of arms, but also through trade, investment, and business activities that enabled the imperial powers to profit from subject societies and influence their affairs without going to the trouble of exercising direct political control

3. Motivations • Many Europeans came to believe that imperial expansion and colonial domination were crucial for the survival of their states and societies • Motivations can be grouped as economic, political, and cultural

4. Economic Motives • Overseas colonies could serve as reliable sources of raw materials not available in Europe that came in demand because of industrialization • Rubber in the Congo River basin and Malaya • Tin in southeast Asia • Copper in central Africa • Oil in southwest Asia Rubber trees in Malaya

5. Cecil Rhodes • Went to south Africa in 1871 and by 1889 he controlled 90% of the world’s diamond production • Also gained a healthy stake in the gold market • Served as prime minister of the British Cape Colony from 1890-1896 and saw the Cape Colony as a base of operations for the extension of British control to all of Africa

6. Political Motives • Some overseas colonies occupied strategic sites on the world’s sea lanes • Others offered harbors or supply stations for commercial and naval ships • Foreign imperialist ventures were useful in defusing social tensions and inspiring patriotism at home, often between industrialists and socialists

7. Russians in Tashkent • The weakening of the Ottoman and Qing empires turned central Asia into a political vacuum and invited Russian expansion • In 1865 Russian forces captured Tashkent which served as an important location for trade between Central Asia and Russia, especially after the construction of the Trans-Caspian Railroad in 1898 • As Russia encroached upon the ill-defined northern frontier of British India, Russians and British played out the “Great Game” of exploration, espionage and imperialistic diplomacy throughout Central Asia

8. Cultural Justifications • Christian missionaries saw Africa and Asia as fertile ground for converts and often served as intermediaries between imperialists and subject peoples • Other Europeans sought to bring “civilization” to subject peoples in the form of political order and social stability • Cecil Rhodes believed, “We (the British) are the finest race in the world and the more of the world we inhabit, the better it is for the human race.”

9. The White Man’s Burden 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. Rudyard Kipling

10. David Livingstone • Went to Africa as a missionary but was a combination of missionary, doctor, explorer, scientist and anti-slavery activist. • Reached and named Victoria Falls in 1855. • In 1871 journalist Henry Stanley found him at Lake Tanganyika, greeting him with the famous words “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?”

11. Technologies that made Imperialism Possible • Transportation • Military • Communications Cartoon showing China being divided by the United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, France, and Japan

12. Transportation Technologies • Steamships allowed imperial powers to travel upriver much further than sailboats so imperialists could project power deep into the interior regions of foreign lands The USS Monocacy was used to protect US interests along the Yangtze River in China

13. Transportation Technologies • The construction of new canals enhanced the effectiveness of steamships and the building of empires by enabling naval vessels to travel rapidly between the world’s seas and oceans • They lowered the costs of trade between imperial powers and subject lands

14. Suez Canal • Between 1859 and 1869, the British constructed the Suez Canal which links Port Said on the Mediterranean Sea and Suez on the Red Sea • Allows two-way north-south water transport from Europe to Asia without circumnavigating Africa • In 1882 the British army occupied Egypt to ensure the safety of the canal which was crucial to British communications with India 1869 opening of the Suez Canal at Port Said

15. Panama Canal • Between 1904 and 1914, the US built the Panama Canal which links the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans without having to transit Cape Horn Gatun locks under construction in 1910

16. Military Technologies • Breech-loading firearms with rifled bores provided European armies with an arsenal vastly stronger than any other in the world • European armies could impose colonial rule almost at will British soldiers show a Maxim gun to an elderly Zulu chief in 1901

17. Communications Technologies • Oceangoing steamships reduced the time required for imperial capitals to deliver messages to colonial lands • In the 1850s engineers began developing submarine telegraph cables to carry messages through oceans • By 1902, cables linked all parts of the British Empire throughout the world Insignia of the British Indian Submarine Telegraph Company

18. British Empire in India • In the 18th and first half of the 19th Century, the East India Company established a strong presence in India • (Remember the East India Company was one of the joint-stock companies we learned about in Lesson 3) • In 1858, the British government intervened, preempting the East India Company and establishing direct imperial rule in India In 1857 Hindu sepoys mutinied against the East India Company

