Modern history
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- Modern Era, Modern Times, and Modern Age all redirect here. For other uses, see Modern Age (disambiguation).
• The term "modern period" should not be confused with modernism, a late 19th and early 20th century movement in art.
Modern history describes the historical timeframe after the Middle Ages. The term modern period or modern era (sometimes also modern times) is the period of history that succeeds the Middle Ages. Contemporary history describes the term of historic events that are immediately relevant to the present time and is a certain perspective of modern history. Recent contemporary history's intentionally loose definition includes major events such as the Second World War, but not those events whose effects have been overcome.
The 1500s is an approximate starting period for the modern era.[1][2] Many major events caused the Western world to change around turn of the 16th century: from the Fall of Constantinople (1453), the fall of Muslim Spain, and Christopher Columbus's voyage to the Americas (both 1492), to the Protestant Reformation begun with Martin Luther's Ninety-Five Theses (1517). Modern history may contain references to the history of Early modern Europe from the turn of the 15th century until the late 18th century, but generally refers to the history of the world since the advent of the Age of Reason and the Age of Enlightenment in the 17th and 18th centuries and the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. The concepts and ideas developed since then are part of the modern era. This terminology is a historical periodization that is applied primarily to Western history.
[edit] Terminology and usage
The term "modern" was coined shortly before 1585 to describe the beginning of a new era.[2] The European Renaissance (about 1420–1630) is an important transition period beginning between the Late Middle Ages and Early Modern Times, which started in Italy.
The term "Early Modern" was introduced in the English language in the 1930s.[3] to distinguish the time between what we call Middle Ages and time of the late Enlightenment (1800) (when the meaning of the term Modern Ages was developing its contemporary form). It is important to note that these terms stem from European History; in usage in other parts of the world, such as in China, India, and Islam, the terms are applied in a very different way, but often in the context with their contact with European culture in the Age of Discoveries.[4]
"Postmodernism", coined 1949, on the other hand, would describe rather a movement in art than a period of history, and is usually applied to arts, but not to any events of the very recent history.[5] This changed, when postmodernity was coined to describe the major changes in the 1950s and 1960s in economy, society, culture, and philosophy. Sometimes distinct from the modern periods themselves, the terms "modernity" and "modernism" refer to a new way of thinking, distinct from medieval thinking.
[edit] Modern era
The modern era includes the early period, sometimes called the early modern period, which lasted from c. AD 1500 to around c. AD 1800 (most often 1815). This period ended in a time of political and economic change triggered by the American Revolution, the first French Revolution, but especially the redrawing of the map of Europe in the Second Treaty of Paris which ended the Napoleonic Wars. This combination of epoch events totally changed thinking in western thought, and so their dates serve as well as any to separate the old from the new modes.
Within the predecessor period, in the 18th century, the Enlightenment occurred. This was followed by the Industrial Revolution in Britain, and an Age of Revolutions, beginning with those in America and France, and then pushed forward in other countries partly as a result of upheavals of the Napoleonic Wars and their impact on thought and thinking, from concepts from nationalism to organising armies.
Our most recent era — Modern Times — begins with the end of these revolutions in the 19th century, and includes the World Wars era (encompassing World War I and World War II) and the Cold War. The 'contemporary era' follows shortly afterward with the explosion of research and increase of knowledge known as the Information Age in the latter 20th century and 21st century.
[edit] Significant developments
The modern period has been a period of significant development in the fields of science, politics, warfare, and technology. It has also been an age of discovery and globalization. During this time that the European powers and later their colonies, began a political, economic, and cultural colonization of the rest of the world.
By the late 19th and early 20th century, modernist art, politics, science and culture has come to dominate not only Western Europe and North America, but almost every civilized area on the globe, including movements thought of as opposed to the west and globalization. The modern era is closely associated with the development of individualism, capitalism, urbanization and a belief in the positive possibilities of technological and political progress.
The brutal wars and other problems of this era, many of which come from the effects of rapid change, and the connected loss of strength of traditional religious and ethical norms, have led to many reactions against modern development. Optimism and belief in constant progress has been most recently criticized by postmodernism while the dominance of Western Europe and North America over other continents has been criticized by postcolonial theory.
[edit] Modern as post-medieval
One common use of the term is to describe the condition of Western history since the mid-1400s, or roughly the European development of moveable type and the printing press.
- Rise of capitalism
- Emergence of socialist countries
- Institution of representative democracy
- Individualism
- Increasing role of science and technology
- Spread of social movements
- Urbanization
- Mass literacy and proliferation of mass media
- Industrialization
In this context the "modern" society is said to develop over many periods, and to be influenced by important events which represent breaks in the continuity:
Particular ways of periodizing modernity include:
- The Age of Discovery
- The Renaissance
- The Reformation and Counter Reformation
- The Age of Reason
- The Enlightenment
- the Romantic era
- the Victorian era (see also the Industrial Revolution)
- the Modern era
- the Postmodern era (see also Postmodernity and Digitality)
Important events in the development of modernity in this context include
- The Arrival of the Printing Press
- The English Civil War
- The American Revolution
- The French Revolution
- The Revolutions of 1848
- The Russian Revolution
- The First World War and the Second World War
[edit] Characteristics
The concept of the modern world as distinct from an ancient or medieval world rests on a sense that the modern world is not just another era in history, but rather the result of a new type of change. This is usually conceived of as progress driven by deliberate human efforts to better their situation.
Advances in all areas of human activity—politics, industry, society, economics, commerce, transport, communication, mechanization, automation, science, medicine, technology, and culture—appear to have transformed an Old World into the Modern or New World. In each case, the identification of the old Revolutionary change can be used to demarcate the old and old-fashioned from the modern.
Much of the Modern world replaced the Biblical-oriented value system, revalued the monarchical government system, and abolished the feudal economic system, with new democratic and liberal ideas in the areas of politics, science, psychology, sociology, and economics.
[edit] Modern events
Some events, though born out of context not entirely new, show a new way of perceiving the world. The concept of modernity interprets the general meaning of these events and seeks explanations for major developments. Historians analyze the events taking place in Modern Times, since the Middle Ages between the present and ancient times.
[edit] Early Modern World
[edit] Africa and the Ottoman Empire
[edit] North and East Africa
In North Africa, the growth of the Ottoman Empire is the period followed after the rise of the Ottoman Empire in which the Ottoman state reached the Pax Ottomana. In this period, the Ottoman Empire expanded southwestwards into North Africa and battled with the re-emergent Persian Shi'ia Safavid Empire to the east. In the Saracen sphere of power, the Ottoman Empire, who had conquered Constantinople in 1453, and had seized Egypt in 1517, established the regencies of Algeria, Tunisia and Tripoli (between 1519 and 1551), Morocco remaining an independent Arabized Berber state under the Sharifan dynasty, which had its beginnings at the end of the 13th century.
In East Africa, the Solomonic dynasty came to rule in the 13th century and claimed direct descent from the old Axumite royal house. The Solomonics continued to rule their area of East Africa with few interruptions well into modern history. In the 16th century, Shewa and the rest of Abyssinia was conquered by the forces of Ahmed Gragn of Adal, and Shewa became under Muslim rule; the region then came under pressure from the Oromo, who succeeded during the first decades of the next century in settling the areas around Shewa.
[edit] West Africa
The Songhai Empire took control of the trans-Saharan trade at the beginning of the modern era. It seized Timbuktu in 1468 and Jenne in 1473, building the regime on trade revenues and the cooperation of Muslim merchants. The empire eventually made Islam the official religion, built mosques, and brought Muslim scholars, including al-Maghil, to Gao.[6]
Around the beginning of the modern era, the Benin Empire was a independent trading power West Africa, blocking other inland nations access to the coastal ports. Benin, which may have housed 100,000 inhabitants at its height, spread over twenty-five square kilometres, and was enclosed by three concentric rings of earthworks. By the late 15th century Benin was in contact with Portugal. At its apogee in the 16th and 17th centuries, Benin encompassed parts of southeastern Yorubaland and the western Igbo.
[edit] Indian Empires and Southeast Asia
[edit] Indian subcontinent empires
On the Indian subcontinent, the Lodhi Dynasty ruled over the Delhi Sultanate during its last phase. The dynasty founded by Bhalul Lodhi ruled from 1451 to 1526. The last ruler of this dynasty, Ibrahim Lodhi was defeated and killed by Babur in the first Battle of Panipat. The Mughal Empire was an Islamic Persianate[7] imperial power which began in 1526, ruled most of the area as Hindustan by the late 17th and early 18th centuries.[8] The Vijayanagara Empire was based in the Deccan Plateau but with diminished power after a major military defeat in 1565 by the Deccan sultanates. The empire is named after its capital city of Vijayanagara.
[edit] Archipelagic empires
At the start of the modern era, the Spice Route between India and China crossed Majapahit. This was an archipelagic empire based on the island of Java. The Majapahit empire was the last of the major Hindu empires of the Malay archipelago and is considered one of the greatest states in Indonesian history.[9] Its influence extended to states on Sumatra, the Malay Peninsula, Borneo and eastern Indonesia, though the effectiveness of the influence is the subject of debate.[10]
Majapahit found itself unable to control the rising power of the Sultanate of Malacca. The Sultanate of Malacca stretched from Muslim Malay settlements of Bukit (Phuket),Setol (Satun), Pantai ni (Pattani) bodering Ayutthaya Kingdom of Siam(Thailand) in the north to Sumatra in the southwest. The Portuguese invaded its capital in 1511 and, in 1528, the Sultanate of Johor was established by a Malaccan prince to succeed Malacca.
[edit] Asian dynasties and politics
[edit] Chinese dynasties
In Chinese history around the 16th century the Ming Dynasty's economy was stimulated by maritime trade with the Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch. China became involved in a new global trade of goods, plants, animals, and food crops known as the Columbian Exchange. Trade with European powers and the Japanese brought in massive amounts of silver, which then replaced copper and paper banknotes as the common medium of exchange in China.
During the last decades of the Ming the flow of silver into China was greatly diminished, thereby undermining state revenues and indeed the entire Ming economy. This damage to the economy was compounded by the effects on agriculture of the incipient Little Ice Age, natural calamities, crop failure, and sudden epidemics. The ensuing breakdown of authority and people's livelihoods allowed rebel leaders such as Li Zicheng to challenge Ming authority.
The Ming Dynasty fell around 1644 to the Qing Dynasty which was the last ruling dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 (with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917). During its reign, the Qing Dynasty became highly integrated with Chinese culture.
[edit] Japanese shogunates
In Japan, the Tokugawa shogunate was a feudal regime of Japan established by Tokugawa Ieyasu and ruled by the shoguns of the Tokugawa family. This period is known as the Edo period and gets its name from the capital city, Edo, which now is called Tokyo. The Tokugawa shogunate ruled from Edo Castle from 1603 until 1868, when it was abolished during the Meiji Restoration around the late Edo period (often called Late Tokugawa shogunate).
[edit] Americas and Native Americans
At the beginning of the modern era, there were several large settled societies in the Americas, like the Aztec, the Inca, the Maya and the Chibcha.
[edit] Aztec Empire and alliance
A native coalition became the foundation of the Aztec Triple Alliance was formed before the turn of the 16th century. The Triple Alliance of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan dominated the Valley of Mexico and extend its power to both the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific shore. Over this period, Tenochtitlan gradually became the dominant power in the alliance. Two of the primary architects of the Aztec empire were the half-brothers Tlacaelel and Montezuma I, nephews of Itzcoatl. Moctezuma I succeeded Itzcoatl as Hueyi Tlatoani in 1440. Although he was also offered the opportunity to be tlatoani, Tlacaelel preferred to operate as the power behind the throne. Tlacaelel reformed the Aztec state and religion.
[edit] Inca civilization
The Inca civilization began a expansion under the command of Patchacuti before the 16th century. Patchacuti founded the Inca Empire (Tawantinsuyu), which became the largest empire in pre-Columbian America.[11] The empire was split by a ritual war to decide who would be Inca Hanan and who would be Inca Hurin, which pitted the brothers Huascar and Atahualpa against each other.
[edit] Mayan Empire and cities
At the end of the Mayan postclassic period before the early 16th century, northern centers of activity were characterized by an increasing diversity of external influences. The important Maya cities were Chichen Itza, Uxmal, Edzná, and Coba. After the decline of the ruling dynasties of Chichen and Uxmal, Mayapan ruled all of Yucatán until a revolt in 1450. The area then degenerated into competing city-states until the Yucatán was conquered by the Spanish.
[edit] Chibcha Confederation
Muisca refers to a nation of the Chibchans that formed the Muisca Confederation which comprised two confederations:
Both confederations were located in the highlands of modern-day Cundinamarca and Boyacá (Altiplano Cundiboyacense) in the central area of Colombia's Eastern Range. Zipa sovereigns were in a constant war against aggressive tribes of the surroundings like the sutagos, fusagasugaes and, especially, the panches. The Caribs were also a permanent threat and the rivalries with the Zaque of Hunza, especially for the possession of the salt mines, a precious resource for the Muisca economy.
[edit] European kingdoms and movements
In the the early modern period, the Holy Roman Empire was a union of territories in Central Europe under a Holy Roman Emperor. The first emperor of the Holy Roman Empire was Otto I. The last was Francis II, who abdicated and dissolved the Empire in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars. Despite its name, for much of its history the Empire did not include Rome within its borders.
The Renaissance [12] was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historic era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not uniform across Europe, this is a general use of the term. As a cultural movement, it encompassed a rebellion of learning based on classical sources, the development of linear perspective in painting, and gradual but widespread educational reform.
[edit] Notable individuals
Johannes Gutenberg is credited with being the first European to use movable type printing, in around 1439, and the global inventor of the mechanical printing press. Nicolaus Copernicus formulated a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology, which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe.[13] His book, De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) began modern astronomy and was an epiphany that sparked the Scientific Revolution. Another notable individual was Machiavelli, an Italian philosopher politician. He is considered a founders of modern political science. Machiavelli is most famous for a short political treatise, The Prince, a work of realist political theory.
Among the royalty of the time that were notable, Charles the Bold, known as Charles the Terrible to his enemies[14], he was the last Valois Duke of Burgundy and his early death was a pivotal, if under-recognized, moment in European history. Charles has often been regarded as the last representative of the feudal spirit — a man who possessed no other quality than a blind bravery. Upon his death, Charles left an unmarried nineteen year-old daughter, Mary of Burgundy, as his heir; her marriage would have enormous implications for the political balance of Europe. The Habsburg Emperor secured the match for his son, the future Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, with the aid of Mary's stepmother, Margaret. In 1477, the territory of the Duchy of Burgundy was annexed by France. In the same year, Mary married Maximilian, Archduke of Austria, giving the Habsburgs control of the remainder of the Burgundian Inheritance.
