The Negative Impact Of European Imperialism In The 19th Century

In the 19th century, European nations were desperate to further explore the world and expand their territory, feeding their endless hunger for power. Europeans in this time period had the philosophical mindset of Social Darwinism, believing that it was their job to civilize and educate nations and countries full of who they deemed to be “savages.” Specifically, the continent of Africa, and the countries of Japan and India. Starting in the country of China, throughout the 1800s the British Empire grew to become the leading political and cultural power in said countries, modernizing them in ways that had negative effects on the people who lived there, and how the country was operated. By imposing European culture on the natives of the nations they imperialized, Europe, in a way, created a territory that spanned over the globe. Though imperialism was objectively a terrible part of world

For example, Mughal rulers before English rule conducted commercial economy by promoting its relationship with markets in and around the Indian Ocean. When the British came, they completely eradicated this idea and and consequently started deindustrialization, “With the developments in industrial techniques in England a new class of industrial capitalists rose there demanding a change in this policy. The British market was to be closed to Indian products and the Indian market opened to British manufacturers.” (Nehru, The Discovery of India) Just 12 years later, textile workers in India faced unemployment; this meant that India would fall behind the rest of the world when in came to progression in industry, “to fall backward in time… losing most of its artisan manufacturing abilities, forcing millions of unemployed craftsmen to return to the soil to scratch meager livelihoods directly from crowded land.” (Voyages,