1.The age of hope
The keys to understanding of present and future, as a rule, inextricably linked with the understanding of human past. Imperialism has long been a dominant force in the history of human civilization. Imperialism is inseparable from the colonial policies, the seizure of new territories and the exploitation of indigenous peoples. Someone inclined to regard imperialism as a purely negative phenomenon, but it’s worth noting that it also had some positive effects. At the end of the XVII century Britain and France have entered the group of the most powerful nations. It was the beginning of the era of English naval might and French hegemony on the European continent, the result of which was the construction of the British and French colonial empires and the end of Dutch hegemony.
Positive consequence of imperialism was the beginning of the way of mankind to the globalization, world trade association, and it may be also noted that cruel colonial policies as an integral part of any imperialism provoked the intensification of aspirations of the conquered peoples for liberation. Also it’s possible to add to the positive impacts of imperialism, or rather colonial policy, the fact that traditional, non Western societies began to get acquainted with the western model of political and economic organization. However, this knowledge was still controversial, because indigenous peoples didn’t play an independent role in the political and economic interrelations with the colonialists.
In the past (and even now), the aggressor countries justified their colonial policy by the most sophisticated methods. One should pay attention at least on Speech before the French Chamber of Deputies by Jules François Camille Ferry. He argued that superior races have a right over the lower races because they have a duty to civilize the inferior races! (Modern History Sourcebook: Jules Ferry (1832-1893): On French Colonial Expansion. (n.d.)) In fact that duty consisted in the ruthless exploitation of the resources of conquered people. And those governmental institutions that have been established on the colonized lands were intended to legalize, organize and anchor exploitation, but not to civilize the less developed races. And Despite R. Goff noted that, although Europeans allowed the indigenous African cultural patterns to continue, in many cases, their colonial rulers imposed Western systems of government, taxation, and justice.(History Exam I - From Imperialism to World War I The First Twentieth Century:. (n.d.)). However, that fairness was primarily west, consequently, advantageous for Europeans.
So, imperialism as a phenomenon has both positive and negative consequences. The colonial policy was beneficial to the invaders, but to the conquered peoples it was rather a burden, because colonialists exploited resources of the conquered territories. And a mission to civilize backward peoples and bring them democracy, justice and other tempting things is nothing more than a screen, behind which hides a political and economic interest of cruel imperialists.
2.The first total world war.
During the First World War were used not only the material resources of the warring countries, but also the material means of a significant number of neutral states. Grand scale and protracted character of World War I, the enormous material resources of the armed forces that were involved, allow us to name this war “total”.
The first global military conflict was caused by a variety of reasons. Some of them were the colonial legacy and existence of the old empires, which encompasses the many different peoples, who have already become more and more aspired to create their own nation states. Even Daniel R. Brower claimed that the emergence of nation-states in place of old empires is the deepest transformation of the 20th century.(Brower & Sanders, 2014)
Such old empires as the Austro-Hungarian and the Russian hampered the technological progress. By the beginning of twentieth century there were colonial empires of leading European states that have built their material prosperity at the expense of robbery of the backward regions of the world. Europe was on the brink of war. World was developing rapidly and trying to destroy all vestiges of the past. Also the beginning of the world military conflict, has been linked with the development of the revolutionary movement in Western Europe, which was stimulated by the increase of the world economic crisis.
The war was the result of a complex web of global political contradictions. However, besides the global disputes there were purely European contradictions. France and Germany after the Franco-Prussian War, argued about the border provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. Issue of the Balkans was contentious too. Russia had territorial claims to Austria-Hungary because of the lands of Galicia (Western Ukraine). Even though the ruling circles of Germany unleashed a war directly, in the outbreak of the World War I were also guilty the governments of Britain, France, Russia and Austria-Hungary.
World War I caused the collapse of empires and the creation of new states. On the ruins of the past people were building a new world in which, to a large extent, we live now. Shards of empires have become independent states. Colonies began to overcome the legacy of the past. For some conquered nations war has become beginning of the path for liberation, but for others it became the beginning of preparations for the World War II, but that’s a completely different story
References
Brower, D. & Sanders, T. (2014). The world in the twentieth century from empires to nations (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice Hall.
History Exam I - From Imperialism to World War I The First Twentieth Century:. (n.d.). Retrieved July 04, 2016, from https://www.coursehero.com/file/11495563/History-Exam-I/
Modern History Sourcebook: Jules Ferry (1832-1893): On French Colonial Expansion. (n.d.). Retrieved July 04, 2016, from https://legacy.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1884ferry.asp