Claude de Lorraine was the first Duke of Guise from 1528 to his death. Claude distinguished himself at the battle of Marignano (1515), and was long in recovering from the twenty-two wounds he received in the battle. In 1521 he fought at Fuenterrabia, and Louise of Savoy ascribed the capture of the place to his efforts. In 1523 he became governor of Champagne and Burgundy, after defeating at Neufchâteau the imperial troops who had invaded this province. In 1525 he destroyed the Anabaptist peasant army, which was overrunning Lorraine, at Lupstein, near Saverne (Zabern). On the return of Francis I from captivity in 1528, Claude was made Duke of Guise in the peerage of France, though up to this time only princes of the royal house had held the title of duke and peer of France. The Guises, as cadets of the sovereign house of Lorraine and descendants of the house of Anjou, claimed precedence of the Bourbon princes of Condé and Conti.
The 3rd Duke of Alba was a noble of interest at the early modern period, nicknamed "the Iron Duke" by the Protestants of the Low Countries because of his harsh rule and cruelty. Tales of atrocities committed during his military operations in Flanders became part of Dutch and English folklore, forming a central component of the Black Legend.
In the England, Henry VIII was the King of England and a significant figure in the history of the English monarchy. Although in the great part of his reign he brutally suppressed the influence of the Protestant Reformation in England,[15] a movement having some roots with John Wycliffe in the 14th century, he is more popularly known for his political struggles with Rome. These struggles ultimately led to the separation of the Church of England from papal authority, the Dissolution of the Monasteries, and establishing himself as the Supreme Head of the Church of England. Though Henry reportedly became a Protestant on his death-bed, he advocated Catholic ceremony and doctrine throughout his life. Royal support for the English Reformation began with his heirs, the devout Edward VI and the renowned Elizabeth I, whilst daughter Mary I temporarily reinstated papal authority over England. Henry also oversaw the legal union of England and Wales with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542. He is also noted for his six wives, two of whom were beheaded.
[edit] Religious trends and philosophy
[edit] Eastern philosophies
Concerning the the development of Eastern philosophies, much of the Eastern philosophies had been in in an advance state of development from study in the previous centuries. The various philosophies include Indian philosophy,[16] Chinese philosophy, Iranian philosophy, Japanese philosophy, and Korean philosophy.
[edit] Muslims and the Muslim world
Islamic theological questions and Islamic philosophy, including Falsafa, were decided in the "Islamic Golden Age". There were attempts by later philosopher-theologians at harmonizing both trends, notably by Avicenna who founded the school of Avicennism, Averroes who founded the school of Averroism, and others such as Ibn al-Haytham (Alhacen), Abū Rayhān al-Bīrūnī.
In the 15th and 16th centuries three major Muslim empires were created: the aforementioned Ottoman Empire in much of the Middle East, the Balkans and Northern Africa; the Safavid Empire in Greater Iran; and the Mughul Empire in South Asia. These powers were made possible by the discovery and exploitation of gunpowder and through the system of Islamic administration. By the end of the 19th century, all three had declined significantly, and by the early 20th century, with the Ottomans' defeat in World War I, the last Muslim empire collapsed.
The Mughal Empire was a product of various Central Asian invasions into the Indian subcontinent. It was founded by the Timurid prince Babur in 1526 with the destruction of the Delhi sultanate, with its capital in Agra. The empire ruled for several centuries, before it declined in the early 18th century, which led to India being divided into smaller kingdoms and princely states. The Mughal dynasty was eventually dissolved by the British Empire after the Indian rebellion of 1857.
The Safavids were an Iranian dynasty ruled from 1501 to 1736, and which established Twelver Shi'a Islam as Iran's official religion and united its provinces under a single Iranian sovereignty, thereby reigniting the Persian identity. Although claiming to be the descendants of Ali, the Safavids were originally Sunni (the name "Safavid" comes from a Sufi order called Safavi). Their origins go back to Firuz Shah Zarrinkolah, an Iranian local dignitary from Iran's north. During their rule, the Safavids recognized Twelver Shi'a Islam as the State religion, thus giving Iran a separate identity from its Sunni neighbors.
Signaling the end of the Byzantine Empire, the Ottomans captured Constantinople. A decisive factor in this siege was the use of firearms and large cannons introduced by the Ottomans (adapted from Europe and improved upon), against which the Byzantines were unable to compete. The Byzantine fortress finally succumbed to the Ottoman invasion in 1453, 54 days into the siege. Mehmed II, entering the city victorious, renamed it Istanbul. With its capital conceded to the Ottomans, the rest of the Byzantine Empire quickly disintegrated.The future successes of the Ottomans and later empires would depend heavily upon the exploitation of gunpowder.
In the early 16th century, the Shi'ite Safavid dynasty assumed control in Persia under the leadership of Shah Ismail I, upon the defeat of the ruling Turcoman federation Aq Qoyunlu (also called the "White Sheep Turkomans") in 1501. The Ottoman sultan Selim I quickly sought to repel Safavid expansion, challenging and defeating them at the Battle of Chaldiran in 1514. Selim I also deposed the ruling Mamluks in Egypt, absorbing their territories into the Ottoman Empire in 1517. Suleiman I (also known as Suleiman the Magnificent), Selim I's successor, took advantage of the diversion of Safavid focus to the Uzbeks on the eastern frontier and recaptured Baghdad, which had previously fallen under Safavid control. Despite this, Safavid power remained substantial, with their empire rivalling the Ottomans'. Suleiman I also advanced deep into Hungary following the Battle of Mohács in 1526 — reaching as far as the gates of Vienna thereafter, and signed a Franco-Ottoman alliance with Francis I of France against Charles V of the Roman Empire 10 years later. Suleiman I's rule (1520 — 1566) signified the height of the Ottoman Empire, after which it fell into a relative decline with the rapid industrialization other nations.
[edit] Christians and Christendom
Christianity at the beginning of the modern period saw the fall of Constantinople, the end of the Hundred Years War, the discovery of the New World, and thereafter various reformations.
[edit] End of the Crusades and Unity
The Hussite Crusades involved the military actions against and amongst the followers of Jan Hus in Bohemia ending ultimately with the Battle of Grotniki. Also know as the Hussite Wars, they were arguably the first European war in which hand-held gunpowder weapons such as muskets made a decisive contribution. The Taborite faction of the Hussite warriors were basically infantry, and their many defeats of larger armies with heavily armored knights helped affect the infantry revolution. In totality, the Hussite Crusades were inconclusive.
The last crusade, the Crusade of 1456 was organized to counter the expanding Ottoman Empire and lift the Siege of Belgrade led by John Hunyadi and Giovanni da Capistrano. The siege eventually escalated into a major battle, during which Hunyadi led a sudden counterattack that overran the Turkish camp, ultimately compelling the wounded Sultan Mehmet II to lift the siege and retreat. The siege of Belgrade has been characterized as having "decided the fate of Christendom".[17] The noon bell ordered by Pope Callixtus III commemorates the victory throughout the Christian world to this day.
Nearly a hundred years later, the Peace of Augsburg officially ended the idea that all Christians could be united under one church. The principle of cuius regio, eius religio ("whose the region is, his religion") established the religious, political and geographic divisions of Christianity, and this was established in international law with the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648, which legally ended the concept of a single Christian hegemony, i.e. the "One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church" of the Nicene Creed. Each government determined the religion of their own state. Christians living in states where their denomination was not the established church were guaranteed the right to practice their faith in public during allotted hours and in private at their will. With the Treaty of Westphalia, the Wars of Religion came to an end, and in the Treaty of Utrecht of 1713 the concept of the sovereign national state was born. The Corpus Christianum has since existed with the the modern idea of a tolerant and diverse society consisting of many different communities.
[edit] Inquisitions and Reformations
The modern Inquisition refers to any one of several institutions charged with trying and convicting heretics (or other offenders against canon law) within the Catholic Church. In the modern era, the first manifestation was the Spanish Inquisition of 1478 to 1834.[18] The Inquisition prosecuted individuals accused of a wide array of crimes related to heresy, including sorcery,[19] blasphemy, Judaizing and witchcraft, as well for censorship of printed literature. Because of its objective — combating heresy — the Inquisition had jurisdiction only over baptized members of the Church (which, however, encompassed the vast majority of the population in Catholic countries). Secular courts could still try non-Christians for blasphemy. (Most of the witch trials went through secular courts.)
The Reformation and rise of modernity in the early 16th century entailed teh start of a series of changes in the Corpus Christianum. Martin Luther challenged the Catholic Church to begin the Reformation. The Protestant Reformation was a Christian reform movement in Europe which is generally deemed to have begun with Martin Luther's Ninety-Five Theses although a number of precursors such as Johannes Hus predate that event. The Protestant movement of the 16th century was effected under the protection of the electors of Saxony. The Electorate of Saxony was an independent hereditary electorate of the Holy Roman Empire. The Elector Frederick III established a university at Wittenberg in 1502, at which the Augustinian monk Martin Luther was made professor of philosophy in 1508; at the same time he became one of the preachers at the castle church of Wittenberg. On 31 October 1517, he posted up on this church the 95 theses against the sale indulgences.
Of the late Inquisitions in the modern era, there were two different manifestations:[18]
- the Portuguese Inquisition (1536–1821)
- the Roman Inquisition (1542 – c.1860)
This Portuguese inquisition was a local analogue of the more famous Spanish Inquisition. The Roman Inquisition covered most of the Italian peninsula as well as Malta and also existed in isolated pockets of papal jurisdiction in other parts of Europe, including Avignon.
The Catholic Reformation began in 1545 when the Council of Trent was called in reaction to the "Protestant Rebellion". The idea was to reform the state of worldliness and disarray which had befallen some of the clergy of the Church, while reaffirming the Catholic Church's spiritual authority and position as the sole true Church of Christ on Earth, as well as preventing further damage to the Church and her faithful at the hands of the newly formed Protestant denominations.
[edit] Discovery and trade
The Age of Discovery was a period from the early 15th century and continuing into the early 17th century, during which European ships traveled around the world to search for new trading routes and partners to feed burgeoning capitalism in Europe. They also were in search of trading goods such as gold, silver and spices. In the process, Europeans encountered peoples and mapped lands previously unknown to them. This factor in the early European modern period was a globalizing character; the 'discovery' of the Americas and the rise of sustained contacts between previously isolated parts of the globe was a important historical event..
The search for new routes was based on the fact that the Silk Road was controlled by the Ottoman Empire, which was an impediment to European commercial interests, and other Eastern trade routes were not available to the Europeans due to Muslim control. The ability to outflank the Muslim states of North Africa was seen as crucial to European survival. At the same time, the Iberians learnt much from their Arab neighbors. The northwestern region of Eurasia has a very long coastline, and has arguably been influenced more by its maritime history than any other continent. Europe is uniquely situated between several navigable seas and intersected by navigable rivers running into them in a way which greatly facilitated the influence of maritime traffic and commerce. In the maritime history of Europe, the carrack and caravel both incorporated the Arab lateen sail that made ships far more maneuverable. It was also through the Arabs that Ancient Greek geography was rediscovered, for the first time giving European sailors some idea of the shape of Africa and Asia.
[edit] Mercantile Capitalism
Mercantilism was the dominant school of thought throughout the early modern period (from the 16th to the 18th century). This led to some of the first instances of significant government intervention and control over the economy, and it was during this period that much of the modern capitalist system was established. Internationally, mercantilism encouraged the many European wars of the period and fueled European imperialism. Belief in mercantilism began to fade in the late 18th century, as the arguments of Adam Smith and the other classical economists won out.
The Commercial Revolution was a period of economic expansion, colonialism, and mercantilism which lasted from approximately the sixteenth century until the early eighteenth century. Beginning with the Crusades, Europeans rediscovered spices, silks, and other commodities rare in Europe. This development created a new desire for trade, and trade expanded in the second half of the Middle Ages. European nations, through voyages of discovery, were looking for new trade routes in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which allowed the European powers to build vast, new international trade networks. Nations also sought new sources of wealth. To deal with this new-found wealth, new economic theories and practices were created. Because of competing national interest, nations had the desire for increased world power through their colonial empires. The Commercial Revolution is marked by an increase in general commerce, and in the growth of non-manufacturing pursuits, such as banking, insurance, and investing.
[edit] Trade and the New Economy
In the Old World, the most desired trading goods were gold, silver and spices. Western Europeans used the compass, new sailing ship technologies, new maps, and advances in astronomy to seek a viable trade route to Asia for valuable spices which would be uncontested by Mediterranean powers.
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In terms of shipping advances, the most important developments were the creation of the carrack and caravel designs in Portugal. These vessels evolved from medieval European designs from the North Sea and both the Christian and Islamic Mediterranean. They were the first ships that could leave the relatively placid and calm Mediterranean, Baltic or North Sea and sail safely on the open Atlantic.
When the carrack and then the caravel were developed in Iberia that European thoughts returned to the fabled East. These explorations have a number of causes. Monetarists believe the main reason the Age of Exploration began was because of a severe shortage of bullion in Europe. The European economy was dependent on gold and silver currency, but low domestic supplies had plunged much of Europe into a recession. Another factor was the centuries long conflict between the Iberians and the Muslims to the south.
[edit] European states and politics
The 15th to 18th century period is marked by the first European colonies, the rise of strong centralized governments, and the beginnings of recognizable European nation states that are the direct antecedents of today's states. Although the Renaissance saw revolutions in many intellectual pursuits, as well as social and political upheaval, it is perhaps best known for European artistic developments and the contributions of such polymaths as Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, who inspired the term "Renaissance man".[20][21]
The Baroque period saw the Thirty Years' War in Central Europe which decimated the population by up to 20%. The treaties in 1648 ended several wars in Europe and established the beginning of sovereign states. The Peace of Westphalia refers to the two peace treaties of Osnabrück and Münster, signed on May 15 and October 24, 1648, respectively, and written in French, that ended both the Thirty Years' War in the Holy Roman Empire (today mostly Germany) and the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. The treaties involved the Holy Roman Emperor, Ferdinand III (Habsburg), the Kingdoms of Spain, France and Sweden, the Netherlands and their respective allies among the princes and the Republican Imperial States of the Holy Roman Empire.
The Peace of Westphalia resulted from the first modern diplomatic congress. Until 1806, the regulations became part of the constitutional laws of the Holy Roman Empire. The Treaty of the Pyrenees, signed in 1659, ended the war between France and Spain and is often considered part of the overall accord.
