Chapter 1

Question 1

What were the causes of imperialism and what effects did the European quest for colonies have on Asia and Africa?

Answer 1

1. Nationalism and the rise of national rivalries between European powers.
   - Europeans became increasingly conscious of their national identities in the 2nd part of the 19th Century. They sensed a bond that was stronger than ever with people who shared their national culture and language.
2. Social Darwinism: it is a belief that is inspired by Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection
3. “The White Man’s Burden”: some imperialists felt that they had a moral responsibility to elevate the “uncivilized” parts of the world.
4. Economic Imperialism/Industrialization: some industrialists wanted their government to directly control the economies and the exploitation of natural resources on other continents.

Question 2

Imperialism definition

Answer 2

Imperialism is a term that is overused and misunderstood.
-This is how William J. Druiker and Bessma Momani define it: “the conquest of foreign territories or peoples for the purposes of expanding political and economic power, and exploiting the resources of such areas and peoples” (2007, p. 26).

Question 3

Imperialism intro

Answer 3

Before 1850, the European presence in Asia and Africa was limited to religious missionary efforts and footholds that were strategically located along major trade routes such as Calcutta, Bombay, Singapore, Cape Town…

-The Europeans became more ambitious in the late-19th century. This led them to want more territories that they would control directly for the following reasons

Question 4

Consequences Nationalism

Answer 4

notionalsm = thought coutry best
best coutry = hast most colonies
rise nationalism = rise want clonies

This created a great sense of belonging but it also created distrusts and rivalries between national groups such as the Germans and the French.

• Another negative impact of the rise of national pride was that many Europeans felt that their nation was superior.
• Acquiring colonies became a source of national pride. It was a way for European political leaders to gain the respect of their citizens and other countries: “Britain, France and others competed for colonies out of fear that they would be at a strategic disadvantage if they had none…Only powers with colonies were respected (Roskin, 2013, p. 417).
• New colonies also represented opportunities for European countries to spread their values: “colonial empires were associated with the idea of national greatness, compositeness, and the survival of the fittest. The colours painted on the maps over large areas of Asia and Africa symbolized national power, prestige, and destiny. Colonies seemed to enrich national character and to encapsulate national glory. The natives were to be civilized while the raw materials and other resources of the colonies would benefit the economy of the metropolitan country” (Howard and Louis, 2002, p. 91).

Question 5

Social Darwinism Definition

Answer 5

Social Darwinism: it is a belief that is inspired by Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection.
-Social Darwinism argues that the survival of the fittest also applies to humans in the economic and political spheres (“The Bedford Glossary for World History”, 2010, p. 80).

Question 6

how did social Darwinism morally ALLOW colonization

Answer 6

• This distorted interpretation of Darwin’s evolutionary theory encouraged European governments to pursue racist and imperialist policies by arguing that it was a natural path towards progress: “Racism was part of Colonialism; it psychologically enabled imperialists to govern millions of unlike peoples who did not want them there” (Roskin, 2013, p. 326).
• Some nations were considered superior and they felt that it was their duty and their right to dominate inferior nations. Conquests were simply part of a natural process.
• Most imperialists believed “that progress comes from the survival of the fittest and decline of the weak” (Druiker & Monami, 2007, p. 34).

Question 7

how did social Darwinism morally ENCOURAGE colonization

Answer 7

-Not having colonies was seen as a sign of weakness. Every great power had to have a colonial empire and many politicians, entrepreneurs and scientists spread that belief whenever they could. Here are some examples from primary sources:
“I repeat that the superior races have a right because they have a duty. They have the duty to civilize inferior races” Jules Ferry, French Prime Minister, 1884.
“The path to progress is strewn with the wreck of nations; traces are everywhere to be seen of the hecatombs of inferior races… Yet these dead peoples are, in very truth, the stepping stones on which mankind as arisen” Karl Pearson, a British mathematician, 1907.

Question 8

“The White Man’s Burden”

Answer 8

: some imperialists felt that they had a moral responsibility to elevate the “uncivilized” parts of the world.

• They convinced themselves that they had a civilizing mission to ennoble their greedy quest for wealth and prestige.
• Their rationale was that it was right for them to govern the world because it allowed them spread their civilization all over the globe.

