Imperialism's Back Story

Chapter 26's main "ism" is.........imperialism.

 

Although this 'ism' may seem unrelated to nationalism, the two actually flow together. The strong foundation of nationalism allowed for imperialism. Once a people felt confident in themselves, they felt the need to share their importance with the rest of the world. Many Europeans resorted to imperialism because they felt that they could offer unique  benefits to other countries. 

In order to understand this chapter, you must first understand the chart on page 856. This chart highlights three important facts we would have written down if we had read this portion of the chapter.

Fact number 1: In 1750, the average income was about the same throughout the whole world. 

Fact number 2: It was industrialization that opened the gaps in wealth and well-being in countries. 

Fact number 3: Income per person stagnated in Third World countries, which was the opposite of industrialized nations 

Fact number 2 begs the question of whether industrialization was needed for imperialism. Industrialization provided the wealth needed to conquer another country. Without the capital, these countries would not have been able to focus their efforts abroad. Industrialization also kept countries modern so that they themselves would not be conquered. A country without industrialization had the potential of themselves becoming conquered. 

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Also at this time, the Great Migration was occurring. 

Thousands of Europeans were leaving their home country and traveling throughout the globe. They could be moving as far as the country next to them or the other side of the ocean. Although Americans are led to believe all the Europeans came to the US, less than half of them immigrated to that destination. Hundreds of others moved to places like Argentina and Brazil. Additionally, many of them returned to their homeland after immigrating. Once they had their needed money, they immigrated back to the land of their birth. 

The Great Migration and Nationalism set the backdrop for the Imperialism that ran rampant in Europe at this time.  

**On a completely unrelated side note, the old imperialism used in the D2L discussion for next week refers to the imperialism that founded the New World. **