[edit] Absolutism
The Age of Absolutism describes the monarchical power that was unrestrained by any other institutions, such as churches, legislatures, or social elites of the European monarchs during the transition from feudalism to capitalism. Monarchs described as absolute can especially be found in the 17th century through the 19th century. Absolutism is characterized by the ending of feudal partitioning, consolidation of power with the monarch, rise of state power, unification of the state laws, and a decrease in the influence of nobility.
[edit] French power
For much of the reign of Louis XIV, who was known as the Sun King (French: le Roi Soleil), France stood as the leading power in Europe, engaging in three major wars—the Franco-Dutch War, the War of the League of Augsburg, and the War of the Spanish Succession—and two minor conflicts—the War of Devolution, and the War of the Reunions. Louis believed in the Divine Right of Kings, the theory that the King was crowned by God and accountable to him alone. Consequently, he has long been considered the archetypal absolute monarch. Louis XIV continued the work of his predecessor to create a centralized state governed from the capital in order to sweep away the remnants of feudalism which had persisted in parts of France. He succeeded in breaking the power of the provincial nobility, much of which had risen in revolt during his minority called the Fronde, and forced many leading nobles to live with him in his lavish Palace of Versailles.
Men who featured prominently in the political and military life of France during this period include Mazarin,Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Turenne, Vauban. French culture likewise flourished during this era, producing a number of figures of great renown, including Molière, Racine, Boileau, La Fontaine, Lully, Le Brun, Rigaud, Louis Le Vau, Jules Hardouin Mansart, Claude Perrault and Le Nôtre.
[edit] English revolutions
Before the Age of Revolution, the English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists. The first and second civil wars pitted the supporters of King Charles I against the supporters of the Long Parliament, while the third war saw fighting between supporters of King Charles II and supporters of the Rump Parliament. The Civil War ended with the Parliamentary victory at the Battle of Worcester. The monopoly of the Church of England on Christian worship in England ended with the victors consolidating the established Protestant Ascendancy in Ireland. Constitutionally, the wars established the precedent that an English monarch cannot govern without Parliament's consent. The English Restoration, or simply put as the Restoration, began in 1660 when the English, Scottish and Irish monarchies were all restored under Charles II after the Commonwealth of England that followed the English Civil War. The Glorious Revolution of 1688 establishes modern parliamentary democracy in England.
[edit] International balance of power
The War of the Spanish Succession was a war fought between 1701 to 1714, in which several European powers combined to stop a possible unification of the Kingdoms of Spain and France under a single Bourbon monarch, upsetting the European balance of power. It was fought mostly in Europe, but it included Queen Anne's War in North America. The war was marked by the military leadership of notable generals like the duc de Villars, the Jacobite Duke of Berwick, the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Savoy.
The Peace of Utrecht established after a series of individual peace treaties signed in the Dutch city of Utrecht concluded between various European states helped end the War of the Spanish Succession. The representatives who met were Louis XIV of France and Philip V of Spain on the one hand, and representatives of Queen Anne of Great Britain, the Duke of Savoy, and the United Provinces on the other. he treaty enregistred the defeat of French ambitions expressed in the wars of Louis XIV and preserved the European system based on the balance of power.[22] The Treaty of Utrecht marked the change from Spanish to British naval supremacy.
[edit] Colonial expansion and possessions
The historical phenomenon of colonization in the modern era centers on the British empire, although the term colonialism is normally used with reference to discontiguous overseas empires rather than contiguous land-based empires, European or otherwise. European colonisation during the 15th to 19th centuries resulted in the spread of Christianity to Sub-Saharan Africa, the Americas, Australia and the Philippines.
[edit] Conquest and Americas exploitation
Christopher Columbus "discovered" the Americas in 1492. Subsequently, the major sea powers in Europe sent expeditions to the New World to build trade networks and colonies and to convert the native peoples to Christianity. Pope Alexander VI divided "newly discovered" lands outside Europe between Spain and Portugal along a north-south meridian 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde islands (off the west coast of Africa). This division was never accepted by the rulers of England or France. (See also the Treaty of Tordesillas that followed the papal decree.)
[edit] Colonial North America
Great Britain held several colonies in North America and the West Indies. The colonies in North America were founded between 1607 (Virginia), and 1733 (Georgia). The British colonies in North America rebelled against British rule in 1775, largely due to the taxation that Great Britain was imposing on the colonies. The Thirteen Colonies were part of what became known as British America, a name that was used by Great Britain until the Treaty of Paris recognized the independence of the original thirteen United States of America in 1783. A provisional government was formed which proclaimed their independence, which is now celebrated as having occurred on July 4, 1776, and subsequently became the original thirteen United States of America.
[edit] Colonial Latin America
Spain concentrated building its empire on the central and southern parts of the Americas allotted to it by the Treaty of Tordesillas, because of presence of indigenous states whose human and material resources it could exploit, and large concentrations of silver and gold. The Portuguese built its empire in Brazil, which fell in its sphere of influence per the Treaty of Tordesillas, by developing the land for sugar production since there was a lack of a large, complex society or mineral resources.
[edit] Western transformations
Traditionally, the European intellectual transformation of and after the Renaissance bridged the Middle Ages and the Modern era.
[edit] Reason and Enlightenment
The Age of Reason in the Western world is generally regarded as being the start of modern philosophy, and a departure from the medieval approach, especially Scholasticism. Early 17th century philosophy is often called the Age of Rationalism and is considered to succeed Renaissance philosophy and precede the Age of Enlightenment, but some consider it as the earliest part of the Enlightenment era in philosophy, extending that era to two centuries. The 18th century saw the beginning of secularization in Europe, rising to notability in the wake of the French Revolution.
The Age of Enlightenment is a term used to describe a time in Western philosophy and cultural life centered upon the eighteenth century, in which reason was advocated as the primary source and legitimacy for authority. Developing more or less simultaneously in many parts of Europe and America. Developing during the Enlightenment era, Renaissance humanism was an intellectual movement spread across Europe. The basic training of the humanist was to speak well and write (typically, in the form of a letter). The term umanista comes from the latter part of the 15th century. The people were associated with the studia humanitatis, a novel curriculum that was competing with the quadrivium and scholastic logic.[23]
Renaissance humanism took a close study of the Latin and Greek classical texts, and was antagonistic to the values of scholasticism with its emphasis on the accumulated commentaries; and humanists were involved in the sciences, philosophies, arts and poetry of classical antiquity. They self-consciously imitated classical Latin and deprecated the use of medieval Latin. By analogy with the perceived decline of Latin, they applied the principle of ad fontes, or back to the sources, across broad areas of learning.
The quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns was a literary and artistic quarrel that heated up in the early 1690s and shook the Académie française. It opposed two sides, the Ancients (Anciens) who constrain choice of subjects to those drawn from the literature of Antiquity and the Moderns (Modernes), who supported the merits of the authors of the century of Louis XIV. Fontenelle quickly followed with his Digression sur les anciens et les modernes (1688), in which he took the Modern side, pressing the argument that modern scholarship allowed modern man to surpass the ancients in knowledge.
[edit] Scientific Revolution
The Scientific Revolution was a period when European ideas in classical physics, astronomy, biology, human anatomy, chemistry, and other classical sciences were rejected and led to doctrines supplanting those that had prevailed from Ancient Greece to the Middle Ages which would lead to a transition to modern science. This period saw a fundamental transformation in scientific ideas across physics, astronomy, and biology, in institutions supporting scientific investigation, and in the more widely held picture of the universe. Individuals started to question all manners of things and it was this questioning that led to the Scientific Revolution, which in turn formed the foundations of contemporary sciences and the establishment of several modern scientific fields.
[edit] American wars and revolution
The French and Indian Wars were a series of conflicts in North America that represented the actions there that accompanied the European dynastic wars. In Quebec, the wars are generally referred to as the Intercolonial Wars. While some conflicts involved Spanish and Dutch forces, all pitted Great Britain, its colonies and American Indian allies on one side and France, its colonies and Indian allies on the other.
The expanding French and British colonies were contending for control of the western, or interior, territories. Whenever the European countries went to war, there were actions within and by these colonies although the dates of the conflict did not necessarily exactly coincide with those of the larger conflicts.
Beginning in the Age of Revolution, the American Revolution and the ensuing political upheaval during the last half of the 18th century saw the Thirteen Colonies of North America overthrow the governance of the Parliament of Great Britain, and then reject the British monarchy itself to become the sovereign United States of America. In this period the colonies first rejected the authority of the Parliament to govern them without representation, and formed self-governing independent states. The Second Continental Congress then joined together against the British to defend that self-governance in the armed conflict from 1775 to 1783 known as the American Revolutionary War (also called American War of Independence).
The American Revolution begun with fighting at Lexington and Concord. On July 4, 1776, they issued the Declaration of Independence, which proclaimed their independence from Great Britain and their formation of a cooperative union. In June, 1776, Benjamin Franklin was appointed a member of the Committee of Five that drafted the Declaration of Independence. Although he was temporarily disabled by gout and unable to attend most meetings of the Committee, Franklin made several small changes to the draft sent to him by Thomas Jefferson.
The rebellious states defeated Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War, the first successful colonial war of independence. While the states had already rejected the governance of Parliament, through the Declaration the new United States now rejected the legitimacy of the monarchy to demand allegiance. The war raged for seven years, with effective American victory, followed by formal British abandonment of any claims to the United States with the Treaty of Paris.
The Philadelphia Convention set up the current United States; the United States Constitution ratification the following year made the states part of a single republic with a strong central government. The Bill of Rights, comprising ten constitutional amendments guaranteeing many fundamental civil rights and freedoms, was ratified in 1791.
[edit] The French Revolutions
Toward the middle and latter stages of the Age of Revolution, the French political and social revolutions and radical change saw the French governmental structure, previously an absolute monarchy with feudal privileges for the aristocracy and Catholic clergy transform, change to forms based on Enlightenment principles of citizenship and inalienable rights. The first revolution was the National Assembly, the second was the Legislative Assembly, and the third was the Directory.
The changes were accompanied by violent turmoil which included the trial and execution of the king, vast bloodshed and repression during the Reign of Terror, and warfare involving every other major European power. Subsequent events that can be traced to the Revolution include the Napoleonic Wars, two separate restorations of the monarchy, and two additional revolutions as modern France took shape. In the following century, France would be governed at one point or another as a republic, constitutional monarchy, and two different empires.
[edit] National and Legislative Assembly
During the French Revolution, the National Assembly, which existed from June 17 to July 9 of 1789, was a transitional body between the Estates-General and the National Constituent Assembly.
The Legislative Assembly was the legislature of France from October 1, 1791 to September 1792. It provided the focus of political debate and revolutionary law-making between the periods of the National Constituent Assembly and of the National Convention.
[edit] The Directory and Napoleonic Era
The Executive Directory was a body of five Directors that held executive power in France following the Convention and preceding the Consulate. The period of this regime (2 November 1795 until 10 November 1799), commonly known as the Directory (or Directoire) era, constitutes the second to last stage of the French Revolution.
The Napoleonic Era is a period in the History of France and Europe. It is generally classified as the fourth stage of the French Revolution. The Napoleonic Era begins roughly with Napoleon's coup d'état, overthrowing the Directory and ends at the Hundred Days and his defeat at Waterloo (November 9, 1799 – June 28, 1815). The congress of Vienna soon set out to restore Europe to pre-French revolution days.
[edit] Italian unification
Italian unification was the political and social movement that annexed different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of Italy in the 19th century. There is a lack of consensus on the exact dates for the beginning and the end of this period, but many scholars agree that the process began with the end of Napoleonic rule and the Congress of Vienna in 1815, and approximately ended with the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, though the last città irredente did not join the Kingdom of Italy until after World War I.
[edit] Industrial revolutions
The date of the Industrial Revolution is not exact. Eric Hobsbawm held that it 'broke out' in the 1780s and wasn't fully felt until the 1830s or 1840s,[24] while T.S. Ashton held that it occurred roughly between 1760 and 1830 (in effect the reigns of George III, The Regency, and George IV).[25] The great changes of centuries before the 19th were more connected with ideas, religion or military conquest, and technological advance had only made small changes in the material wealth of ordinary people.
The first Industrial Revolution merged into the Second Industrial Revolution around 1850, when technological and economic progress gained momentum with the development of steam-powered ships and railways, and later in the nineteenth century with the internal combustion engine and electric power generation. The Second Industrial Revolution was a phase of the Industrial Revolution; sometimes labeled as the separate Technical Revolution. From a technological and a social point of view there is no clean break between the two. Major innovations during the period occurred in the chemical, electrical, petroleum, and steel industries. Specific advancements included the introduction of oil fired steam turbine and internal combustion driven steel ships, the development of the airplane, the practical commercialization of the automobile, mass production of consumer goods, the perfection of canning, mechanical refrigeration and other food preservation techniques, and the invention of the telephone.
[edit] Industrialization
Industrialization is the process of social and economic change whereby a human group is transformed from a pre-industrial society into an industrial one. It is a subdivision of a more general modernization process, where social change and economic development are closely related with technological innovation, particularly with the development of large-scale energy and metallurgy production. It is the extensive organization of an economy for the purpose of manufacturing. Industrialization also introduces a form of philosophical change, where people obtain a different attitude towards their perception of nature.
[edit] Revolution in manufacture and power
An economy based on manual labour was replaced by one dominated by industry and the manufacture of machinery. It began with the mechanization of the textile industries and the development of iron-making techniques, and trade expansion was enabled by the introduction of canals, improved roads, and then railways.
The introduction of steam power (fuelled primarily by coal) and powered machinery (mainly in textile manufacturing) underpinned the dramatic increases in production capacity.[26] The development of all-metal machine tools in the first two decades of the 19th century facilitated the manufacture of more production machines for manufacturing in other industries.
The modern petroleum industry started in 1846 with the discovery of the process of refining kerosene from coal by Nova Scotian Abraham Pineo Gesner. Ignacy Łukasiewicz improved Gesner's method to develop a means of refining kerosene from the more readily available "rock oil" ("petr-oleum") seeps in 1852 and the first rock oil mine was built in Bóbrka, near Krosno in Galicia in the following year. In 1854, Benjamin Silliman, a science professor at Yale University in New Haven, was the first to fractionate petroleum by distillation. These discoveries rapidly spread around the world.
[edit] Notable Engineers
Engineering achievements of the revolution ranged from electrification to developments in materials science. The advancements made a great contribution to the quality of life. In the first revolution, Lewis Paul was the original inventor of roller spinning, the basis of the water frame for spinning cotton in a cotton mill. Matthew Boulton and James Watt's improvements to the steam engine were fundamental to the changes brought by the Industrial Revolution in both the Kingdom of Great Britain and the world.