19. British Empire in India • A viceroy represented British royal authority in India and administered the colony through an elite Indian civil service staffed almost exclusively by the British • The British formulated all domestic and foreign policy for India • Indians served in low-level bureaucratic positions Lord John Morley served as Secretary of State for India from 1905 to 1910

20. British Empire in India • The British transformed India by clearing forests, restructuring landholdings, building railroad and telegraph networks, encouraging the cultivation of valuable crops, and constructing canals, harbors, and irrigation systems • Established English-style schools for Indian children and suppressed Indian customs that conflicted with British values The British forced the Indians to ban sati, the practice of burning widows on their husbands’ funeral pyres

21. British in Burma • In the early 1820s, British colonial officials in India had conflicts with the kings of Burma (modern Myanmar) while seeking to expand their influence to the Irrawaddy River delta • By the 1880s, the British had established colonial authority in Burma • Burma provided teak, ivory, rubies, and jade 1905 watercolor painting of a temple scene in Burma

22. British in Singapore • In 1824, Thomas Stamford Raffles founded the port of Singapore, which soon became the busiest center of trade in the Strait of Melaka Singapore Harbor

23. British in Singapore • Singapore was administered by the colonial regime in India • It served as the base for the British conquest of Malaya (modern Malaysia) in the 1870s and 1880s

24. British in Malaya • Malaya provided outstanding ports that enabled the British navy to control sea lanes linking the Indian Ocean with the South China Sea ands also provided abundant supplies of tin and rubber Planter supervising workers on a Malayan rubber plantation

25. French in Indochina • The French were unsuccessful in establishing themselves in India, but between 1859 and 1893, they did establish a large southeast Asian colony consisting of the modern states of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos • Indochina would become an important supplier of rubber

26. French in Indochina • Unlike the British in their colonies, the French encouraged conversion to Christianity and the Roman Catholic Church became prominent throughout Indochina, especially in Vietnam • We’ll talk more about this in Lesson 25

27. Africa • Until 1875, Europeans maintained a limited presence in Africa • Around then, the adventures and reports of explorers such as David Livingstone, Henry Stanley, Richard Burton, and John Speke began to excite merchants about business possibilities in Africa Richard Burton explored east Africa with John Speke, seeking the source of the Nile

28. Africa: the Congo • In the 1870s King Leopold II of Belgium employed Henry Stanley to help develop commercial ventures and establish a colony called Congo Free State in the basin of the Congo River • Leopold said the Congo Free State would be a free-trade zone open to all European merchants in order to forestall competition from his more powerful European neighbors Leopold II

29. Africa: the Congo • In reality, Leopold ran the Congo Free State as a personal colony and filled it with lucrative rubber plantations run under brutal conditions • Humanitarians protested Leopold’s colonial regime • In 1908 the Belgium government took control of the colony and it became known as Belgian Congo Clearing tropical forests ate away at Leopold’s profit margins so Congolese farming villages such as this one were leveled to make way for rubber tree plantations

30. Africa: South Africa • The Dutch East India Company had established a supply station at Cape Town in 1652 and settlers began expanding outward to take up ranching and farming • These settlers were called “Boers” (the Dutch word for farmer) or “Afrikaners” (the Dutch word for African) • During the Napoleonic Wars (1799-1815), the British took over the Cape and established British rule in 1806

31. Africa: South Africa • British rule disrupted Boer society because it brought in English law and language • When Britain abolished slavery in 1833, Boer financial viability and lifestyles were further threatened • Chafing under British rules the Boer began migrating eastward where they established several independent colonies such as the Orange Free State (1854) and the South African Republic or Transvaal territories (1860)

32. Africa: South Africa • The lenient British attitude toward this changed when diamonds were discovered on Boer-populated territories in 1867 and gold in 1886 • Two “Boer Wars” were fought from 1880-1881 and 1899-1902 with the British winning and putting an end to the Boer independent republics • By 1910, Britain had consolidated the provinces into the Union of South Africa Boer guerrillas during the Second Boer War

33. Africa: Berlin Conference • Tensions among the European powers seeking African colonies led to the Berlin West Africa Conference (1884-1885), during which delegates from 14 European states and the US (no Africans were present) devised the rules for the colonization of Africa • The conference produced an agreement that any European state could establish African colonies after notifying the others of its intentions and occupying previously unclaimed territory

