The New Power Balance, 1850-1900

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CHAPTER 28 The New Power Balance, 1850–1900 CHAPTER OUTLINE I. New Technologies and the World Economy A. Railroads 1. By 1850 the first railroads had proved so successful that every industrializing country began to build railroad lines. Railroad building in Britain, France, Germany, Canada, Russia, Japan, and especially in the United States fueled a tremendous expansion in the world’s rail networks from 1850 to 1900. 2. In the non-industrialized world, railroads were also built wherever they would be of value to business or to government. 3. Railroads consumed huge amounts of land and timber for ties and bridges. Throughout the world, railroads opened new land to agriculture, mining, and other human exploitation of natural resources. B. Steamships and Telegraph Cables 1. In the mid-nineteenth century a number of technological developments in shipbuilding made it possible to increase the average size and speed of…show more content…
International relations revolved around a united Germany, which, under Bismarck’s leadership, isolated France and forged a loose coalition with Austria-Hungary and Russia. At home, Bismarck used mass politics and social legislation to gain popular support and to develop a strong sense of national unity and pride amongst the German people. 2. Wilhelm II (r. 1888–1918) dismissed Bismarck and initiated a German foreign policy that placed emphasis on the acquisition of colonies. B. The Liberal Powers: France and Great Britain 1. France was now a second-rate power in Europe, its population and army being smaller than those of Germany, and its rate of industrial growth lower than that of the Germans. French society seemed divided between monarchist Catholics and republicans with anticlerical views; in fact, popular participation in politics, a strong sense of nationhood, and a system of universal education gave the French people a deeper cohesion than appeared on the
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