Question 9

how was conquest seen through the lens of the white man burden

Answer 9

• European Imperialists argued that they had to nurture the development of other peoples of Asia and Africa until they were ready to govern themselves but it was up to the imperialists to decide when this time would come.
• The historian Richard Drayton (2004) has a critical viewpoint of the White Man’s Burden: “We hear a lot about the rule of law…and economic progress - the reality was tyranny, oppression, poverty and the unnecessary deaths of countless millions of human beings”.

Question 10

Economic Imperialism/Industrialization

Answer 10

: some industrialists wanted their government to directly control the economies and the exploitation of natural resources on other continents.

• The European proponents of economic imperialism also wanted to have unrestricted access to new markets overseas.
• Industrialization led the Europeans to see Asia and Africa as providers of resources such as oil, tea, coffee, tobacco, rubber, minerals (tin, gold…) and food (sugar, peanuts, cocoa, palm oil…):

Question 11

what do many people think the real reason of Imperialism to be

Answer 11

“Economic and technological growth drove colonialism like never before, creating in nations a hunger for raw materials to feed their industries and dominate world markets” (Grant, 2009, p. 234).
“For all the fine sentiments, the real aim of colonization was, of course, financial gain. The world was sacked by Europe for its metals, rubber, coffee, tea, oil, lumber, gold and diamonds, fruit and fish” (Hopkinson & Yapp, 2012, p.136)

Question 12

How do people in the metropoles view the colonies

Answer 12

• But the European imperialists also saw the population of colonies as customers for their manufactured products.
• Industrialization also allowed Europe to develop superior weapons such as machine guns that enabled them to quickly overwhelm insurrectionists in the colonies: “The imperial powers had no right to conquer and govern others; they simply had better guns” (Roskin, 2013, p. 326).
• For example, in 1896, Zanzibar tried to rebel against the British. The insurrection was crushed in only 38 minutes (the British only lost 1 soldiers. The troops of the sultan of Zanzibar lost 500 soldiers).
• These four factors led to a global scramble for colonies. By 1900, Asia and Africa were almost entirely under European control (Japan and Thailand were the exceptions who managed to remain completely free. It allowed them to maintain their ancient dynasties).

Question 13

British empire begin 1800s

Answer 13

• In 1829, John Wilson, a British imperialist was already able to claim that the sun never sets on the British Empire.
• He was right. The British Empire eventually covered one fourth of the land and the population of the globe. It was the largest empire the world ever saw. This is a map of the British empire in 1866.

Question 14

crown jewel of the British Empire

Answer 14

• India was the crown jewel of the British Empire. It was the largest colony ever possessed by an empire. It had an enormous population of nearly 300 million inhabitants by 1900 (Louis, 2002, p.99).
• The British control of trade in India dated back to 1763 after they defeated France in the Seven Years’ War. It’s also at that point that the British took control of Canada.

Question 15

How did the Bristish establish this colony

Answer 15

• The British progressively unified the peoples of India through a series of conflicts between 1775 and 1818.
• A network of railways was established in 1853. The British also built roads, standardized the tribunals, developed a postal service and imposed a common currency, the rupee in India.

Question 16

did idians feel grateful to be colonized

Answer 16

• But the old Indian ruling class did not accept the erosion of its power and many Indian soldiers felt disrespected by the EIC.
• This led to the Sepoy Rebellion of 1857. The Sepoys were Indian soldiers who were working EIC. They mutinied against their condescending British officers.

Question 17

Sepoy Rebellion

Answer 17

• 1857
• The Sepoys killed 50 British imperialists and freed prisoners in the cities of Delhi and Lucknow.
• But their uprising was quickly suppressed and severely punished. Approximately 2,000 rebellious Sepoys were killed in the ensuing counter insurrection.

Question 18

Sepoy Rebellion Conclusion

Answer 18

• The rebellion of the Sepoys showed that Indians deeply resented the British.
• It led the British political authorities to dissolve the unpopular EIC.
• India was placed directly under the rule of Queen Victoria, the new empress of India. She received this title from Prime Minister Disraeli. She kept that title until her death in 1901.