In the latter part of the second revolution, Thomas Alva Edison developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world and is often credited with the creation of the first industrial research laboratory. In 1882, Edison switched on the world's first large-scale electrical supply network that provided 110 volts direct current to fifty-nine customers in lower Manhattan. Also toward the end of the second industrial revolution, Nikola Tesla made many contributions in the field of electricity and magnetism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Much of Tesla's early work in electrical engineering and many of his discoveries were of importance. Tesla's patents and theoretical work formed the basis of modern alternating current electric power systems, including the polyphase systems power distribution and the alternating current motor, with which he helped usher in the Second Industrial Revolution. In 1887, Tesla filed a number of patents related to a competing form of power distribution known as alternating current. In the following years a bitter rivalry between Tesla and Edison, known as the "War of Currents", took place over the preferred method of distribution. After Tesla's demonstration of wireless communication (radio) in 1894 and after being the victor in the "War of Currents", he was widely respected as one of the greatest electrical engineers who worked in America.
[edit] Social effects and classes
The Industrial Revolutions were major technological, socioeconomic, and cultural changes in late 18th and early 19th century that began in Britain and spread throughout the world. The effects spread throughout Western Europe and North America during the 19th century, eventually affecting the majority of the world. The impact of this change on society was enormous and is often compared to the Neolithic revolution, when mankind developed agriculture and gave up its nomadic lifestyle.[27] It has been argued that GDP per capita was much more stable and progressed at a much slower rate until the industrial revolution and the emergence of the modern capitalist economy, and that it has since increased rapidly in capitalist countries.[28]
[edit] Mid-19th century European Revolts
The European Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Spring of Nations or the Year of Revolution, were a series of political upheavals throughout the European continent. Described by some historians as a revolutionary wave, the period of unrest began in France and then, further propelled by the French Revolution of 1848, soon spread to the rest of Europe. Although most of the revolutions were quickly put down, there was a significant amount of violence in many areas, with tens of thousands of people tortured and killed. While the immediate political effects of the revolutions were reversed, the long-term reverberations of the events were far-reaching.
[edit] Industrial age reformism
Industrial age reform movements began the gradual change of society rather with episodes of rapid fundamental changes. THe reformists' ideas were often grounded in liberalism, although they also possessed aspects of utopian, socialist or religious concepts. The Radical movement campaigned for electoral reform, a reform of the Poor Laws, free trade, educational reform, postal reform, prison reform, and public sanitation.
Following the Enlightenment's ideas, the reformers looked to the Scientific Revolution and industrial progress to solve the social problems which arose with the Industrial Revolution. Newton's natural philosophy combined a mathematics of axiomatic proof with the mechanics of physical observation, yielding a coherent system of verifiable predictions and replacing a previous reliance on revelation and inspired truth. Applied to public life, this approach yielded several successful campaigns for changes in social policy.
[edit] European Hegemony and the 19th century
Historians sometimes define the nineteenth century historical era stretching from 1815 (the Congress of Vienna) to 1914 (the outbreak of the First World War); alternatively, Eric Hobsbawm defined the "Long Nineteenth Century" as spanning the years 1789 to 1914. During this time, the fall of the Spanish Armada enabled the rise of the British Empire.
[edit] Imperialism and empires
During the 19th century, the Spanish, Portuguese, and Ottoman empires began to crumble and the Holy Roman and Mughal empires ceased. Following the Napoleonic Wars, the British Empire became the world's leading power, controlling one quarter of the World's population and one third of the land area. It enforced a Pax Britannica, encouraged trade, and battled rampant piracy.
Electricity, steel, and petroleum enabled Germany to become great international power that raced to create empires of it's own. The Meiji Restoration was a chain of events that led to enormous changes in Japan's political and social structure that was taking a firm hold at the beginning of the Meiji Era which coincided the opening of Japan by the arrival of the Black Ships of Commodore Matthew Perry and made Imperial Japan a great power. However, Russia and Qing Dynasty China failed to keep pace with the other world powers which led to massive social unrest in both empires. The Qing Dynasty's military power weakened during the 1800s, and faced with international pressure, massive rebellions and defeats in wars, the dynasty declined after the mid-19th century.
[edit] British Victorian era
The Victorian era of the United Kingdom was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from June 1837 to January 1901. This was a long period of prosperity for the British people, as profits gained from the overseas British Empire, as well as from industrial improvements at home, allowed a large, educated middle class to develop. Some scholars would extend the beginning of the period—as defined by a variety of sensibilities and political games that have come to be associated with the Victorians—back five years to the passage of the Reform Act 1832.
Between 1815 and 1914, a period referred to as Britain's "imperial century" by some historians, around 10,000,000 square miles (25,899,881 km²) of territory and roughly 400 million people were added to the British Empire. Victory over Napoleon left Britain without any serious international rival, other than Russia in central Asia. Unchallenged at sea, Britain adopted the role of global policeman, a state of affairs later known as the Pax Britannica, and a foreign policy of "splendid isolation".
Alongside the formal control it exerted over its own colonies, Britain's dominant position in world trade meant that it effectively controlled the economies of many nominally independent countries, such as China, Argentina and Siam, which has been characterised by some historians as "informal empire". Of note during this time was the Anglo-Zulu War, which was fought in 1879 between the British Empire and the Zulu Empire.
British imperial strength was underpinned by the steamship and the telegraph, new technologies invented in the second half of the 19th century, allowing it to control and defend the Empire. By 1902, the British Empire was linked together by a network of telegraph cables, the so-called All Red Line.
[edit] French governments and conflicts
The Bourbon Restoration followed the ousting of Napoleon I of France in 1814. The Allies restored the Bourbon Dynasty to the French throne. The ensuing period is called the Restoration, following French usage, and is characterized by a sharp conservative reaction and the re-establishment of the Roman Catholic Church as a power in French politics. The July Monarchy was a period of liberal constitutional monarchy in France under King Louis-Philippe starting with the July Revolution (or Three Glorious Days) of 1830 and ending with the Revolution of 1848. The Second Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.
The Franco-Prussian War was a conflict between France and Prussia, while Prussia was backed up by the North German Confederation, of which it was a member, and the South German states of Baden, Württemberg and Bavaria. The complete Prussian and German victory brought about the final unification of Germany under King Wilhelm I of Prussia. It also marked the downfall of Napoleon III and the end of the Second French Empire, which was replaced by the Third Republic. As part of the settlement, almost all of the territory of Alsace-Lorraine was taken by Prussia to become a part of Germany, which it would retain until the end of World War I.
The French Third Republic was the republican government of France between the end of the Second French Empire following the defeat of Louis-Napoléon in the Franco-Prussian war in 1870 and the Vichy Regime after the invasion of France by the German Third Reich in 1940. The Third Republic endured seventy years, making it the most long-lasting regime in France since the collapse of the Ancien Régime in the French Revolution of 1789.
[edit] Slavery and abolition
Slavery was greatly reduced around the world in the 19th century. Following a successful slave revolt in Haiti, Britain forced the Barbary pirates to halt their practice of kidnapping and enslaving Europeans, banned slavery throughout its domain, and charged its navy with ending the global slave trade. Slavery was then abolished in Russia, America, and Brazil (see Abolitionism).
[edit] African colonization
Following the abolition of the slave trade, and propelled by economic exploitation, the Scramble for Africa was initiated formally at the Berlin West Africa Conference in 1884–1885. All the major European powers laid claim to the areas of Africa where they could exhibit a sphere of influence over the area. These claims did not have to have any substantial land holdings or treaties to be legitimate. The French gained major ground in West Africa, the British in East Africa, and the Portuguese and Spanish at various points throughout the continent, while King Leopold was able to retain his personal fiefdom, Congo.
[edit] Meiji Japan
Around the end of hte 19th century and into the 20th century, the Meiji era was a marked by the reign of the Meiji Emperor. During this time, Japan started its modernization and rose to world power status. This era name means "Enlightened Rule". It wasn’t until the beginning of the Meiji Era that the Japanese government began taking modernization seriously. Japan expanded its military production base by opening arsenals in various locations. The hyobusho (war office) was replaced with a War Department and a Naval Department. The shogun class suffered great disappointment the following years.
Laws were instituted that required every able bodied male Japanese citizen, regardless of class, to serve a mandatory term of three years with the first reserves and two additional years with the second reserves. This action, signifying the beginning of the end for the shogun class, initially met resistance from both the peasant and warrior alike. The peasant class interpreted the term for military service, ketsu-eki (blood tax) literally, and attempted to avoid service by any means necessary. The Japanese government began modeling their ground forces after the French military. The French government contributed greatly to the training of Japanese officers. Many were employed at the military academy in Kyoto, and many more still were feverishly translating French field manuals for use in the Japanese ranks.
After the death of the Meiji Emperor, the Taishō Emperor took the throne, thus beginning the Taishō period. A key foreign observer of the remarkable and rapid changes in Japanese society in this period was Ernest Mason Satow.
[edit] United States egress
[edit] Antebellum Expansion
The Antebellum Age was the a period of increasing sectionalism that led up to the American Civil War. The Antebellum Age was a time of great transition because of the industrial revolution in America. It also was a time of growth in slavery in the American South. In a sense, the Antebellum Period is often considered to have begun with the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, though it is sometimes stipulated to extend back as early as 1812.
"Manifest Destiny" was the territorial expansion of the United States from 1812 to 1860. Manifest Destiny incorporated the belief that the United States was destined, even divinely ordained, to expand across the North American continent, from the Atlantic seaboard to the Pacific Ocean. This era, from the end of the War of 1812 to the beginning of the American Civil War, has been called the "Age of Manifest Destiny." During this time, the United States expanded to the Pacific Ocean—"from sea to shining sea"—largely defining the borders of the contiguous United States as they are today.
[edit] US Civil War and Reconstruction
The American Civil War, also known as the War Between the States, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the U.S. and formed the Confederate States of America (the Confederacy). Led by Jefferson Davis, they fought against the U.S. federal government (the Union), which was supported by all the free states and the five border slave states in the north.
Northern leaders agreed that victory would require more than the end of fighting. It had to encompass the two strategies: secession had to be totally repudiated and all forms of slavery had to be eliminated. They disagreed sharply on the military tactics and political tactics for these goals. They also disagreed on the degree of federal control, that should be imposed on the South and the process by which Southern states should be reintegrated into the Union. The Reconstruction Era in United States history existed in the post-Civil War era in the entire United States between 1865 and 1877.
[edit] The Gilded Age and legacy
The Gilded Age saw a substantial growth in population in the United States and extravagant displays of wealth and excess of America's upper-class during the post-Civil War and post-Reconstruction era, in the late 19th century. The wealth polarization derived primarily from industrial and population expansion. The businessmen of the Second Industrial Revolution created industrial towns and cities in the Northeast with new factories, and contributed to the creation of an ethnically diverse industrial working class which produced the wealth owned by rising super-rich industrialists and financiers called the "robber barons". An example is the company of John D. Rockefeller, who was an important figure in shaping the new oil industry. Using highly effective tactics and aggressive practices, later widely criticized, Standard Oil absorbed or destroyed most of its competition.
The creation of a modern industrial economy took place. With the creation of a transportation and communication infrastructure, the corporation became the dominant form of business organization and a managerial revolution transformed business operations. In 1890, Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust Act — the source of all American anti-monopoly laws. The law forbade every contract, scheme, deal, or conspiracy to restrain trade, though the phrase "restraint of trade" remained subjective. By the beginning of the twentieth century, per capita income and industrial production in the United States exceeded that of any other country except Britain. Long hours and hazardous working conditions led many workers to attempt to form labor unions despite strong opposition from industrialists and the courts. But the courts did protect the marketplace, declaring the Standard Oil group to be an "unreasonable" monopoly under the Sherman Antitrust Act in 1911. It ordered Standard to break up into 34 independent companies with different boards of directors.[29]
[edit] Transitions and Enlightenment negation
Around the turn of the 20th century, Enlightenment philosophy was challenged in various quarters. After the use of classical physics since the end of the scientific revolution, modern physics arose with the advent of quantum physics;[30] substituting mathematics studies for experimental studies and examining equations to build a theoretical structure.[31] The old quantum theory was a collection of results which predate modern quantum mechanics, but were never complete or self-consistent.[32] The collection of heuristic prescriptions for quantum mechanics were the first corrections to classical mechanics.[32][33] Inaddition, the various number of aether theories in classical physics which supposed a "fifth element", such as the Luminiferous aether,[34] was nullified by the Michelson-Morley experiment in an attempt to detect the motion of earth through the aether. In biology, Darwinism gained acceptance and exposed adaptation in the theory of natural selection. The fields of geology, astronomy and psychology also made strides and gained new insights. In medicine, there were advances of medical theory and treatments.
Another philosophical trend was Chinese philosophy began to integrate concepts of Western philosophy, as steps toward modernization. By the time of the Xinhai Revolution in 1911, there were many calls, such as the May Fourth Movement, to completely abolish the old imperial institutions and practices of China. There have been attempts to incorporate democracy, republicanism, and industrialism into Chinese philosophy, notably by Sun Yat-Sen (Sūn yì xiān, in one Mandarin form of the name) at the beginning of the 20th century. Mao Zedong (Máo zé dōng) added Marxism, Stalinism, and other communist thought. When the Communist Party of China took over power, previous schools of thought, excepting notably Legalism, were denounced as backward, and later even purged during the Cultural Revolution.
Developed from earlier secular traditions, modern Humanism ethical philosophies affirm the dignity and worth of all people, based on the ability to determine right and wrong by appealing to universal human qualities, particularly rationality, without resorting to the supernatural or alleged divine authority from religious texts.[35][36] For liberal humanists such as Rousseau or Kant, the universal law of reason guided the way towards total emancipation from any kind of tyranny. These ideas were challenged. The young Karl Marx criticized the project of political emancipation (embodied in the form of human rights), asserting it to be symptomatic of the very dehumanization it is supposed to oppose. For Friedrich Nietzsche, humanism was nothing more than a secular version of theism. In his Genealogy of Morals, he argues that human rights exist as a means for the weak to collectively constrain the strong. On this view, such rights do not facilitate emancipation of life, but rather deny it. In the twentieth-century, the notion that human beings are rationally autonomous was challenged by the concept that humans were driven by unconscious irrational desires.
[edit] Notable persons
Sigmund Freud is renowned for his redefinition of sexual desire as the primary motivational energy of human life, as well as his therapeutic techniques, including the use of free association, his theory of transference in the therapeutic relationship, and the interpretation of dreams as sources of insight into unconscious desires.
