Europe; a key contender that seems to be involved with every country throughout the 19th and 20th century. During this time period was the imperialist expansion of Japan and China by the Europeans. While both countries were forced to comply to the wishes of the Europeans states due to advanced weaponry, China received worse treatment than Japan. The Chinese were forced to into unfair trade, unfair opening of ports, and other disadvantages. Imperialism caused China to become weaker, meanwhile Japan was over all strengthened by it. During the nineteenth century, the Manchu - or Qing - Dynasty were at the height of their power. Under the rule of the emperors Kangxi and Qianlong, the country was able to flourish and remain in a state of peace …show more content…
The Chinese also ceded the island of Hong Kong to Great Britain. Later on with the legislation of the opium trade, the opening of more ports, and the peninsula of Kowloon to the British; while other territories in the north were given to Russia - due to the Treaty of Tianjin. So much began to happen to and around China that people grew confused and somewhat angry. One major event of the people that occurred was the Boxer Rebellion. The people were set off by the damage drought and the high unemployment rates.The boxers began to attack the foreign residents and surrounded the foreign legation in Beijing. Not until late summer were the foreigners were rescued by a expeditionary force. As punishment, temples in the Capitol suburbs were destroyed and the government felt the need to pay a lump sum to the foreign governments that helped to suppress the …show more content…
While Japan was a reserved island that only had real relations with Korea, they were not totally opposed to western culture. When men such as Matthew Perry and Townsend Harris came along, the Japanese were able to compromise and come to agreements. Same happened with the revolution from above. Japan was able to remove unfair treaties that were imposed during the mid-century. Luckily it contained little to no violence. Plus the people began to modernize in their government, social life, and many other aspects. The genro were a class of modernizing samurai which were later known as the Elder statesmen, or the Sat-Cho clique. There were two political parties based off western culture; the Liberal Party and the Progressive Party. There was also a system to limit the amount of corruption among the officials known as the Meiji Constitution. Also another section was referred to as the dancing cabinet. The dancing cabinet was the ministers who had taken up western style ballroom dancing and
European Imperialism of China and Japan Imperialism is the practice by which powerful nations or peoples seek to extend and maintain control or influence over weaker nations or peoples. By the 1800’s, the Western powers had advantages in this process. They led the world in technological advances, giving them dominance when conquering other countries. The European Imperialists made attempts to conquer China and Japan.
Japanese revolts ensue with the opening of Japan to the Western World. The middle and lower classes wanted Japan to be open while the conservative daimyo did not. Both of these groups looked to the emperor for a decision. The shogunate, reliant on the isolation, collapsed under pressures caused by outsid...
Imperialism is the colonizing of weak peoples by stronger nations and sucking all of the natural resources out of their land. The age of Imperialism was in the late 1800s through the early 1900s. The main region that was the sovereign states in this time period was Europe. Imperialism is viewed negatively because it was enforced with excessive violence. Avatar mirrors the Age of Imperialism and how it was enforced with the military powers at play, the attempt to use economic influence, and the attempt to assimilate native people.
In the middle of the 19th century, despite a few similarities between the initial responses of China and Japan to the West, they later diverged; which ultimately affected and influenced the modernizing development of both countries. At first, both of the Asian nations rejected the ideas which the West had brought upon them, and therefore went through a time period of self-imposed isolation. However, the demands that were soon set by Western imperialism forced them, though in different ways, to reconsider. And, by the end of the 19th century both China and Japan had introduced ‘westernizing’ reforms. China’s aim was to use modern means to retain and preserve their traditional Confucian culture. Whereas Japan, on the other hand, began to successfully mimic Western technology as it pursued modernization, and thus underwent an astounding social upheaval. Hence, by the year 1920, Japan was recognized as one of the world’s superpowers, whereas China was on the edge of anarchy.
American Imperialism began at the start of the 19th Century, but many Americans had different views on whether Imperialism was proper and legal. Many Americans at the turn of the century believed that bringing new nations into the United States was proper, and necessary to improve America. Legally Imperialism violated the Constitution, and it contradicted statements in the Declaration of Independence and Washington 's Farewell Address. American Imperialism was right deemed proper because it involved the idea of Social Darwinism, and it helped improve American Industries. The need to obtain land to increase trading and materials lead to many countries such as England, France, and Germany to take control of most of Africa and Asia for industrial
In the 19th century, both Japan and China found themselves lacking with little to no improvement when it came to technology and military advancements in their prospective countries. This lack of progression would bring the possibility of great injustice to both areas. At certain times during this century they would be faced with making decisions of whether to allow western powers force their way in, to intimidate and gain relations between themselves and that power. Japan found itself reacting well to imperialism by giving into whichever country wanted relations and brought force enough to get it thereby saving itself from unnecessary strife and possibility of war. China had other ideas about letting western powers in and ultimately deciding
When Japan defeated China in 1895, European powers answered with an order they called, “ carving up the Chinese melon.'; Following the division of Africa among European powers, they turned their sights to what they saw as an extremely weak Chinese government. European powers and America began to scramble for what was called “spheres of interest.'; These spheres of interest involved holding leases for all railway and public advantages in different regions of China. Russia got Port Arthur, Britain got the New Territories near the Hong Kong region, Germany got Shantung and America got nothing. America was focusing largely on Guam and the Philippines and had missed the opportunity and so insisted on the “open-door policy'; in China were commercial opportunities were equally available to all Western powers and the political and territorial integrity of China stayed intact.