Question 19

India constitution as colony

Answer 19

• From 1858 until India’s independence in 1947, the British monarch was the official ruler of India.
• This enormous colony also included the present-day countries of Pakistan, Bangladesh and Myanmar.

Question 20

British taxes on their Indian colony and economic influence

Answer 20

• The British profited from this colony mainly by producing cotton, opium and imposing ruinous taxes on India`s large population.
• British control over the economy of India caused endemic famines because the Indians had to use their land to produce crops that were profitable for the British Empire such as opium and cotton instead of using their fertile lands to grow enough edible crops
• The tax on salt was particularly unpopular but attempts to rebel against the British were promptly suppressed:
• The exportation of Indian opium to China also caused social and political unrest in China

Question 21

was china a colony

Answer 21

“China avoided being absorbed like India into a European empire. Yet the fate of the mass of its people was hardly more enviable.” (Harman, 2008, p. 359).
-China was too big to be controlled by a single imperial power. Although the Chinese emperors remained the official rulers they progressively lost control to foreign imperial powers who became increasingly powerful in China after 1840.

Question 22

china position on the global sphere in the last centuries

Answer 22

• China had reached its apogee in the 15th Century under the Ming Dynasty.
  The Manchu (Qing) Dynasty ruled China between 1644 and 1912. This period was marked by a decline of China’s power.
  -The era of the Manchu Dynasty was marked by the growing influence of foreign powers within China (Great Britain, France, Japan, Russia, Germany and the United States exerted influence in China).
  -Foreigners hoped to trade with China to obtain valuable Asian goods such as silk, porcelain and tea.

Question 23

was china interested in trade

Answer 23

• On the other hand, the Chinese showed little interest for foreign products. Back in 1793, the Chinese told King George III of Great Britain that “our celestial empire possesses all things in prolific abundance” (Roskin, 2013, p. 268).
• During the 1820s, the British solve the problem by exporting massive quantities of Indian opium to the Chinese even if it was an illegal drug in China.
• The Manchu emperors wanted to stop the importation of opium, an addictive illegal drug that had catastrophic socio-economic effects on their subjects.
• Chinese authorities made this perfectly clear to when British stocks of compressed opium were burnt in the port Canton (i.e., Guangzhou) in 1839.

Question 24

Did the British abandon the opium trade in china when the authorities pushed against it

Answer 24

• The British refusal to abandon this lucrative drug trade led to the First Opium War (1840-1842).
• The Chinese were defeated and the treaty of Nanking forced them to open 5 ports to foreign merchants.
• They also had to cede Hong Kong to Great Britain for an undetermined period. The British finally signed a 99 years lease in 1898. Hong Kong became a special administrative region of China in 1997.

Question 25

Opium trade in china “conslusion”

Answer 25

• This harsh treaty was not enough to please the imperialists because opium was still an illegal substance in China in the early 1850s.
• The British and the French allied themselves to defeat the Chinese during the Second Opium War (1856-1860).
• The Chinese were forced to legalize the commerce of opium.
• It allowed foreigners to produce opium on Chinese soil (China even passed India to become the main producer of Opium in the world).

Question 26

what other advantages did the loss of the second opium war yeild to European countries

Answer 26

-The Chinese authorities also had to pay indemnities to Great Britain and France and it had to guarantee the protection of Christian missionaries on Chinese soil.

Question 27

Did the chines population easily accept the new measures put in place by the loss of the second opium war

Answer 27

• The Chinese’s population desire to end their subjugation to foreigners led to the Boxer Rebellion (1899-1901).
• The Boxers were militias supported by the Manchu dynasty. They aimed at removing foreigners who exploited China. Their slogan was “Protect the country, kill the foreigner”.

Question 28

Boxer Rebellion date and descript

Answer 28

(1899-1901).
They attacked buildings and railways owned by foreigners. Their assassinations of about 200 diplomats and Christian missionaries quickly led to the formation of an international coalition of countries who “shared a common overreaching goal of controlling China” (Hallcock, 2013, p. 19).
-The Boxers were defeated and China had to accept foreign military bases on their land.
-This was extremely humiliating for the declining Manchu Dynasty.

