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10. Colonial Encounters in Asia, Africa, Oceania

Industry and empire

Europe’s 19th-century expansion mostly from Industrial Revolution

Imports

new economic needs often found solutions abroad

productivity, growing wealth → raw materials, agricultural products

wheat (American Midwest, southern Russia)

meat (Argentina)

bananas (Central America)

rubber (Brazil)

cocoa (West Africa)

palm oil (West Africa)

etc.

Exports

factories churned more goods than people could afford to buy

1840: Britain exported 60% of cotton-cloth production annually

200 million yards to Europe

300 million yards to Latin America

145 million yards to India

Europeans and Americans fascinated with China because of market potential

capital: European investors found it more profitable to invest abroad than at home

1910-1913: Britain sent about half of its savings overseas as foreign investment

Imperialism

foreign markets kept factories functioning, workers employed

Growth factors

promised to solve class conflicts of industrializing society while avoiding revolution or serious redistribution of wealth

most significant factor: rise of nationalism

1871: unification of Italy, Germany intensified Europe’s competitive international relations

spilled into struggle for colonies or economic concessions in Asia, Africa, Pacific Oceania

colonies, spheres of influence abroad became symbols of “Great Power” status

urgently needed to be acquired even if they did not have immediate value

after 1875: mattered (even to ordinary people) who controlled distant lands

summary:

appealed on economic, social grounds to wealthy and ambitious

seemed politically, strategically necessary for international power politics

emotionally satisfying

New means for expansion

steam-driven ships, Suez Canal (1869)

allowed Europeans to reach distant African, Asian, Pacific ports more quickly, predictably

could reach interior rivers too

underwater telegraph: almost instant communication with distant parts of empire

quinine: prevent malaria; reduced European death rates in tropics

breech-loading rifles, machine guns: widened military gap between Europeans and others

European perception of people

Self-perception

then: defined in religious terms

“they” were heathens

“we” were Christian

now: secular arrogance that fused with or rejected previous ideas of superiority

unlocked secrets of nature

created society of unprecedented wealth

produced unsurpassed military power

View of other nations

opinions of other cultures dropped

Chinese

“John Chinaman”

weak

cunning

conservative

distinct threat

“yellow peril”

Africans

became primitive

nations/kings → tribes/chiefs

Pacific Oceania, etc.

“big children”

lived “closer to nature” than civilized people

distant from European culture

motives of views

criticize artificiality, materialism of modern European life

justify conquest of people who were doing little to improve what nature offered

Scientific racism

used prestige, apparatus of science to support racial preferences, prejudices

phrenology/craniology

allegedly scientific methods and instruments

classified size and shape of human skulls

determined that skulls of white people were larger and therefore more advanced

biology: plant/animal classification applied to humans

hierarchy of races (white on top, then less developed “child races”)

race determined intelligence, moral development, destiny

“Race is everything. Civilization depends on it” (Robert Knox, British anatomist, 1850)

germ theory of disease took hold in 19th-century Europe

with fear that contact with “inferiors” threatened health and biological future of “superior” peoples

Civilizing mission

European perception of expansion: inevitable; natural outgrowth of superior civilization

genuine sense of responsibility to “weaker races”

Superior races have a right, because they have a duty...to civilize the inferior races” (Jules Ferry, French politician, 1883)

civilizing mission

heathens → Christianity

disordered lands → good government

“lazy natives” → work discipline, production for market

ignorant, illiterate → education

naked → clothing

sick → healthcare

suppressed “native customs”

Social Darwinism

applied Charles Darwin’s evolutionary concept of “survival of the fittest” to human society

European dominance inevitably led to displacement/destruction of backwards peoples or “unfit races”

justified imperialism, war, aggression

natural and progressive

weed out “weaker” peoples; allow “stronger” to flourish