The East Asians, mostly China and Japan, both were trying to become or stay a great power, and did it in different ways. Japan tried to isolate themselves by only allowing limited contact and no spreading of Christianity, as was talked about in document sixteen. China tried to keep up with them by using a strong legal system as was mentioned in document six, and government set up like the monarchs of Europe, in that the power is passed from father to son, as seen in document five. Japan, at first, let the newcomers in and learn about them, and let them learn a little from them. However, they didn't have very good experiences, like as portrayed in document twelve, the Japanese thought of the Europeans as arrogant and full of themselves, and the Europeans, like Will Adams in document fourteen, didn't like what the Japanese did, in holding them there when they wanted to leave, and the way they treated the women as completely there just to serve and help the men, as was mentioned in document eleven.
During the late 1800s and 1900s in various societies, imperialism played a major role. Imperialism consists of a country's domination of an economic and cultural life in another country. Within the 1800s and 1900s, Europe became a large-scale global leader. Europeans set up colonies all over the world, specifically Africa, India, China, and Japan. Imperialism is viewed through two different major points such as the imperialist and colonialist.
Japan had to open ports to foreign commerce when they lost the fight against Europe and America in Tokyo Bay (Bentley 508). After losing, Japan began industrializing and soon enhanced their military by investing in tools from western empires, who had very strong and powerful militaries. Once Japan had built a strong military they began to fight for Korea. They fought China and “demolished the Chinese fleet in a battle lasting a mere five hours,” and they later gained Korea and treaty rights in China (Bentley 550). China’s military was very weak. After losing Hong Kong and many trading ports to western empires following the Opium War, China was in trouble. Chinese people began rebelling against the Qing Dynasty. After the most popular rebellion, The Taiping Rebellion, China began the Self-Strengthening Movement. “While holding to Confucian values, movement leaders built shipyards, constructed railroads, established weapons industries, opened steel foundries with blast furnaces, and founded academies to develop scientific expertise” (Bentley 543). After doing all of these things, China still did not have a strong enough military. They continued to deal with problems from the western
At the end of 1800s and early 1900s, U.S start taking control and expand all over the
It was first established in 1636 by them to designate their regime in Manchuria (Brittanica,2018), which is now the Northeast region of China. The Manchus took advantage of the opportunity to seize the capital and establish their own dynasty in China by adopting the Ming form of Government and continuing to employ Ming officials, the Manchus pacified the Chinese population. This occurred in 1644 when the Chinese capital at Beijing was captured by the rebel leader and when the officials of the Ming dynasty called on the Manchus for aid. The Qing dynasty was the last Imperial dynasty of China (Joel,2018). The military power of the Qing dynasty weakened during the 1800s and faced with international pressure from the European powers who were extending their imperial influence into China, massive rebellions and defeats in wars, including the Opium wars with Great Britain (Joel,2018). The downfall of the Qing dynasty was not something that happened overnight. It was weakened over several decades through protests from the people, major rebellions, and conflicts and wars with other nations, including major powers like Britain and France. This showed other countries that China was no longer the superpower that it once was and had now become vulnerable and weak. So, once other nations saw China as weak, China began to lose a grip on its
Even though they had different forms of imperialism, the United States and England both
The Qing Dynasty prospered well into the 20th century despite the numerous problems the administration faced. However, during the early days of the 20th century, civil disorders continued to grow in such unmanageable factions that the administration was pushed to do something about it. The high living standards of the previous century had contributed to a sharp increase in China’s population, there was approximately 400 million people living in China around the nineteenth century. This spike increased population density, it also created a surplus of labour shortages, land shortages, inadequate food production and several famines. As an attempt for a solution, Empress Dowager Cixi proclaimed a call for proposals for reform from the generals and governors. There were three reform movements between 1860-1911, “ the Qing court and Chinese provincial officials had tried to adapt a wide range of Western techniques and ideas to China’s proven needs: artillery, ships, the telegraph, new schools, factories, chambers of commerce and international law” (Spence, 234). The first reform being the Self-strengthening Movement the second was the Hundred Days Reform and the last is regarded as the Late Qing reform. These three reforms were similar in the fact that the main objective was to strengthen China. However, there were multiple reasons for the failed plans of the reforms. Analyzing certain individuals and events during the late Qing dynasty will help determine if the Manchus would have been viable leaders for modern China.
Many foreign powers ravaged China in search of wealth, brutally destroying land and violently fighting people. After much of the devastation, the Dynasty was ‘forced’ to acquiesce to the foreign powers (-only after they assured Cixi that her position and power would be held in place). The results of these was called the Boxer Protocol – which would later be considered one of the “Unequal Treaties.” Among the stipulations of the Boxer Protocol, China would have to pay an enormous amount of money, for indemnity, to about 14 countries (in different proportions). Furthermore, foreign powers were given the right to seize and inhabit certain places in China.