Albert Einstein is known for his theories of special relativity and general relativity. He also made important contributions to statistical mechanics, especially his mathematical treatment of Brownian motion, his resolution of the paradox of specific heats, and his connection of fluctuations and dissipation. Despite his reservations about its interpretation, Einstein also made contributions to quantum mechanics and, indirectly, quantum field theory, primarily through his theoretical studies of the photon.
[edit] Social Darwinism
At the end of the 19th century, Social Darwinism was promoted and included the various ideologies based on a concept that competition among all individuals, groups, nations, or ideas was the framework of social evolution in human societies. In this view, society's advancement was dependent on the "survival of the fittest", the term was in fact coined by Herbert Spencer and referred to in "The Gospel of Wealth" theory written by Andrew Carnegie.
[edit] Marxism's society
Karl Marx summarized his approach to history and politics in the opening line of the first chapter of The Communist Manifesto (1848). He wrote:
- The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.[37][38]
The Manifesto went through a number of editions from 1872 to 1890; notable new prefaces were written by Marx and Engels for the 1872 German edition, the 1882 Russian edition, the 1883 German edition, and the 1888 English edition. In general, Marxism identified five (and one transitional) successive stages of development in Western Europe.[39]
- Primitive Communism: as seen in cooperative tribal societies.
- Slave Society: which develops when the tribe becomes a city-state. Aristocracy is born.
- Feudalism: aristocracy is the ruling class. Merchants develop into capitalists.
- Capitalism: capitalists are the ruling class, who create and employ the true working class.
- Dictatorship of the proletariat: workers gain class consciousness, overthrow the capitalists and take control over the state.
- Communism: a classless and stateless society.
[edit] European decline and the 20th century
Major political developments saw the former British Empire lose most of its remaining political power over commonwealth countries, most notably by ways of the dividing of the British crown into several sovereignties by the Statute of Westminster, the patriation of constitutions by the Canada Act 1982 and the Australia Act 1986, and by the independence of countries like India, Pakistan, South Africa, and Ireland. Other events include the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, two world wars, and the Cold War.
[edit] World Wars era
[edit] Turn of the 20th century
Begun at the Battle of Port Arthur, the Russo-Japanese War establishes the Empire of Japan as a world power. The Russians were in constant pursuit of a warm water port on the Pacific Ocean, for their navy as well as for maritime trade. The Manchurian Campaign of the Russian Empire was fought against the Japanese over Manchuria and Korea. The major theatres of operations were Southern Manchuria, specifically the area around the Liaodong Peninsula and Mukden, and the seas around Korea, Japan, and the Yellow Sea. The resulting campaigns, in which the fledgling Japanese military consistently attained victory over the Russian forces arrayed against them, were unexpected by world observers. These victories, as time transpired, would dramatically transform the distribution of power in East Asia, resulting in a reassessment of Japan's recent entry onto the world stage. The embarrassing string of defeats increased Russian popular dissatisfaction with the inefficient and corrupt Tsarist government.
The Russian Revolution of 1905 was a wave of mass political unrest through vast areas of the Russian Empire. Some of it was directed against the government, while some was undirected. It included terrorism, worker strikes, peasant unrests, and military mutinies. It led to the establishment of the limited constitutional monarchy, the establishment of State Duma of the Russian Empire, the multi-party system and Russian Constitution of 1906.
In China, the Qing Dynasty was overthrown following the Xinhai Revolution. The Xinhai Revolution began with the Wuchang Uprising on October 10, 1911 and ended with the abdication of Emperor Puyi on February 12, 1912. The primary parties to the conflict were the Imperial forces of the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911), and the revolutionary forces of the Chinese Revolutionary Alliance (Tongmenghui).
[edit] Edwardian Britain
THe Edwardian era in the United Kingdom is the period spanning the reign of King Edward VII up to the end of the First World War, including the years surrounding the sinking of the RMS Titanic. In the early years of the period, the Second Boer War in South Africa split the country into anti- and pro-war factions. The imperial policies of the Conservatives eventually proved unpopular and in the general election of 1906 the Liberals won a huge landslide. The Liberal government was unable to proceed with all of its radical programme without the support of the House of Lords, which was largely Conservative. Conflict between the two Houses of Parliament over the People's Budget led to a reduction in the power of the peers in 1910. The general election in January that year returned a hung parliament with the balance of power held by Labour and Irish Nationalist members.
[edit] World War I
The causes of World War I included many factors, including the conflicts and antagonisms of the four decades leading up to the war. The Triple Entente was the name given to the loose alignment between the United Kindom, France, and Russia after the signing of the Anglo-Russian Entente in 1907. The alignment of the three powers, supplemented by various agreements with Japan, the United States, and Spain, constituted a powerful counterweight to the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy, the third having concluded an additional secret agreement with France effectively nullifying her Alliance commitments. Militarism, alliances, imperialism, and nationalism played major roles in the conflict. The immediate origins of the war lay in the decisions taken by statesmen and generals during the July crisis of 1914, the spark (or casus belli) for which was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria.
However, the crisis did not exist in a void; it came after a long series of diplomatic clashes between the Great Powers over European and colonial issues in the decade prior to 1914 which had left tensions high. The diplomatic clashes can be traced to changes in the balance of power in Europe since 1870. An example is the Baghdad Railway which was planned to connect the Ottoman Empire cities of Konya and Bagdad with a line through modern-day Turkey, Syria and Iraq. The railway became a source of international disputes during the years immediately preceding World War I. Although it has been argued that they were resolved in 1914 before the war began, it has also been argued that the railroad was a cause of the First World War.[40] Fundamentally the war was sparked by tensions over territory in the Balkans. Austria-Hungary competed with Serbia and Russia for territory and influence in the region and they pulled the rest of the great powers into the conflict through their various alliances and treaties. The Balkan Wars were two wars in South-eastern Europe in 1912–1913 in the course of which the Balkan League (Bulgaria, Montenegro, Greece, and Serbia) first captured Ottoman-held remaining part of Thessaly, Macedonia, Epirus, Albania and most of Thrace and then fell out over the division of the spoils, with incorporation of Romania this time.
Allies and Central Powers in the First World War
Allied powers and areas
Central powers and colonies or occupied territory
Neutral countries
The First World War began in 1914 and lasted to the final Armistice in 1918. The Allied Powers, led by the British Empire, France, Russia until March 1918, Japan and the United States after 1917, defeated the Central Powers, led by the German Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire. The war caused the disintegration of four empires — the Austro-Hungarian, German, Ottoman, and Russian ones — as well as radical change in the European and Middle Eastern maps. The Allied powers before 1917 are sometimes referred to as the Triple Entente, and the Central Powers are sometimes referred to as the Triple Alliance.
Much of the fighting in World War I took place along the Western Front, within a system of opposing manned trenches and fortifications (separated by a “No man's land”) running from the North Sea to the border of Switzerland. On the Eastern Front, the vast eastern plains and limited rail network prevented a trench warfare stalemate from developing, although the scale of the conflict was just as large. Hostilities also occurred on and under the sea and — for the first time — from the air. More than 9 million soldiers died on the various battlefields, and nearly that many more in the participating countries' home fronts on account of food shortages and genocide committed under the cover of various civil wars and internal conflicts. Notably, more people died of the worldwide influenza outbreak at the end of the war and shortly after than died in the hostilities. The unsanitary conditions engendered by the war, severe overcrowding in barracks, wartime propaganda interfering with public health warnings, and migration of so many soldiers around the world helped the outbreak become a pandemic.[41]
Ultimately, World War I created a decisive break with the old world order that had emerged after the Napoleonic Wars, which was modified by the mid-19th century’s nationalistic revolutions. The results of World War I would be important factors in the development of World War II approximately 20 years later. More immediate to the time, the partitioning of the Ottoman Empire was a political event that redrew the political boundaries of the Middle East. The huge conglomeration of territories and peoples formerly ruled by the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire was divided into several new nations.[42] The partitioning brought the creation of the modern Arab world and the Republic of Turkey. The League of Nations granted France mandates over Syria and Lebanon and granted the United Kingdom mandates over Mesopotamia and Palestine (which was later divided into two regions: Palestine and Transjordan). Parts of the Ottoman Empire on the Arabian Peninsula became parts of what are today Saudi Arabia and Yemen.
[edit] Russian Revolutions and Civil War
The Russian Revolution is the series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. Following the abdication of Nicholas II of Russia, the Russian Provisional Government was established. In October of 1917, a red faction revolution occurred in which the Red Guard, armed groups of workers and deserting soldiers directed by the Bolshevik Party, seized control of Saint Petersburg (then known as Petrograd) and began an immediate armed takeover of cities and villages throughout the former Russian Empire.
Another action in 1917 that is of note was the armistice signed between Russia and the Central Powers at Brest-Litovsk.[43] As a condition for peace, the treaty by the Central Powers conceded huge portions of the former Russian Empire to Imperial Germany and the Ottoman Empire, greatly upsetting nationalists and conservatives. The Bolsheviks made peace with the German Empire and the Central Powers, as they had promised the Russian people prior to the Revolution. Vladimir Lenin's decision has been attributed to his sponsorship by the foreign office of Wilhelm II, German Emperor, offered by the latter in hopes that with a revolution, Russia would withdraw from World War I. This suspicion was bolstered by the German Foreign Ministry's sponsorship of Lenin's return to Petrograd.[44] The Western Allies, expressed their dismay at the Bolsheviks, upset at:
- the withdrawal of Russia from the war effort,
- worried about a possible Russo-German alliance, and
- galvanized by the prospect of the Bolsheviks making good their threats to assume no responsibility for, and so default on, Imperial Russia's massive foreign loans. [45]
In addition, there was a concern, shared by many Central Powers as well, that the socialist revolutionary ideas would spread to the West. Hence, many of these countries expressed their support for the Whites, including the provision of troops and supplies. Winston Churchill declared that Bolshevism must be "strangled in its cradle".[46]
The Russian Civil War was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed and the Soviets under the domination of the Bolshevik party assumed power, first in Petrograd (St. Petersburg) and then in other places. In the wake of the October Revolution, the old Russian Imperial Army had been demobilized; the volunteer-based Red Guard was the Bolsheviks' main military force, augmented by an armed military component of the Cheka, the Bolshevik state security apparatus. There was an instituted mandatory conscription of the rural peasantry into the Red Army.[47] Opposition of rural Russians to Red Army conscription units was overcome by taking hostages and shooting them when necessary in order to force compliance.[48] Former Tsarist officers were utilized as "military specialists" (voenspetsy),[49] sometimes taking their families hostage in order to ensure loyalty.[50] At the start of the war, three-fourths of the Red Army officer corps was composed of former Tsarist officers.[51] By its end, 83% of all Red Army divisional and corps commanders were ex-Tsarist soldiers.[52]
The principal fighting occurred between the Bolshevik Red Army and the forces of the White Army. Many foreign armies warred against the Red Army, notably the Allied Forces, yet many volunteer foreigners fought in both sides of the Russian Civil War. Other nationalist and regional political groups also participated in the war, including the Ukrainian nationalist Green Army, the Ukrainian anarchist Black Army and Black Guards, and warlords such as Ungern von Sternberg. The most intense fighting took place from 1918 to 1920. Major military operations ended on 25 October 1922 when the Red Army occupied Vladivostok, previously held by the Provisional Priamur Government. The last enclave of the White Forces was the Ayano-Maysky District on the Pacific coast. The majority of the fighting ended in 1920 with the defeat of General Pyotr Wrangel in the Crimea, but a notable resistance in certain areas continued until 1923 (e.g, Kronstadt Uprising, Tambov Rebellion, Basmachi Revolt, and the final resistance of the White movement in the Far East).
[edit] The Twenties and the Depression
The interwar period was the period between the end of the First World War and the beginning of the Second World War. This period was marked by turmoil in much of the world, as Europe struggled to recover from the devastation of the First World War.
In North America, especially the first half of this period, people experienced considerable prosperity in the Roaring Twenties. The social and societal upheaval known as the Roaring Twenties began in North America and spread to Europe in the aftermath of World War I. The Roaring Twenties, often called "The Jazz Age", saw a exposition of social, artistic, and cultural dynamism. 'Normalcy' returned to politics, jazz music blossomed, the flapper redefined modern womanhood, Art Deco peaked. The spirit of the Roaring Twenties was marked by a general feeling of discontinuity associated with modernity, a break with traditions. Everything seemed to be feasible through modern technology. New technologies, especially automobiles, movies and radio proliferated 'modernity' to a large part of the population. The Twenties saw the general favor of practicality, in architecture as well as in daily life. The Twenties was further distinguished by several inventions and discoveries, extensive industrial growth and the rise in consumer demand and aspirations, and significant changes in lifestyle.
Europe spent these years rebuilding and coming to terms with the vast human cost of the conflict. The economy of the United States became increasingly intertwined with that of Europe. In Germany, the Weimar Republic gave way to saw an episodes of political and economic turmoil, which culminated with the German hyperinflation of 1923 and the failed Beer Hall Putsch of that same year. When Germany could no longer afford war payments, Wall Street invested heavily in European debts to keep the European economy afloat as a large consumer market for American mass produced goods. By the middle of the decade, economic development soared in Europe, and the Roaring Twenties broke out in Germany, Britain and France, the second half of the decade becoming known as the "Golden Twenties". In France and francophone Canada, they were also called the "années folles" ("Crazy Years").[53]
Worldwide prosperity changed dramatically with the onset of the Great Depression in 1929. The Wall Street Crash of 1929 served to punctuate the end of the previous era, as The Great Depression set in. The Great Depression was a worldwide economic downturn starting in most places in 1929 and ending at different times in the 1930s or early 1940s for different countries.[54] It was the largest and most important economic depression in the 20th century, and is used in the 21st century as an example of how far the world's economy can fall.[55]
The depression had devastating effects in virtually every country, rich or poor. International trade plunged by half to two-thirds, as did personal income, tax revenue, prices and profits. Cities all around the world were hit hard, especially those dependent on heavy industry. Construction was virtually halted in many countries. Farming and rural areas suffered as crop prices fell by roughly 60 percent.[56][57][58] Facing plummeting demand with few alternate sources of jobs, areas dependent on primary sector industries suffered the most.
The Great Depression ended at different times in different countries with the effect lasting into the next era.[59] America's Great Depression ended in 1941 with America's entry into World War II.[60] The majority of countries set up relief programs, and most underwent some sort of political upheaval, pushing them to the left or right. In some world states, the desperate citizens turned toward nationalist demagogues — the most infamous being Adolf Hitler — setting the stage for the next era of war. The convulsion brought on by the worldwide depression resulted in the rise of Nazism. In Asia, Japan became an ever more assertive power, especially with regards to China.