Question 29

New political regime in china

Answer 29

• Another rebellion broke out in 1911. It led to the abdication of Pu Yi, the last ruler of the Manchu Dynasty.
• Sun Yat-sen became the 1st president of the new Republic of China. The Republic of China still exists. It is limited to the island of Taiwan since 1949.

Question 30

which countrie(s) colonized China ?

Answer 30

• China managed to avoid direct domination by Europe’s imperial powers.
• However, the decline of the Manchu Dynasty allowed France and Great Britain to grab territories in China’s backyard.

Question 31

which countries had colonies in southeast Asia

Answer 31

• France conquered Vietnam (1885). They quickly added Cambodia and Laos to form the colony of Indochina in 1887.
• Great Britain added Burma to India (1886). The British also controlled Singapore and the rest of the Malay Peninsula (a very important point to control trade between India and China).
• The Netherlands already controlled Indonesia (Spice Islands), since the early 17th Century.

-Siam (Thailand) was able to preserve its independence. King Mongkut maintained a good rapport with the Europeans and he modernize his kingdom. The British and the French were happy to have a Thai buffer zone between their colonies.

Question 32

colonies southeast Asia use

Answer 32

-The colonies of Southeast Asia were used for the production of rubber and rice. This picture was taken on a French rubber plantation in Indochina. The wealthy French plantation owner is in the car. He is surrounded by locals that he exploited.

Question 33

name a middle eastern country which modernized and how

Answer 33

• In Egypt, Said Pasha tried to modernize his country by developing a postal system, building roads and factories and founding the Bank of Egypt.
• He also ordered the construction of the Suez Canal to connect the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. This canal still exists. It’s almost 200 kilometers long. It allowed vessels to avoid going around Africa to reach India by sea.

Question 34

Who paid for the Suez canal (consequences)

Answer 34

• The canal was completed in 1869. Egypt was severely indebted to Great Britain and France because of the construction cost of this colossal engineering project.
• Said Pasha’s successor, Ismail Pasha, was restricted by the growing influence of the Imperial powers. Egypt was even forced to sell the Suez Canal to the British.

Question 35

Describe the take over of the Suez canal after the achat

Answer 35

• The resentment towards the Europeans led to a massacre Christians of the city of Alexandria in 1882.
• The British turned this tragedy into an opportunity to send troops to Egypt and occupy the Suez Canal.
• The British were able to crush Egyptian resistance in only 30 minutes at the Battle of Tel el-Kebir.
• The British had direct control over the canal from 1883 to 1922.

Question 36

why do we even care about the suez canal

Answer 36

-It was a vital shortcut to access their colonies in Asia and eastern Africa. Nowadays, the Suez Canal is back under Egyptian control. It is an indispensable source of revenues for the Egyptian government. About 20,000 ships pay the $250,000 fee to take the canal every year.

Question 37

which countrie(s) colonized Persia (Iran)?

Answer 37

• Persia (Iran) also attracted a lot of attention from European imperialists.
• Like China, Persia never officially became a colony. It remained under the control of its Shah (i.e., its king).
• However, the discovery of oil reserves in 1908 forced the Persians cooperate with the British and the Russians who were determined to get their share of that bonanza.

Question 38

slave trade intro

Answer 38

-The transatlantic slave trade led the Europeans to establish trading outposts on the western littoral of Africa back in the 17th century (about 13 million enslaved Africans embarked on the Middle Passage between the early 17th Century and the early 19th Century).

Question 39

How was the slave trade conducted in the 16th and 18th Centuries

Answer 39

-During the 16th and 18th Centuries, the European and American slave traders preferred to deal with African intermediaries rather than venturing in the interior of the African continent to capture Africans.

Question 40

name one big obstacle the Europeans faced in their expansion into tropical areas

Answer 40

-Malaria terrified Europeans until they discovered that quinine could be an effective treatment for this illness. It had been a bacteriological obstacle that had curtailed European expansion in tropical areas.

Question 41

did the trading outpostes in western africa last their whole occupation

Answer 41

-These commercial outposts in western Africa became unprofitable and neglected with the decline of slave trading and the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869.

