WW Part 6: Ch 22 (End of Empire), Ch 23 (Capitalism & Culture)

Ch 22 (End of Empire)
It was the beginning of the end for the established empires of the world.

• In the 18th and 19th centuries the Americas had become independent of the British, French, Spanish, and Portuguese colonizers.
• In the 1940’s, the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Burma, Indonesia, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Israel had all achieved independence. Between the 1950s and 1970s, 50 African colonies had achieved the same independence.

An important distinction between the decolonization occurring in the 18th/19th and 20th centuries is that the earlier liberations were of fully integrated peoples who were culturally similar to their colonizers, where where as the independence efforts of the 20th century were by nations who continued to be culturally distinct from their oppressors.

During the 20th century numerous Empires dissolved or were reformed:

• The Austrian and Ottoman Empires collapsed as a result of World War 1, creating a series of independent nations throughout Europe and the Middle East.
• The Russian Empire collapse and was reformed as the USSR.
• The German and Japanese Empires collapsed after World War 2.

Self-deterministic nationalism became the focus of many emerging nations in Afro-Asia and Latin American nations. Each of these nations put at the same level of the remaining dominant nations.

European colonial rule ended for several reasons: these Empires had been severely weakened during the World Wars discrediting these nations and the legitimacy of their rule, self-created Empire-like nations (United State / USSR) opposed the older regimes, the United Nations created a platform to rally against anti-colonialism, and internal nationalist movements made independence possible.

Influential nationalist movements began around charismatic and intellectual leaders who mobilized the people into peaceful, and guerilla military forces to take action:

• Gandhi and Nehru in India
• Sukarno in Indonesia
• Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam
• Nkrumah in Ghana
• Mandela in South Africa

India: Ending British Rule

• Britain ruled India without integration into their society, and inadvertently provided the motivation and means by which to rebel. By governing from a position of racial superiority, and through repeated attacks of the Muslim Ottoman Empire, they helped to create a single Indian identity distinct from Britain. Through creation of infrastructure necessary to expedite trade and communication (railroads, schools, printing press, etc.) they created the means by which native Indians could step up and begin asserting the will of the people. Initially the Indian National Congress (INC), formed of English-educated Indians, was treated with little regard, though in order to acquire support for the War Effort the British gave way to INC reforms.
• After establishing himself in South Africa as an organizer for racial and political rights for Indian Muslims, Gandhi returned to India during a period of British repression and antagonization. Upon his return Gandhi became a key player in the INC; his mass-campaigns, support for Muslims, and incorporation of Hindu themes, found support from all castes and religions throughout India. His goal was not steered towards social revolution, rather a moral change in all Indians. To this end, he worked to raise up the lower castes and women, scrutinized the caste system, and sought a return to self-sufficient local governments over Industrialization.
• A growing divide between the nations Muslim and Hindu people threatened India’s unity. During the British declaration of their intent to leave, these religious and ideological differences led Gandhi and the INC to partition the country into Muslim (Pakistan) and Hindu (India) nations.

South Africa: Ending Apartheid

• The struggle in South Africa was not from an oppressive nation leagues away; rather it was an internal, almost civil conflict, between the Dutch Boers and the 80% black South African majority.
• Unlike India, South Africa had a complex industrial economy based initially on gold and diamonds, but also stele, chemicals and heavy engineering. This white-dominated economy created a dependence for those employed in farms, mines and factories.
• During the Apartheid, the white-controlled economy attempted to separate the races in every way possible while retaining their workforce.
• The African National Congress (ANC) as an organization of male, educated, professional Africans who sought to change the existing order through peaceful protests and petitions. While the ANC fought for African rights and a change to the social order, this was still denied to women who organized under unionized protests.
• During the 50’s the ANC broadened its support and attempted non-violent civil disobedience, similar to Gandhi. This existed in the form of boycotts, strikes, and pass burning. The result was an armed response and shooting of unarmed demonstrators, the imprisonment of the ANC leadership (including Mandela), and a restriction of major political parties.
  After the demonstration restrictions began, more guerilla methods were employed to sabotage and assassinate key targets. Additionally women and youths were incorporated into the struggle, coming to a head during a bloody conflict in the neighborhood of Soweto.
  External pressures were also imposed on South Africa during this time, which isolated it from the global community. The restrictions materialized in the form of exclusion from international sporting events, refusal of artists to perform in the country, and restricted private investments.
  The combination of internal and external factors led the abolishment of apartheid policies, and the release of Nelson Mandela from prison.