[edit] The League and crises
The interwar period was also marked by a radical change in the international order, away from the balance of power that had dominated pre-World War I Europe. One main institution that was meant to bring stability was the League of Nations, which was created after the First World War with the intention of maintaining world security and peace and encouraging economic growth between member countries. The League was undermined by the bellicosity of Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, the Soviet Union, and Mussolini's Italy, and by the non-participation of the United States, leading many to question its effectiveness and legitimacy.
A series of international crises strained the League to its limits, the earliest being the invasion of Manchuria by Japan and the Abyssinian crisis of 1935/36 in which Italy invaded Abyssinia, one of the only free African nations at that time. The League tried to enforce economic sanctions upon Italy, but to no avail. The incident highlighted French and British weakness, exemplified by their reluctance to alienate Italy and lose her as their ally. The limited actions taken by the Western powers pushed Mussolini's Italy towards alliance with Hitler's Germany anyway. The Abyssinian war showed Hitler how weak the League was and encouraged the remilitarization of the Rhineland in flagrant disregard of the Treaty of Versailles. This was the first in a series of provocative acts culminating in the invasion of Poland in September 1939 and the beginning of the Second World War.
[edit] World War II
The Second World War was a global military conflict that took place in 1939–1945. It was the largest and deadliest war in history, culminating in the Holocaust and ending with the dropping of the atom bomb.
Even though Japan had been fighting in China since 1937, the conventional view is that the war began on September 1, 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded Poland, the Drang nach Osten. Within two days the United Kingdom and France declared war on Germany, even though the fighting was confined to Poland. Pursuant to a then-secret provision of its non-aggression Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union joined with Germany on September 17, 1939, to conquer Poland and to divide Eastern Europe.
The Allies were initially made up of Poland, the United Kingdom, France, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, as well as British Commonwealth countries which were controlled directly by the UK, such as the Indian Empire. All of these countries declared war on Germany in September 1939.
Following the lull in fighting, known as the "Phoney War", Germany invaded western Europe in May 1940. Six weeks later, France, in the mean time attacked by Italy as well, surrendered to Germany, which then tried unsuccessfully to conquer Britain. On September 27, Germany, Italy, and Japan signed a mutual defense agreement, the Tripartite Pact, and were known as the Axis Powers.
Nine months later, on June 22, 1941, Germany launched a massive invasion of the Soviet Union, which promptly joined the Allies. Germany was now engaged in fighting a war on two fronts. This proved to be a mistake by Germany - Germany had not successfully carried out the invasion of Britain and the war turned against of the Axis.
On December 7, 1941, Japan attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor, bringing it too into the war on the Allied side. China also joined the Allies, as eventually did most of the rest of the world. China was in turmoil at the time, and attacked Japanese armies through guerilla-type warfare. By the beginning of 1942, the major combatants were aligned as follows: the British Commonwealth, the United States, and the Soviet Union were fighting Germany and Italy; and the British Commonwealth, China, and the United States were fighting Japan. From then through August 1945, battles raged across all of Europe, in the North Atlantic Ocean, across North Africa, throughout Southeast Asia, throughout China, across the Pacific Ocean and in the air over Japan.
Italy surrendered in September 1943 and split in a northern Germany-occupied puppet state and in an Allies-friendly state in the South; Germany surrendered in May 1945. Following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan surrendered, marking the end of the war on September 2, 1945.
It is possible that around 62 million people died in the war; estimates vary greatly. About 60% of all casualties were civilians, who died as a result of disease, starvation, genocide (in particular, the Holocaust), and aerial bombing. The former Soviet Union and China suffered the most casualties. Estimates place deaths in the Soviet Union at around 23 million, while China suffered about 10 million. No country lost a greater portion of its population than Poland: approximately 5.6 million, or 16%, of its pre-war population of 34.8 million died.
The Holocaust (which roughly means "burnt whole") was the deliberate and systematic murder of millions of Jews and other "unwanted" during World War II by the Nazi regime in Germany. Several differing views exist regarding whether it was intended to occur from the war's beginning, or if the plans for it came about later. Regardless, persecution of Jews extended well before the war even started, such as in the Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass). The Nazis used propaganda to great effect to stir up anti-Semitic feelings within ordinary Germans.
After World War II, Europe was informally split into Western and Soviet spheres of influence. Western Europe later aligned as North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and Eastern Europe as the Warsaw Pact. There was a shift in power from Western Europe and the British Empire to the two new superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union. These two rivals would later face off in the Cold War. In Asia, the defeat of Japan led to its democratization. China's civil war continued through and after the war, resulting eventually in the establishment of the People's Republic of China. The former colonies of the European powers began their road to independence.
[edit] Post-1945 World
The mid-20th century is distinguished from most of human history in that its most significant changes were directly or indirectly economic and technological in nature. Economic development was the force behind vast changes in everyday life, to a degree which was unprecedented in human history.
Over the course of the 20th century, the world’s per-capita gross domestic product grew by a factor of five,[61] much more than all earlier centuries combined (including the 19th with its Industrial Revolution). Many economists make the case that this understates the magnitude of growth, as many of the goods and services consumed at the end of the century, such as improved medicine (causing world life expectancy to increase by more than two decades) and communications technologies, were not available at any price at its beginning. However, the gulf between the world’s rich and poor grew wider,[62] and the majority of the global population remained in the poor side of the divide.[63]
Still, advancing technology and medicine has had a great impact even in the Global South. Large-scale industry and more centralized media made brutal dictatorships possible on an unprecedented scale in the middle of the century, leading to wars that were also unprecedented. However, the increased communications contributed to democratization. Technological developments included the development of airplanes and space exploration, nuclear technology, advancement in genetics, and the dawning of the Information Age.
[edit] American Peace
Pax Americana is an appellation applied to the historical concept of relative liberal peace in the the Western world, resulting from the preponderance of power enjoyed by the United States of America starting around the turn of the 20th century. Although the term finds its primary utility in the latter half of the 20th Century, it has been used in various places and eras. It's modern connotations concern the peace established after the end of World War II in 1945.
[edit] Cold War era
The Cold War began in the mid-1940s and lasted into the early 1990s. Throughout this period, the conflict was expressed through military coalitions, espionage, weapons development, invasions, propaganda, and competitive technological development. The conflict included costly defense spending, a massive conventional and nuclear arms race, and numerous proxy wars; the two superpowers never fought one another directly.
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The Soviet Union created the Eastern Bloc of countries that it occupied, annexing some as Soviet Socialist Republics and maintaining others as satellite states that would later form the Warsaw Pact. The United States and various western European countries began a policy of "containment" of communism and forged myriad alliances to this end, including NATO. Several of these western countries also coordinated efforts regarding the rebuilding of western Europe, including western Germany, which the Soviets opposed. In other regions of the world, such as Latin America and Southeast Asia, the Soviet Union fostered communist revolutionary movements, which the United States and many of its allies opposed and, in some cases, attempted to "roll back". Many countries were prompted to align themselves with the nations that would later form either NATO or the Warsaw Pact, though other movements would also emerge.
The Cold War saw periods of both heightened tension and relative calm. International crises arose, such as the Berlin Blockade (1948–1949), the Korean War (1950–1953), the Berlin Crisis of 1961, the Vietnam War (1959–1975), the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962), the Soviet war in Afghanistan (1979–1989) and NATO exercises in November 1983. There were also periods of reduced tension as both sides sought détente. Direct military attacks on adversaries were deterred by the potential for mutual assured destruction using deliverable nuclear weapons. In the Cold Ware era, the Generation of Love and the rise of computers changed society in very different, complex ways, including higher social and local mobility.
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The Cold War drew to a close in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. The United States under President Ronald Reagan increased diplomatic, military, and economic pressure on the Soviet Union, which was already suffering from severe economic stagnation. In the second half of the 1980s, newly appointed Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introduced the perestroika and glasnost reforms. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, leaving the United States as the dominant military power, though Russia retained much of the massive Soviet nuclear arsenal.
[edit] Space Age
The Space Age is a period encompassing the activities related to the Space Race, space exploration, space technology, and the cultural developments influenced by these events. The Space Age began with the development of several technologies that culminated with the launch of Sputnik 1 by the Soviet Union. This was the world's first artificial satellite, orbiting the Earth in 98.1 minutes and weighing in at 83 kg. The launch of Sputnik 1 ushered a new era of political, scientific and technological achievements that became known as the Space Age. The Space Age was characterized by rapid development of new technology in a close race mostly between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Space Age reached its peak with the Apollo program which captured the imagination of much of the world's population. The landing of Apollo 11 was an event watched by over 500 million people around the world and is widely recognized as one of the defining moments of the 20th century. Since then and with the end of the space race due to the collapse of the Soviet Union, public attention has largely moved to other areas.
[edit] Contemporary era
Contemporary historic events are immediately relevant to the present time. The term "contemporary" may well be applied to the history of the world since end of the Cold War and fall of Communism. The effects of the World Wars era (encompassing World War I and World War II) and the Cold War are still being felt in contemporary history. Many persons now living have watched the unfolding of each of its successive phases. It possesses a distinct character of its own. While preeminent in its scientific and humanitarian achievements, the contemporary era has specially contributed to political progress, not so much in what it has originated as by what it has developed. More than most periods of like duration, the contemporary era is the direct consummation of the years immediately preceding. The contemporary era differs from them as the harvest differs from the seed-time.[64]
The contemporary era's memorable achievements in the domain of the public have been along the lines of unification of nationalities and the ongoing technological advances. Yet here as everywhere else human attainment is partial and incomplete. Because people are so near the events to be described and because the sources of information are so many, the narration will be difficult.
[edit] Socio-technological trends
At the end of the twentieth century, the world was at a major crossroads. Throughout the century, more technological advances had been made than in all of preceding history. Computers, the Internet, and other modern technology radically altered daily lives. Increased globalization, specifically Americanization, had occurred. While not necessarily a threat, it has caused anti-Western and anti-American feelings in parts of the world, especially the Middle East. The English language has become a leading global language, with people who did not speak it becoming increasingly disadvantaged.
A trend connecting economic and political events in North America, Asia, and the Middle East is the rapidly increasing demand for fossil fuels, which, along with fewer new petroleum finds, greater extraction costs (see peak oil), and political turmoil, saw the price of gas and oil soar ~500% between 2000 and 2005. In some places, especially in Europe, gas could be $5 a gallon, depending on the currency. Less influential, but omnipresent, is the debate on Turkey's participation in the European Union.
[edit] Challenges and problems
In the contemporary era, several problems are faced the world. First of all, the gap between rich and poor nations continued to widen. The problem may not be fixable, there is a set amount of wealth and it can only be shared by so many. Though, powerful nations with large economies can improve the rapidly evolving economies of the Third World. However, developing countries face many challenges, including the scale of the task to be surmounted, rapidly growing populations, and the need to protect the environment, and the cost that goes along with facing such challenges.
Secondly, disease threatened to destabilize many regions of the world. New viruses such as SARS, West Nile, and Bird Flu continued to spread quickly and easily. In poor nations, malaria and other diseases affected the majority of the population. Millions were infected with HIV, the virus which causes AIDS. The virus was becoming an epidemic in southern Africa.
Terrorism, dictatorship, and the spread of nuclear weapons were also issues requiring immediate attention. Dictators such as Kim Jong-il in North Korea continued to lead their nations toward the development of nuclear weapons. The fear existed that not only are terrorists already attempting to get nuclear weapons, but that they have already obtained them.
[edit] Climate change
Climate change reflects the modern environment's climate. The changes of climate over the past century, have been attributed of to various factors which have resulted in a global warming. This warming is the increase in the average temperature of the Earth's near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century and its projected continuation. Some effects on both the natural environment and human life are, at least in part, already being attributed to global warming. A 2001 report by the IPCC suggests that glacier retreat, ice shelf disruption such as that of the Larsen Ice Shelf, sea level rise, changes in rainfall patterns, and increased intensity and frequency of extreme weather events are attributable in part to global warming.[65] Other expected effects include water scarcity in some regions and increased precipitation in others, changes in mountain snowpack, and adverse health effects from warmer temperatures.[66] It is important to note though that there is a global warming controversy which centers on a dispute regarding the nature, causes, and consequences of global warming.
It usually is impossible to connect specific weather events to human impact on the world. Instead, such impact is expected to cause changes in the overall distribution and intensity of weather events, such as changes to the frequency and intensity of heavy precipitation. Broader effects are expected to include glacial retreat, Arctic shrinkage, and worldwide sea level rise. Other effects may include changes in crop yields, addition of new trade routes,[67] species extinctions,[68] and changes in the range of disease vectors.
[edit] 21st century and the late modern world
The 2000s decade refers to the years from 2000 to 2009 inclusively. The 2000s has been marked generally with an escalation of the social issues of the 1990s, which included the rise of terrorism, stress, the expansion of economic globalization, the expansion of communications and telecommunications with mobile phones and the Internet and international pop culture.
[edit] Information age and computers
The Information Age or Information Era, also commonly known as the Age of the Computer, is an idea that the current age will be characterized by the ability of individuals to transfer information freely, and to have instant access to knowledge that would have been difficult or impossible to find previously. The idea is heavily linked to the concept of a Digital Age or Digital Revolution, and carries the ramifications of a shift from traditional industry that the Industrial Revolution brought through industrialization, to an economy based around the manipulation of information. The period is generally said to have begun in the latter half of the 20th century, though the particular date varies. The term began it's use around the late 1980s and early 1990s, and has been used up to the present with the availability if the Internet.
During the late 1990s, both Internet directories and search engines were popular — Yahoo! (founded 1995) and Altavista (founded 1995) were the respective industry leaders. By late 2001, the directory model had begun to give way to search engines, tracking the rise of Google (founded 1998), which had developed new approaches to relevancy ranking. Directory features, while still commonly available, became after-thoughts to search engines. Database size, which had been a significant marketing feature through the early 2000s, was similarly displaced by emphasis on relevancy ranking, the methods by which search engines attempt to sort the best results first.
"Web 2.0" is characterized as facilitating communication, information sharing, interoperability, User-centered design[69] and collaboration on the World Wide Web. It has led to the development and evolution of web-based communities, hosted services, and web applications. Examples include social-networking sites, video-sharing sites, wikis, blogs, mashups and folksonomies.
[edit] Development of Eastern powers
| Country | % Growth | Date of information | Continent Rank |
|---|---|---|---|
 People's Republic of China |
11.90% | 2007 est. | 3 |
 India |
9.00% | 2007 est. | 2 in 2009 |
The rapid development of Asia's economic and political potential, with China, experiencing immense economic growth, moving toward the status of a regional power and billion-consumer market. India, along with other developing non-western countries, is also growing rapidly, and has begun integrating itself into the world economy.