Question 42

what else did those quirky colonizers do when they weren’t destroying human lives :)

Answer 42

• In the meantime, finding the source of the Nile, the world’s longest river, became one of the greatest scientific quests of the 19th Century.
• It led intrepid explorers such as Richard Burton and John H. Speke to venture deep into the African continent.
• Their exciting journeys incited Europeans to venture to areas if the African continent that had never been visited by Europeans.
• It was John H. Speke, a British military officer, who solved the mystery of the source of the Nile when he discovered Lake Victoria in 1858

Question 43

Dr Livingstone

Answer 43

• Exploration also captivated Dr. David Livingstone, a famous medical missionary who spent 15 years in Africa.
• Henry M. Stanley, a British correspondent for the New York Herald, a newspaper that had a reputation of creating events, was sent to Africa to find Dr. Livingstone. It took him 7 months to find him.
• This journalistic stunt was successful. Stanley’s search for Livingstone captivated readers in Great Britain and the United States for over 6 months.
• He did find Dr. Livingstone near Lake Tanganyika. Stanley said his famous catchphrase: “Dr. Livingstone, I presume”.
• Dr. Livingstone stayed in Africa and died of Malaria two years later. There is still a city named in his honor in Zambia.

Question 44

fill in

Answer 44

• Stanley used his fame to begin a lucrative career of exploring the African continent.
• He was hired by King Leopold II of Belgium who wanted to start a colony in the Congo River area.

Question 45

keeping with the trend were the Belgiums kinder overlords

Answer 45

• Leopold II ruled Congo directly without any restrictions. He demanded profits out of his new colony.
• This led to atrocious abuses in the plantations and the mines of Congo.
• Congo was the largest African colony. It had copper, uranium, diamonds, rubber, cotton and palm oil.
• The Belgians coerced the population of Congo to work in horrible conditions. Resistance led to mutilation and even murder.
• The abuses of the Belgians caused the population of Congo to decline from 20 to 10 million persons between 1880 and 1920 (Morrow, 2011).

Question 46

reactions to the abuse in Congo

Answer 46

-Horrified journalists such as Edward Morel and George W. Williams denounced the abuses of Leopold II:
“Your Majesty’s Government (Leopold II of Belgium) has sequester their land (Congo), burned their towns, stolen their property, enslaved their women and children, and committed crimes too numerous to mention in detail.” George W. Williams, 1890.

-The horrible legacy of this greedy king also inspired Joseph Conrad when he wrote Heart of Darkness. The story of this masterpiece of British literature takes place on the Congo river. This novel was adapted for the classic movie Apocalypse Now, that takes place on the Mekong River during the Vietnam War.

Question 47

with all of these European countries crowding Africa what solution did they find

Answer 47

-To avoid war over African territories, European leaders organized the Berlin Conference (1884-1885). This is often referred to as the “Great Carve-up”. They agreed that they had legitimate claims over an African territory simply by occupying it.

• The European leaders claimed to have noble goals. But the results were disastrous for Africa: “It established the principle that European claims to African territory had to rest on effective occupation to be recognized by other states. As a result, several European countries launched aggressive campaigns to extend their current coastal holdings to the interior” (“The Bedford Glossary for World History”, 2010, p. 8).
• The Europeans divided the African continent among themselves without considering the history, the languages and the religious beliefs of the peoples of Africa.
• European countries were able to claim the interior of their coastal outposts until they arrived at the border of another European colony.

Question 48

Berlin Conference triggered

Answer 48

-This triggered the scramble for Africa, a land-grabbing frenzy that led the Europeans to control 90 percent of the African continent by 1900.

Question 49

which courtesy colonized what after Berlin conference

Answer 49

• Belgium’s control of Congo was acknowledged by other Europeans but front-runners quickly became Great Britain and France.
• The French controlled most of western and northern Africa.
• Algeria even became an integral part of France; until it obtained its independence in 1962 (the citizens of French Polynesia, Réunion, Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana and St. Pierre and Miquelon are still French citizens).
• The British dreamed of developing a Cape-to-Cairo Road so they strategically took over southern and eastern Africa to links all their colonies located between Cairo, Egypt and Cape Town, South Africa.