On the edge of independence, many emerging third world nations had to contend with the creation of a political system while dealing with the common conditions of population explosion, high independence expectations, cultural diversity, and little nationalist loyalty.

• Communism: China, Vietnam, and Cuba
• Democracy: India, South Africa, Mexico, Tanzania, and Senegal
• Military Regimes: Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East
• Dictatorships: Uganda and the Philippines

In Chile, the transition from Democracy to Marxist politics brought together the socialist and communist parties of the country. While initially the attempt to redistribute wealth and improve th life of average citizens. What resulted was infighting from military and religious parties, and external intrusion from corporations and nations until the a military regime took control of the nation for a significant period of time.

In Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk repealed remnants of the old empires as he attempted to modernize his country under a new secular nation. Islam was relegated to the private life, while all forms of government were modernized to reflect European Enlightenment thinking, and modernized European dress and actions for men and women.


Ch 23 (Capitalism & Culture)

The end of World War II saw the capitalist victors setting up the infrastructure to prevent future Depression-era conditions in the form of the World Bank and the International Monetary FUnd [IMF]. The purpose of these institutions were set rules for commercial and financial dealings among other capitalist nations while promoting free trade.

During the postwar reglobalization efforts, money and goods became globally accessible in three ways.

• Foreign Direct Investment - A firm in one country sets up facilities in another country.
• Short-term Movement of Capital - Purchase of foreign currency and stocks for quick turnaround.
• Personal Individual Funds - Credit Cards which eased the transfer of money cross borders.

Transnational Corporations (TNCs) created goods or services in countries all across the world. This allowed companies to move facilities to low cost labor locations with limited regulation restrictions.

A pattern of globalization is the migration of people from developing, or third world, nations to industrialized nations in Europe and North America.

Economic globalization helped to create the largest economic growth in recorded history. This had tremendous impact to the world nearly everywhere, as infant mortality declined, literacy increased, and life expectancies expanded. This rapid increase in wealth also created an enormous gap between the poor and wealthy, as never before seen.

The U.S. is seen as an “American Empire” which uses economic penetration, political pressure, and military action to create compatible systems of government with with c to interact with without directly governing.

Liberation from oppression was a key concept in the post Cold War world. In the U.S. civil rights demands of African and Hispanic Americans created a culture of resistance to the unjust U.S. system. Across the world, a feminist resurgence focused on:

• In the West, equal employment and rights rather than voting rights brought attention and action against the gender divide.
• In the South (Latin America, Asia, and Africa), colonialism, racism, and independence were interconnected with women's struggle.

In the wake of enlightenment, religious belief and practice had declined dramatically as science became the dominant religion of industrialized world. In the pre-industrialized and developing nations (China, Latin America, and Africa), conversion to Christianity and Islam spiked in contrast.

Fundamentalism was the reaction the pious took against scientific scrutiny of religion. In the west, a return to a literal interpretation of scriptures and their fundamental truthfulness was at the core of this fundamentalist movement, which created a rift with more modern ideas such as homosexuality and abortion rights. In Islam, to combat secular influences on society, a stricter return to Quran based laws and government were established in many Muslim nations, and many revolutionary movements were established to create Islamic states

Humanities ability to impact the planet is a distinctive feature of the Anthropocene Era. Wars and civilizations have come and gone since humanity's early years, but the environmental impact seen since early civilizations were formed can still be seen across the planet.

Three of the key factors impacting the environment during the 20th century:

• Population explosion, longer life expectancies, and reduced death rates.
• Incorporation of new energy sources fossil fuels, hydroelectric, natural gas, nuclear, etc.)
• Economic growth or development

Environmentalism took shape in the early 19th century as poets identified the impact of industrialization of the surrounding countryside.  In the 20th and 21st century, environmentalist approaches were abound bringing more direct widespread visibility the plight of the planet.