After China joined the World Trade Organization, the standards of living in the country has improved significantly as China saw the reappearance of the middle class. Wealth disparity between East and the Western hinterlands continued to widen by the day, prompting government programs to "develop the West", taking on such ambitious projects such as the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. The burden of education was greater than ever. Rampant corruption continued despite Premier Zhu's anti-corruption campaign that executed many officials.
By the beginning of 2009, about 300 million people in India - equivalent to the entire population of the entire United States - have escaped extreme poverty.[70] The fruits of India's economic liberalization policies reached their peak in 2007, with India recording its highest GDP growth rate of 9%.[71] With this, India became the second fastest growing major economy in the world, next only to China.[72] An Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report states that the average growth rate 7.5% will double the average income in a decade, and more reforms would speed up the pace.[73]
[edit] Eurasian Union and Federation
In Europe, the European Union is a geo-political founded upon numerous treaties and has undergone expansions to include a majority of states in Europe. Its origins date back to the post-World War II era, in particular the foundation of the European Coal and Steel Community in Paris 1951, following the "Schuman declaration", or the Treaties of Rome establishing the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community. Both these bodies are now part of the European Union, which was formed under that name in 1993.
In the Post-communist period, the Russian Federation became an independent country. Russia was the largest of the fifteen republics that made up the Soviet Union, accounting for over 60% of the GDP and over half of the Soviet population. Russians also dominated the Soviet military and the Communist Party. Thus, Russia was widely accepted as the Soviet Union's successor state in diplomatic affairs and it assumed the USSR's permanent membership and veto in the UN Security Council; see Russia and the United Nations. Russia today shares many continuities of political culture and social structure with its tsarist and Soviet past.
[edit] Late modern terrorism and warfare
Major political developments in the 2000s for the Western World and the Middle East revolved around recent modern terrorism, the War on Terrorism, the Afghanistan War, and the Iraq War.
The September 11 attacks were a series of coordinated suicide attacks by Al-Qaeda upon the United States on September 11, 2001. On that morning, 19 Al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four commercial passenger jet airliners.[74][75] The hijackers intentionally crashed two of the airliners into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, killing everyone on board and many others working in the buildings. Both buildings collapsed within two hours, destroying nearby buildings and damaging others. The hijackers crashed a third airliner into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, just outside of Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed into a field near Shanksville in rural Somerset County, Pennsylvania, after some of its passengers and flight crew attempted to retake control of the plane, which the hijackers had redirected toward Washington, D.C. Major terrorist events after the September 11, 2001 Attacks include the Moscow Theatre Siege, the 2003 Istanbul bombings, the Madrid train bombings, the Beslan school hostage crisis, the 2005 London bombings, the October 2005 New Delhi bombings, and the 2008 Mumbai Hotel Siege.
The United States responded to the September 11, 2001 Attacks by launching a "Global War on Terrorism", invading Afghanistan to depose the Taliban, who had harbored al-Qaeda terrorists, and enacting the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act. Many other countries also strengthened their anti-terrorism legislation and expanded law enforcement powers. The 'Global War on Terrorism' is the military, political, legal and ideological conflict against Islamic terrorism and Islamic militants since the 2001 attacks.
The Modern War of Afghanistan began in late 2001 and was launched by the United States with the United Kingdom, and NATO-led, UN authorized ISAF in response to the September 11 attacks. The aim of the invasion was to find the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden and other high-ranking al-Qaeda members and put them on trial, to destroy the whole organization of al-Qaeda, and to remove the Taliban regime which supported and gave safe harbor to al-Qaeda. The Bush administration policy and the Bush Doctrine stated forces would not distinguish between terrorist organizations and nations or governments that harbor them. Two military operations in Afghanistan are fighting for control over the country. Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) is a United States combat operation involving some coalition partners and currently operating primarily in the eastern and southern parts of the country along the Pakistan border. The second operation is the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), which was established by the UN Security Council at the end of 2001 to secure Kabul and the surrounding areas. NATO assumed control of ISAF in 2003.
The multinational infantry actions, with additional ground forces supplied by the Afghan Northern Alliance, and aerial bombing campaign removed the Taliban from power, but Taliban forces have since regained some strength.[76] The war has been less successful in achieving the goal of restricting al-Qaeda's movement than anticipated.[77] Since 2006, Afghanistan has seen threats to its stability from increased Taliban-led insurgent activity, record-high levels of illegal drug production,[78][79] and a fragile government with limited control outside of Kabul.[80] At the end of 2008, the war had been unsuccessful in capturing Osama bin Laden and tensions have grown between the the United States and Pakistan due to incidents of Taliban fighters crossing the Pakistan border while being pursued by coalition troops.
The Second Persian Gulf War military campaign began in 2003 with the invasion of Iraq by a multinational force.[81] The invasion of Iraq led to an occupation and the eventual capture of Saddam Hussein, who was later executed by the Iraqi Government. Violence against coalition forces and among various sectarian groups soon led to asymmetric warfare with the Iraqi insurgency, strife between many Sunni and Shia Iraqi groups, and al-Qaeda operations in Iraq.[82][83] Member nations of the Coalition withdrew their forces as public opinion favoring troop withdrawals increased and as Iraqi forces began to take responsibility for security.[84][85] In late 2008, the U.S. and Iraqi governments approved a Status of Forces Agreement effective through to the end of 2011.[86] The Iraqi Parliament also ratified a Strategic Framework Agreement with the U.S.,[87] aimed at ensuring international cooperation in constitutional rights, threat deterrence, education,[88] energy development, and other areas.[89] In 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama announced an 18-month withdrawal window for "combat forces".
The Obama administration has pursued a "Overseas Contingency Operation"[90] with the objectives to protect US citizens and business interests in the US and abroad, break up terrorist cells in the US, and disrupt the activities of the international network of terrorist organizations made up of a number of groups under the umbrella of al-Qaeda.[91][92] The administration has re-focused US involvement in the conflict on the withdrawal of its troops from Iraq, the closing of Guantanamo Bay detention camp, and increasing the activity in Afghanistan.
[edit] Israeli–Palestinian conflict
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict has been an ongoing dispute between Israelis and the Palestinians.[93] It forms part of the wider Arab–Israeli conflict. The two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is the consensus solution that is currently under discussion by the key parties to the conflict.
A two-state solution envisions two separate states in the Western portion of the historic region of Palestine, one Jewish and another Arab to solve the conflict. According to the idea, the Arab inhabitants would be given citizenship by the new Palestinian state; Palestinian refugees would likely be offered such citizenship as well. Arab citizens of present-day Israel would likely have the choice of staying with Israel, or becoming citizens of the new Palestine.
At present, a considerable majority of both Israelis and Palestinians, according to a number of polls, prefer the two-state solution over any other solution as a means of resolving the conflict.[94][95][96] Most Palestinians view the West Bank and Gaza Strip as constituting the area of their future state, which is a view also accepted by most Israelis.[97] A handful of academics advocate a one-state solution, whereby all of Israel, the Gaza Strip, and West Bank would become a bi-national state with equal rights for all.[98][99]
There are significant areas of disagreement over the shape of any final agreement and also regarding the level of credibility each side sees in the other in upholding basic commitments. Within Israeli and Palestinian society, the conflict generates a wide variety of views and opinions. This serves to highlight the deep divisions which exist not only between Israelis and Palestinians, but also amongst themselves. Since 2003, the Palestinian side has been fractured by conflict between the two major factions: Fatah, the traditionally dominant party, and its more recent electoral challenger, Hamas.
[edit] Modern History education and schools
The humanities are academic disciplines which study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytic, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural and social sciences. Although many of the subjects of modern history coincide with that of standard history, the subject is taught independently by various systems of education in the world.
[edit] British education
A-level is the lowest tier of education at which modern history is taught in the UK, and students can also choose the subject at University. The material covered includes from the mid-18th century, to analysis of the present day. Virtually all colleges and sixth forms that do teach modern history do it alongside standard history; very few teach the subject exclusively.
[edit] Universities
At the University of Oxford 'Modern History' has a somewhat different meaning. The contrast is not with the Middle Ages but with Antiquity. The earliest period that can be studied in the Final Honour School of Modern History begins in 285.[100]
[edit] See also
- Religious
- Irreligion, Atheism, Ancestor Worship, Muslims and the Muslim world, Christians and Christendom, Huguenots, Puritans, Church Missionary Society, Robert College, Pietist, London Missionary Society, Society of Jesus (Jesuits), European wars of religion
- People and groups
- Andreas Karlstadt, Anne Boleyn, Menocchio, Descartes, Goethe, Voltaire, Nostradamus, Isaac Newton, Fugger, Charles VII, Holy Roman Emperor, Boers, Congress of Berlin, Lenin, Yamagata Aritomo, Tojo Hideki, Balkan League, Tutsi, William Paley, British Whig Party and the Radical Whigs, US Whig Party, John Stuart Mill, John Partridge, Sir Frederick Pollock, William Ashley, American Historical Association, John Adams, Andrew Jackson and Jacksonian Democracy, United States Republican party, Joseph Galloway, Frederick Jackson Turner, American Anti-Slavery Society, A. P. Herbert, Rosa Parks, Jackie Robinson, Institute of Contemporary History
- Companies and businesses
- Laissez-faire, Marconi Company, Electric Vehicle Company, Henry Ford and the Ford Motor Company, AT&T, Bechtel, Asahi Shimbun, Daily Mail
- Areas and histories
- List of World Map changes, Duchy of Warsaw, Bohemia, Cape Colony, Transvaal, History of the Netherlands, History of Iran, History of Korea, History of Manchuria, History of Vladivostok, History of Pakistan, History of Saudi Arabia, History of Kuwait, History of Cambodia, Kansas-Nebraska Act, History of New York City, Moabit, Levittown
- Culture and society
- Iconoclasm, Le Corbusier, Apsley House, Yosano Akiko, Romanticist, Television and Cable television, History of modern literature, Symbolist, The Beatles, Rodgers and Hammerstein, I Love Lucy
- Legal
- letter of credence, prisoners of war, laws of war, exequatur, extradition, right of asylum, jus soli, jus sanguinis, exterritoriality
- Other
- Free silver, political consciousness, Sophisms, Fire of London, Tower of London, utilitarian, Uitlanders, Pan-Slavism, Sinn Fein, UNESCO, Women's suffrage, The Nobel and the Peace Prize, Origin of Species, human evolution, Social evolution, Bakelite, Transistors, Infidelity, Penicillin, Ethanol, Gasoline, Fuel Cell, Automobile, personal computers, mobile phone
[edit] Further reading
- 20th and 21st century sources
- Boyd, Andrew, Joshua Comenetz. An atlas of world affairs. Routledge, 2007. ISBN 0415391695
- Black, Edwin. Internal Combustion: How Corporations and Governments Addicted the World to Oil and Derailed the Alternatives. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2006.
- Briggs, Asa, and Peter Burke. A Social History of the Media: From Gutenberg to the Internet. Cambridge: Polity, 2002.
- Barzun, Jacques. From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life : 1500 to the Present. New York: HarperCollins, 2001.
- Burke, Peter. A Social History of Knowledge: From Gutenberg to Diderot. Cambridge, UK: Polity, 2000.
- CBS News. People of the century. Simon and Schuster, 1999. ISBN 0684870932
- Wang, Ke-wen. Modern China: an encyclopedia of history, culture, and nationalism. Taylor & Francis, 1998. ISBN 0815307209
- Huffman, James L. Modern Japan: an encyclopedia of history, culture, and nationalism. Taylor & Francis, 1998. ISBN 0815325258
- Schlesinger, Arthur M. New Viewpoints in American History. New York: Macmillan, 1922.
- Bakeless, John Edwin. The Economic Causes of Modern War; A Study of the Period: 1878-1918. New York: Printed for the Department of political science of Williams college, by Moffat, Yard and Co, 1921
- Day, Clive. A History of Commerce. New York [etc.]: Longmans, Green, and Co, 1921.
- Moore, Edward Caldwell. The Spread of Christianity in the Modern World. Chicago, Ill: University of Chicago Press, 1919.
- Muir, Ramsay. The Expansion of Europe; The Culmination of Modern History. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917.
- Robinson, James Harvey, and Charles Austin Beard. Readings in Modern European History; A Collection of Extracts from the Sources Chosen with the Purpose of Illustrating Some of the Chief Phases of Development of Europe During the Last Two Hundred Years. Boston: Ginn & Co, 1908.
- McCarthy, Michael J. F. The Coming Power; A Contemporary History of the Far East, 1898-1905. London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1905.
- Kidd, Benjamin. Principles of Western Civilisation. London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1902.
- Acton, John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, Adolphus William Ward, G. W. Prothero, Stanley Mordaunt Leathes, and E. A. Benians. The Cambridge Modern History. New York: Macmillan Co, 1902.
- Wilson, George Grafton, and George Fox Tucker. International Law. New York: Silver, Burdett and co, 1901.
- 19th century sources
- Duruy, Victor, and Edwin A. Grosvenor. History of Modern Times, From the Fall of Constantinople to the French Revolution. New York: H. Holt and company, 1894.
- Fredet, Peter. Modern History; From the Coming of Christ and Change of the Roman Republic into an Empire, to the Year of Our Lord 1888. Baltimore: J. Murphy & Co, 1888.
- Thalheimer, M. E. An Outline of General History: For the Use of Schools. Cincinnati: Van Antwerp, Bragg & Co, 1883.
- Lord, John. A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon. Philadelphia: C. Desilver & Sons [etc.], 1877.
- Timbs, John. Predictions Realized in Modern Times.: Now First Collected by Horace Welby. London: Kent and Co. Paternoster Row, 1862.
- Post, Truman M. The Skeptical Era in Modern History; Or, The Infidelity of the Eighteenth Century, the Product of Spiritual Despotism. New York: C. Scribner, 1856.
- Modern history. Chambers W. and R., ltd. 1856.
- Michelet, Jules, and Alonzo Potter. Modern History. New-York: Harper & Brothers, 82 Cliff-St, 1846.
- Goodrich, Samuel G. Famous Men of Modern Times. Boston: Bradbury, Soden & Co, 1843.
- General History of the World: Abridged. Huddersfield: Brook and Lancaster, 1802.
[edit] References
- General information
Books
- Earle, Edward Mead. An Outline of Modern History; A Syllabus with Map Studies. New York: Macmillan Co, 1921.
- Grosvenor, Edwin A. Contemporary History of the World. New York and Boston: T.Y. Crowell & Co, 1899.
- Taylor, William Cooke, Charles Duke Yonge, and G. W. Cox. The Student's Manual of Modern History; Containing the Rise and Progress of the Principal European Nations, Their Political History, and the Changes in Their Social Condition; with a History of the Colonies Founded by Europeans. 1880.