34. Africa: Berlin Conference • The Berlin Conference gave European diplomats the justification they needed to draw lines on maps and carve Africa into colonies • By the turn of the century, all of Africa was divided into European colonies except for Ethiopia, where native forces had fought off Italian efforts at colonization, and Liberia, a small republic populated by freed slaves that was effectively a dependency of the US

36. Colonial Rule • Three types • Concessionary companies • Direct rule • Indirect rule

37. Concessionary Companies • This was the earliest approach to colonial rule • European governments granted private companies large concessions of territory and empowered them to undertake economic activities such as mining, plantation agriculture, or railroad construction Stamps issued by the Mozambique Company which received a 50-year administrative charter from Portugal in 1891

38. Concessionary Companies • This system allowed European governments to colonize and exploit immense territories with only a modest investment, but the brutal practices of the private companies produced a public outcry and the imperial countries decided to establish their own rule The Imperial British East Africa Company began work on the Uganda Railway in 1896. 2,500 workers died during the construction.

39. Direct Rule • The concessionary companies gave way to direct or indirect imperial rule • Under direct rule, administrative districts headed by European personnel collected taxes, recruited labor and soldiers, and maintained law and order • Direct rule was typical of the French colonies French colonial administrator Louis Léon César Faidherbe served as governor of Senegal from 1854 to 1861 and from 1863 to 1865. He transformed the colony into the dominant political and military power in West Africa.

40. Direct Rule • Administrative boundaries intentionally cut across existing African political and ethnic boundaries in order to divide and weaken potentially powerful indigenous groups • Direct rule aimed at removing strong kings and other leaders and replacing them with more malleable people • The underlying principle was to keep African populations in check and permit European administrators to engage in a “civilizing mission”

41. Indirect Rule • Indirect rule exercised control over subject populations through indigenous institutions such as existing “tribal” authorities and “customary laws” • Indirect rule work in places where Africans had already established strong and highly organized states, but elsewhere erroneous assumptions about the “tribal” nature of African societies caused problems

42. Later Problems • The invention of rigid tribal categories and the establishment of artificial tribal boundaries became one of the greatest obstacles to nation building and regional stability in much of Africa during the second half of the 20th Century • The arbitrary boundaries of the Berlin Conference did not take into consideration the natural divisions of the African people (religion, culture, language, ethnicity, etc)

43. Later Impacts • When decolonization began in the 1950s, loyalties to these natural groups were often stronger than those to the arbitrarily-created state, leading to civil unrest in many countries • After independence, the dominant nationalist movements and their leaders tended to install themselves in virtually permanent power and tried to establish single-party states

44. US in Latin America • In 1823 President James Monroe issued the Monroe Doctrine that warned European states against imperialist designs in the western hemisphere • Any European attempt to reassert control over former colonies or to establish new ones would be considered as a threat against the US and an act of provocation • The Monroe Doctrine served as a justification for US intervention in hemispheric affairs

45. Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine • In 1904 the government of the Dominican Republic went bankrupt • President Theodore Roosevelt feared that Germany and other nations might intervene forcibly to collect their debts  • Roosevelt asserted that “in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power....” Cartoon portraying Roosevelt as an international policeman wielding his “big stick”

46. Early 20th Century US Interventions in Latin America • Cuba • Dominican Republic • Nicaragua • Honduras • Haiti

47. US: Alaska and Hawaii • In 1867 the US purchased Alaska from Russia • In 1875 the US claimed a protectorate over Hawaii, where US entrepreneurs had established highly productive sugarcane plantations • In 1893 a group of businessmen and planters overthrew Queen Liliuokalani and invited the US to annex Hawaii • Hawaii became a US possession in 1898 Queen Liliuokalani

48. US: Spanish-American War (1898-1899) • The US had large business interests in Puerto Rico and Cuba, the last remnant’s of Spain’s American empire • In 1898 the US battleship Maine exploded and sank in Havana harbor • US leaders suspected sabotage and declared war on Spain

49. US: Spanish-American War • The US easily defeated Spain and took possession of Puerto Rico and Cuba • In the Pacific, the US took possession of the Philippines and Guam • After the Spanish-American War the US emerged as a major imperial and colonial power Commodore Dewey destroyed the Spanish fleet in a single day at the Battle of Manila.

50. Puerto Rico and Cuba Today • Today Puerto Rico is a commonwealth associated with the US • In 1917, Puerto Ricans were granted US citizenship in 1917 • In plebiscites held in 1967, 1993, and 1998, voters chose to retain commonwealth status