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8. Atlantic Revolutions, Global Echos

Echoes of revolution

impacts of Atlantic revolutions were immense, lasting long after they finished

North America → Britain became more interested in Asia → British colonial rule in India, Opium Wars in China

Napoleon’s brief conquest of Egypt → modernization of Egypt → westernizing reforms in Ottoman Empire

“constitution” in Poland, Russia, Spanish-ruled Philippines, China, Ottoman Empire, British-ruled India

smaller revolutions in Europe

republicanism

greater social equality

national liberation

Western Europe, United States, Argentina increased number of people who could vote

mostly universal male suffrage by 1914

Russians tried to build constitution but failed

American and French revolutions led sympathetic elites in Central Europe to feel that they were falling behind and “sleeping”

Abolition of slavery

17800-1890

impacted by ideas and practices of Atlantic revolutions

Causes

Enlightenment thinkers in 18th Europe increasingly critical of slavery

violation of natural rights of every person

declarations by American and French revolutions about liberty and equality

slavery as “crime in the sight of God”

first by Quakers

later Protestants in Britain and United States

new belief that slavery was not essential for economy

England, New England were among most prosperous in Western World—both based on free labor

slavery out of date and unnecessary with industrial technology and capitalism

slave actions

successful Haitian Revolution

Great Jamaica Revolt (1831-2): 60,000 slaves attacked several hundred plantations

demonstrated that slaves were not content

brutality of oppression was appalling

Abolitionist movement

mostly in Britain

growing power on governments to end slave trade and ban slavery

late 18th: support with middle- and working-classes

techniques

pamphlets with pathos-filled descriptions of slavery

petitions to Parliament

lawsuits

boycotts of slave-produced sugar

public meetings featuring African testimonies

1807: Britain forbade sale of slaves within country

1834: emancipated slaves

other nations followed suit, responding to growing international pressure

British navy in Atlantic intercepted illegal slave ships and sent people to Freetown in West Africa

most Latin American countries abolished slavery by 1850s

last: Brazil in 1888

1861: Russian tsar freed serfs but from tensions above, not below

Difficulties

slave economies continued to flourish well into 19th

plantation owners resisted abolitionists

slave traders (European and African) together shipped millions of additional slaves long after it was illegal in Britain (mostly to Cuba and Brazil)

“If they think it bad now, why did they think it good before?” (Osei Bonsu, king of West African state of Asante)

southern states of America: only slaveholding society where end of slavery occurred through highly destructive and lengthy civil war

Impacts

Economic

most cases: economic lives of former slaves did not improve that much

most wanted economic autonomy on own land

independent peasant agriculture (in areas where there was unoccupied land like Jamaica)

legally free but highly dependent labor, e.g. sharecropping (like in southern United States)

former slaves reluctant to continue working in plantation agriculture

labor shortages

global migration of indentured servants

Political

no political equality except in Haiti

Caribbean: white planters, farmers, mine owners still had local authority (colonial rule)

southern United States: “radical reconstruction” (full political rights, some power) → systemic racism

harsh segregation laws

denial of voting rights

lynchings

racism

emancipation usually meant “nothing but freedom”

Russia: end of serfdom → peasants gained some of nobles’ land → need to pay with “redemption dues”, growth of rural population → peasants were still impoverished

Outside of Atlantic World

West and East Africa

decreased price of slaves

increased slave use in African societies to make export crops

late 19th: Europeans imposed colonial rule on Africa; proclaimed commitment to ending slavery

Islamic world

freeing slaves was strongly recommended as mark of religious devotion

some 19th-century Muslim authorities fully opposed slavery because it violated Quran’s ideals of freedom and equality

no popular antislavery movements

slavery outlawed gradually in 20th after international pressure

Nations and nationalism

new idea: humankind divided into separate nations

distinct culture and territory

independent political life

Before

states did not usually coincide with culture of particular people

empires governed culturally diverse societies

rule by foreigners was not bad because the most important identities/loyalties were local

Rise

Revolutions

North/South America: independence movements made in the name of new nations

French Revolution: sovereignty with “the people”; defend “French nation” against external enemies

Napoleon’s conquest of Europe

European states felt that they were citizens of a nation

bound to each other by blood, culture, common experience, not subjects of dynasty

Europe’s modernization

science weakened hold of religion

migration to industrial cities or abroad lowered allegiances to local communities

printing, publishing standardized dialects into languages (common linguistic group/nation)

reawakening of older linguistic or cultural identities

Impact

Europe/Eurasia

political unification of Italy (1870) and Germany (1871)

Greeks, Serbs asserted independence from Ottoman Empire

Czechs, Hungarians demanded more autonomy within Austrian Empire

Poles, Ukrainians more aware of oppression within Russian Empire

Irish sought “home rule” and separation from Britain

Zionist movement in Palestine among frequently-persecuted Jews

Rivalries

increased rivalry among European states, drive for colonies in Asia and Africa

nationalism → suffering/sacrifice in Europe → World War I

rivalries among European-derived states in Americas (e.g. Mexican-American War, 1846-8; conflict between Paraguay and Triple Alliance of Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay from 1864 to 1870)

Instilling loyalties

governments tried to instill national loyalties into citizens

schools

public rituals

mass media

military service

Russia: imposed Russian language

only made nationalism of Ukraine, Poland, Finland more prominent

Political ideologies

endless controversy

who belonged to nation?

who should speak for it?

supporters of liberal democracy, representative government (e.g. France, US): emphasis on the people helped goals of wider involvement in political life

civic nationalism

identified nation with particular territory

people of various backgrounds could assimilate into dominant culture

sometimes defined in racial terms (e.g. in Germany)

excluded those without imagined common ancestry (e.g. Jewish)

conservatives: used to combat socialism, feminism (dividd nation along class/gender lines)

Outside of Euro-America

Egypt: “Egypt for the Egyptians” movement (1870s) as British and French intervened more in Egyptian affairs

Japan: confronted European aggression (late 19th); distinct culture became assertive nationalism

British-ruled India: Western-educated men began to think of their diverse country as one nation; Indian National Congress

Ottoman Empire: Turkish national state, not Muslim or dynastic

China: some began to think as a nation troubled by foreign ruling dynasty and Europeans

West Africa: “African nation” among some freed slaves and missionary-educated men

Feminist beginnings

Inspiration

European Enlightenment

challenged ancient traditions

including

women’s inferiority⁠

⁠

Condorcet (French): “complete destruction of those prejudices that have established an inequality of rights between the sexes”

French Revolution: possibility of recreating human societies on new foundations

many women participated

some insisted that the revolutionary ideals of liberty, equality must include women

England: Mary Wollstonecraft write Vindication of the Rights of Man

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