- Taylor, W. C., and C. S. Henry. A Manual of Modern History, Containing the Rise and Progress of the Principal European Nations, Their Political History, and the Changes in Their Social Condition ... Revised, with a Chapter on the History of the United States. New York: D. Appleton & co, 1853.
- Michelet, Jules, and Alonzo Potter. Modern History. New-York: Harper & Brothers, 82 Cliff-St, 1846.
Websites
- Internet Modern History Sourcebook, fordham.edu
- Footnotes
- ^ Dunan, Marcel. Larousse Encyclopedia of Modern History, From 1500 to the Present Day. New York: Harper & Row, 1964.
- ^ a b modern. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
- ^ New Dictionary of the History of ideas, Volume 5, Detroit 2005. Modernism and Modern
- ^ Islamic Culture and the Medical Arts: Late Medieval and Early Modern Medicine
- ^ postmodern - Definition from the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
- ^ Ira M. Lapidus, A History of Islamic Societies, Cambridge 1988
- ^ L. Canfield, Robert; Jonathan Haas (2002). Turko-Persia in Historical Perspective. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521522919, 9780521522915.; p. 20;
- ^ "The Mughal Empire"
- ^ M.C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia Since c. 1300, 2nd ed. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991. page 19
- ^ Prapantja, Rakawi, trans. by Theodore Gauthier Pigeaud, Java in the 14th Century, A Study in Cultural History: The Negara-Kertagama by Pakawi Parakanca of Majapahit, 1365 AD (The Hague, Martinus Nijhoff, 1962), vol. 4, p. 29. 34; G.J. Resink, Indonesia’s History Between the Myths: Essays in Legal History and Historical Theory (The Hague: W. van Hoeve, 1968), p. 21.
- ^ Civilizations in America
- ^ Renaissance, Online Etymology Dictionary
- ^ A Greek mathematician, Aristarchus of Samos, had already discussed heliocentric hypotheses as early as the third century BCE. However, there is little evidence that he ever developed his ideas beyond a very basic outline (Dreyer, 1953, pp.135–48; Linton, 2004, p. 39).
- ^ The title was derived from his savage behavior against his enemies, and particularly from a war with France in late 1471: frustrated by the refusal of the French to engage in open battle, and angered by French attacks on his unprotected borders in Hainault and Flanders, Charles marched his army back from the Ile-de-France to Burgundian territory, burning over two thousand towns, villages and castles on his way - Taylor, Aline S, Isabel of Burgundy, pp.212-213
- ^ See "Martyrdom of William Tyndale".
- ^ Of note in modern Indian philosophy are the philosophers which gave contemporary meaning to traditional philosophy, such as Swami Vivekananda.
- ^ Pope Calixtus III account from 1456 to the Burgundian bishop talking about the saviour of Christianity at Belgrade
- ^ a b Medieval Sourcebook: Inquisition - Introduction
- ^ this also includes black magic (Maleficium).
- ^ BBC Science & Nature, Leonardo da Vinci (Retrieved on May 12, 2007)
- ^ BBC History, Michelangelo (Retrieved on May 12, 2007)
- ^ R.R. Palmer, A History of the Modern World 2nd ed. 1961, p. 234.
- ^ Paul Oskar Kristeller, Humanism, pp. 113-4, in Charles B. Schmitt, Quentin Skinner (editors), The Cambridge History of Renaissance Philosophy (1990).
- ^ Eric Hobsbawm, The Age of Revolution: Europe 1789–1848, Weidenfeld and Nicholson Ltd. ISBN 0-349-10484-0
- ^ Joseph E Inikori. Africans and the Industrial Revolution in England, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-01079-9.
- ^ Business and Economics. Leading Issues in Economic Development, Oxford University Press US. ISBN 0-19-511589-9.
- ^ Russell Brown, Lester. Eco-Economy, James & James, Earthscan. ISBN 1-85383-904-3.
- ^ Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis essay retrieved Mar. 11, 2006
- ^ See generally Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v. United States, 221 U.S. 1 (1911).
- ^ F.K Richtmyer, E.H Kennard, T. Lauristen (1955). "Introduction". Introduction to Modern Physics (5th edition ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company. p. 1. LCCN 55-6862.
- ^ Nikola Tesla, "Radio Power Will Revolutionize the World" in Modern Mechanics and Inventions (July 1934) (ed., "Today's scientists have substituted mathematics for experiments, and they wander off through equation after equation, and eventually build a structure [...].")
- ^ a b ter Haar, D. (1967). The Old Quantum Theory. Pergamon Press. pp. 206.
- ^ Matrix mechanics and wave mechanics supplanted other studies to end the era of the old-quantum theory.
- ^ a substance in early physics considered to be the medium through which light propagates.
- ^ Compact Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. 2007. "humanism n. 1 a rationalistic system of thought attaching prime importance to human rather than divine or supernatural matters. 2 a Renaissance cultural movement that turned away from medieval scholastic-ism and revived interest in ancient Greek and Roman thought." Typically, abridgments of this definition omit all senses except #1, such as in the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary, Collins Essential English Dictionary, and Webster's Concise Dictionary. New York: RHR Press. 2001. pp. 177.
- ^ Collins Concise Dictionary. HarperCollins. 1999. "The rejection of religion in favour of a belief in the advancement of humanity by its own efforts.".
- ^ That is, all written history. In 1847, the prehistory of society, the social organization existing previous to recorded history, was all but unknown. Since then Haxthausen discovered common ownership of land In Russia, Maurer concluded it to be the social foundation from which all Teutonic races started in history, and by and by village communities were found to be, or to have been, the primitive form of society everywhere from India to Ireland. The Inner organization of this primitive Communistic society was laid bare, In its typical form, by Morgan's work on the true nature of the gens and Its relation to the tribe. With the dissolution of these primaeval communities society begins to be differentiated into separate and finally antagonistic classes.
- ^ Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx, and Wilhelm Liebknecht. Manifesto of the Communist Party / No Political Trading / by Wilhelm Liebknecht ; Translated by A.M. Simons and Marcus Hitch. Chicago, Ill: Charles H. Kerr, 1906.
- ^ Marx makes no claim to have produced a master key to history. Historical materialism is not "an historico-philosophic theory of the marche generale imposed by fate upon every people, whatever the historic circumstances in which it finds itself". (Marx, Karl, Letter to editor of the Russian paper Otetchestvennye Zapiskym, 1877) His ideas, he explains, are based on a concrete study of the actual conditions that pertained in Europe.
- ^ (Jastrow 1917)
- ^ Barry, John M. (2004). The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Greatest Plague in History. Viking Penguin. ISBN 0-670-89473-7.
- ^ Roderic H. Davison; Review "From Paris to Sèvres: The Partition of the Ottoman Empire at the Peace Conference of 1919-1920. by Paul C. Helmreich" in Slavic Review, Vol. 34, No. 1 (Mar., 1975), pp. 186-187
- ^ Evan Mawdsley (2008) The Russian Civil War: 42
- ^ Lenin
- ^ the legal notion of Odious debt had not yet been formulated
- ^ Cover Story: Churchill's Greatness. Interview with Jeffrey Wallin. (The Churchill Centre)
- ^ Read, Christopher, From Tsar to Soviets, Oxford University Press (1996), p. 237: By 1920, 77% of the Red Army's enlisted ranks were composed of peasant conscripts.
- ^ Williams, Beryl, The Russian Revolution 1917-1921, Blackwell Publishing Ltd. (1987), ISBN 9780631150831 0631150838: Typically, men of conscriptible age (17-40) in a village would vanish when Red Army draft units approached. The taking of hostages and a few exemplary executions usually brought the men back.
- ^ Overy, R.J., The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia, W.W. Norton & Company (2004), ISBN 0393020304, 9780393020304, p. 446: By the end of the civil war, one-third of all Red Army officers were ex-Tsarist voenspetsy.
- ^ Williams, Beryl, The Russian Revolution 1917-1921, Blackwell Publishing Ltd. (1987), ISBN 9780631150831 0631150838
- ^ Williams, Beryl, The Russian Revolution 1917-1921, Blackwell Publishing Ltd. (1987), ISBN 9780631150831 0631150838
- ^ Overy, R.J., The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia, W.W. Norton & Company (2004), ISBN 0393020304, 9780393020304, p. 446:
- ^ Hakim, Joy (1995). War, Peace, and All That Jazz. New York, New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 41–46. ISBN 0-19-509514-6.
- ^ Great Depression, Encyclopaedia Britannica
- ^ Charles Duhigg, "Depression, You Say? Check Those Safety Nets," New York Times, March 23, 2008
- ^ "Commodity Data". US Bureau of Labor Statistics. http://www.bls.gov/data/. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.
- ^ Cochrane, Willard W. (1958). Farm Prices, Myth and Reality. pp. 15.
- ^ "World Economic Survey 1932–33". League of Nations: 43.
- ^ Great Depression and World War II. The Library of Congress.
- ^ What Ended the Great Depression of 1929?. Source: The Federal Reserve Board web site, “Remarks by Governor Ben Bernanke at the H. Parket Willis Lecture in Economic Policy”, March 2, 2004, FDR Library Web Site.
- ^ J. Bradford DeLong, Cornucopia: Increasing Wealth in the Twentieth Century. 2000.
- ^ Morrison, Wayne. Theoretical criminology: from modernity to post-modernism. Page 53.
- ^ Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (Program). Ecosystems and Human Well-Being. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment series. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 2005. Page 12
- ^ Grosvenor, 1899.
- ^ "Climate Change 2001: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change". IPCC. 2001-02-16. http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg2/index.htm. Retrieved on 2007-03-14.
- ^ McMichael AJ, Woodruff RE, Hales S (2006). "Climate change and human health: present and future risks". Lancet 367 (9513): 859–69. doi:. PMID 16530580.
- ^ Macey, Jennifer (September 19, 2007). "Global warming opens up Northwest Passage". ABC News. http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/09/19/2037198.htm?section=business. Retrieved on 2007-12-11.
- ^ "Climate Change 2007: Synthesis report" (PDF). Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report. IPCC. 2007-02-05. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/syr/ar4_syr.pdf. Retrieved on 2009-02-03.
- ^ "Core Characteristics of Web 2.0 Services". http://www.techpluto.com/web-20-services/.
- ^ Nick Gillespie (2008). "What Slumdog Millionaire can teach Americans about economic stimulus". Reason. http://www.reason.com/blog/show/131810.html.
- ^ https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/in.html#Econ
- ^ "The India Report". Astaire Research. http://www.ukibc.com/ukindia2/files/India60.pdf.
- ^ "Economic survey of India 2007: Policy Brief". OECD. http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/17/52/39452196.pdf.
- ^ "Security Council Condemns, 'In Strongest Terms', Terrorist Attacks on the United States". United Nations. September 12, 2001. http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2001/SC7143.doc.htm. Retrieved on 2006-09-11. "The Security Council today, following what it called yesterday’s "horrifying terrorist attacks" in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania, unequivocally condemned those acts, and expressed its deepest sympathy and condolences to the victims and their families and to the people and Government of the United States."
- ^ "Bin Laden claims responsibility for 9/11". CBC News. 2004-10-29. http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2004/10/29/binladen_message041029.html. Retrieved on 2009-01-11. "Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden appeared in a new message aired on an Arabic TV station Friday night, for the first time claiming direct responsibility for the 2001 attacks against the United States."
- ^ "The Taliban Resurgence in Afghanistan". http://www.cfr.org/publication/10551/.
- ^ "Afghanistan: and the troubled future of unconventional warfare By Hy S. Rothstein". http://books.google.com/books?id=w7fmg1cCjskC&vid=ISBN8170493064&dq=Afghanistan+and+the+troubled+future+of+unconventional+warfare&q=Al+Qaeda&pgis=1#search.
- ^ "Opium Harvest at Record Level in Afghanistan". http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/03/world/asia/03afghan.html.
- ^ "Afghanistan opium at record high". http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6965115.stm.
- ^ "Afghanistan could return to being a ‘failed State,’ warns Security Council mission chief". http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=20702&Cr=afghan&Cr1=.
- ^ "US Names Coalition of the Willing". http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2862343.stm. Retrieved on 2007-11-03.
- ^ U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, 2 Feb 2007, see "four wars" remark
- ^ "CBS on civil war". CBS News. September 26, 2006. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/09/26/eveningnews/main886305.shtml.
- ^ Britain's Brown visits officials, troops in Iraq. International Herald Tribune, October 2, 2007.
- ^ Italy plans Iraq troop pull-out BBC March 15, 2005
- ^ Agreement Between the United States of America and the Republic of Iraq On the Withdrawal of United States Forces from Iraq and the Organization of Their Activities during Their Temporary Presence in Iraq
- ^ http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/iraq/SE_SFA.pdf Strategic Framework Agreement (pdf bitmap)
- ^ English Language Teaching and Learning Program (US State Dept.)
- ^ Karadsheh, J. (November 27, 2008) "Iraq parliament OKs pact on U.S. troops' future" CNN
- ^ 'Global War On Terror' Is Given New Name, Scott Wilson and Al Kamen, The Washington Post, March 25, 2009; Page A04
- ^ The White House (October 7, 2001). Presidential Address to the Nation. Press release. http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/10/print/20011007-8.html.
- ^ "Counterterrorism and Terrorism". Federal Bureau of Investigation. http://www.fbi.gov/terrorinfo/counterrorism/waronterrorhome.htm. Retrieved on 2008-04-14.
- ^ A History of Conflict:introduction, BBC
- ^ "Just another forgotten peace summit." Haaretz.com. By Prof. Ephraim Yaar and Prof. Tamar Hermann. Published 11/12/2007.
- ^ Poll on Palestinian attitudes - Jerusalem Media and Communications Centre.
- ^ Kurtzer, Daniel and Scott Lasensky. "Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace ..." Google Book Search. 30 January 2009.
- ^ Dershowitz, Alan. The Case for Peace: How the Arab-Israeli Conflict Can Be Resolved. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2005
- ^ Israel: The Alternative, The New York Review of Books, Volume 50, Number 16, October 23, 2003
- ^ Virginia Tilley, The One-State Solution, University of Michigan Press (May 24, 2005), ISBN 0472115138
- ^ history.ox.ac.uk
[edit] External links
- Journal of Contemporary History. SAGE Publications. ISSN 1461-7250 (Print ISSN 0022-0094)
- Contemporary History Institute (CHI). ohiou.edu (ed., Analyzes the contemporary period in world affairs — the period from World War II to the present — from an interdisciplinary historical perspective.)
- China and Europe, 1500–2000 and Beyond What is Modern. columbia.edu.
