Japan’s industrialized economy needed resources, which Japan believed they could obtain through the same methods of imperialism. Japan would use the same military might as exhibited by Europe and America but would control not only the governments of these countries but the people as well. The indigenous people of these regions would suffer due to the greed of the great powers and eventually gain a greater since of nationalism needed to overthrow their aggressors. India Britain took control of India after defeating France and the Indian government during the eighteenth century. India was considered the “jewel in the crown” of the British Empire.
Spain’s conquest of the New World was strictly by force. Spain’s chief opponents in their conquest of America were natives with much less advanced technology who had never seen a modern army. Because of this, Spain could easily trounce the Aztecs and Incas with small expeditions. This was very different from Russia’s expansion because Russia had to defeat nations with modern, well equipped armies. Also, Russia expanded directly from its center to the area surrounding it, allowing its conquering armies to be well supplied and manned, because they were close to home Contrary, Spain was forced to send all its supplies and men in ships on long journeys across the Atlantic, significantly reducing the amount of soldiers Spain had in the New World.
Since the Enlightenment liberalism had flourished. This resulted in the conservative right nurturing fascism as a literal antithesis to democracy. Fascism was more of an ethos than a political ideology and incorporated concepts from contemporary genius such as Charles Darwin and Friedrich Nietzsche to validate the expansionist mindset. (See Appendices 1 & 2) Imperial Russia under the Tsars had always been synonymous with oppression, and the rise of both Lenin and Stalin was less accountable to charisma than to ruthlessness, with one hard-liner simply replacing another. At the beginning of the 1900’s, Russian society was suffering while Western Europeans were seeing increasing civic powers.
This, however, was seen by the Soviet Union as a form of economic expansion through which the Americans were bringing Eastern European states into their own sphere of influence, and was a direct challenge to their authority. It is possible to argue that the Americans were indeed trying to help struggling states with their growth and that the aims were purely altruistic in nature. However, it must be noted that the Marshall Plan did have strings attached, forcing the countries that it provided aid for to open their markets for American goods and not advancing it to countries who did not do
However after Karakazov attempts to assassinate the Tsar in 1866, he becomes much more autocratic, revealing that he had no intention of significantly developing politics, his use of the Zemstvas were in fact to help sustain autocracy, through making local administration more efficient. It can be suggested from this that Alexander II had put the Zemstva Act in place to appease the nobles angered by the Emancipation Act. Alexander III was much more of a successful autocrat. His reactionary attitude led to the reversal of many of his father’s liberal reforms, and was in some cases angered by them. Alexander III re-implements Tsarist form, through the use of repression and terror.
Lenin was aware that it was the Provisional Government’s unwillingness or inability to act on questions of land and peace that contributed to its unpopularity and allowed the Bolsheviks to take power so easily in October. Lenin’s response to this is represented within the quote by Russian historian Dmitri Olkogonov: “The Russian revolutionaries, including Lenin, rightly exposed the age-old evils of human existence, the exploitation, inequality, lack of freedom”. In response to his Decree on Peace, Lenin created the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk that saw the Bolsheviks lose land but ultimately solve external issues with Germany and allowed Lenin to focus all of his efforts on Russia. By acting in ways that the people had demanded from the opposing
How far does Alexander II deserve the Title “Tsar Liberator”? Prior to the reign of Alexander II, his father, Nicholas I ruled Russia under repressive and old fashioned policies. Alexander felt there was a lot of change needed to help boost the Russian economy. Russia’s economy was largely based around agriculture which was seen as backward for the time. One of Alexander’s reforms was to boom industries to start competing with the west who had more developed technology and whose economies were much more stable.
This closed all trade and depended on the country supporting itself and therefore Japan was an inward looking nation. Japan before the Meiji restoration Japan was a war run country. It was run by the strongest clans which would fight for power to control the country. However as the Tokugawa shogunate came to power the country was closed off from the rest of the world apart from the small port which was allowed for Dutch traders in Nagasaki. This was because the shogun and people feared the increasing Portuguese influence on religion and trade would bring down the Japanese hierarchical system.
Reform Some of the most fundamental changes occurred immediately after the American occupation. War crime trials were conducted in Tokyo, the Japanese military was dismantled and efforts were undertaken to transform the economy into a free market capitalist system by introducing land reform and to break up large business conglomerates in an attempt to distribute resources and allocate wealth more evenly throughout the economy. (Kumano, 2007) The most substantial change came with the creation of a new constitution in 1947. This new constitution took away political power from the emperor leaving him in office only as a figurehead. The new constitution gave more power to the parliament system, took away the right to wage war, and promoted more privileges and better rights for women.
How far do you agree that the economy of Tsarist Russia was transformed in the years to 1914? During the Tsarist rule, Russia’s economy dramatically changed both for the positive and the bad. Every Tsar wanted one thing. To modernise Russia from which they saw to be dramatically, economically behind countries across Europe. Their main of doing this was by building the trans-Siberian railway and was thought to be ‘the way forward’ for Russia.