VARIETY OF EXPLAINATIONS HAVE BEEN PUT FORWARD FOR THE NEW IMPERIALISM OF THE LATE 19TH CENTURY
... D: 0033057 COURSE TITLE: EUROPE AND THE WIDER WORLD: IMPERIALISM AND DECOLONISATION. TUTORS NAME: ALONA T ESSAY TITLE: “A VARIETY OF EXPLAINATIONS HAVE BEEN PUT FORWARD FOR THE NEW IMPERIALISM OF THE LATE 19TH CENTURY EUROPE; ECONOMIC, POLITICAL, PHYSOLOGICAL. IDENTIFY AND ASSESS THOSE WHICH YOU THINK ARE THE KEY ONES” EUROPEAN EXPANSION OVERSEAS WAS NOT UNHEARD OF BY THE END OF THE LATE NINETEENTH CENTURY. HOWEVER, DURING THE LAST QUATHER OF THE CENTURY, IT TOOK ON A NEW MEANING AND IMPERIALISM AS IT BECAME KNOWN BECAME AN IMPORTANT ELEMENT IN EUROPEAN POLITICS. ... THIS PERIOD OF EUROPEAN EXPANSION HAS BEEN ATTRIBUTED TO NUMEROUS EXPLAINATIONS, NOT LEAST: ECONOMIC, POLITICAL AND PSYCHOLOGICAL INFLUENCES. ... AMONG THOSE MOTIVES WAS ECONOMIC MOTIVATION, HOBSON SAW IMPERIALISM AS “PRIMARILY A STRUGGLE FOR PROFITABLE MARKETS OF INVESTMENT” THERE IS NO DOUBT THAT THE ECONOMY IN GENERAL, BANKS AND ENTREPRENEURS PLAYED A LEADING ROLE IN IMPERIALIST POLITICS. ... THE INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC CRISIS, WHICH BEGAN IN THE 1870’s CONTRIBUTED TO THE OIRGIN OF IMPERIALISM, BY STIMULATING THE IMAGINATION OF THOSE CAUGHT UP IN IT, TO FIND WAYS OF ESCAPING FROM A PRECARIOUS SITUATION. IMPERIALISM SIGNIFIED INCREASED EXPORTS AND FOREIGN INVESTMENT, WHICH WAS HOPED WOULD INSPIRE INCREASED CONFIDENCE IN THE HOME ECONOMY. ... EVERY INSTINCT OF THE BUSINESSMEN SEEMED TO BE TO GRAP THEIR MARKETS AND SOURCES OF RAW MATERIALS WHILE THEY COULD, IMPERIALISM WAS THEN SEEN AS A MEANS OF OVERCOMING THE DEPRESSION, NOT ONLY BY THE BUSINESSMEN BUT ALSO BY THE PUBLIC AT LARGE. ... FRANCE, WHILST HAVING AMASSED THE SECOND LARGEST EMPIRE IN THE WORLD, DID NOT SEE IMPERIALISM IN PURELY ECONOMIC TERMS. ... THERE ARE MANY VIEWS REGARDING ECONOMIC EXPLAINATIONS FOR IMPERIALISM. LENIN SAW IMPERIALISM AS “THE INEVITABLE RESULT OF THE CAPITALIST SYSTEM AND AN IMPORTANT SYMPTOM OF ITS ULTIMATE AND INESCAPABLE DECAY” ROBSON AND GALLACHER EXPLAINED THE ECONOMIC DIMENSION TO IMPERIALISM AS “AN EXPLAINATION OF EUROPEAN RULE IN TROPICAL AFRICA, THE THEORY OF ECONOMIC IMPERIALISM, PUTS THE TRADE BEFORE THE FLAG, THE CAPITAL BEFORE THE CONQUEST AND THE CART BEFORE THE HORSE” GERMAN VICTORY IN THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR HAD SERIOUSLY CHANGED THE EUROPEAN POLITICAL LANDSCAPE. A UNIFIED GERMANY, CAME TO THE FORE OF EUROPEAN AFFAIRS, OF WHICH IMPERIALISM WAS TO BECOME ONE. ... K FIELDHOUSE SAW THE NEW IMPERIALISM AS A NATURAL OUTCOME OF THE MILITANT NATIONALISM WHICH HAD COME TO DOMINATE EUROPE AFTER THE VICTORY OF BISMARCKS “BLOOD AND IRON” POLICY IN THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR.