EUROPE AND AMERICA

Forces for Change, 1890-1914

Major Forces for Change

• More education for more people

• Industry overtakes agriculture

• Industrial growth – prosperity and labor

• Shortened distances and faster communications

• Growth of “scientific knowledge”

• European empires

UNITED STATES

• Resources of most of a continent

• Large and growing industry

• Peaceful neighbors (Canada and Mexico)

• Protected by oceans from other powers

• A tradition of neutrality in relation to the nations of Europe

Europe was divided by many nations, ethnicities and ideas.

Europe in 1914

The Great Powers

• Britain – largest empire and navy• Germany -- recently unified (1871) and ambitious

for colonies and navy• France – Only republic, an issue with Germany

(war in 1870)• Austria – Old empire, much divided by ethnic

differences, worried about SE Europe • Russia – Fastest growing in industry and

population, major internal problems

Alliances

• Germany is allied with Austria and Italy in the “Triple Alliance” to check Russia and France

• France and Russia allied in the Entente to check Germany

• Britain is not allied, but is worried about Germany’s growing navy and trade with rest of world

TRADITIONAL LEADERSHIPS

Queen Victoria, Britain, 1837-1901, by 1900 was the grandmother of many European monarchs.

Victoria

George V, King of Britain in 1914 (right)

Nicholas II, Tsar of Russia, in 1914 (left)

George and Nick

Wilhelm (William) II, the Kaiser of Germany, ca. 1910 – first cousin to both Nicholas II and George V

Wilhelm

The Aristocracy controlled much of the wealth, more of the power, in Europe

Aristocracy

Mass education – expanded opportunity for more people

Mass education

Women particularly benefited from larger school expenditures – literacy of woman more than quadrupled from 1860-1900 in Europe, tripled in U.S.

Women and education

Schools were important for teaching Nationalism – France, rather than Loraine, etc.

Nationalism

Industrial growth meant greater production but also major changes in society

Industry

A rising middle class reflected the growth of a nation’s economy

Middle Class

Middle class – clerks, businessmen, sales force – more leisure time

Painting by Seurat

Consumer Goods

What only the wealthy once enjoyed, middle class now had

Peasants – Van Gogh

Factory values exceeded agricultural wealth in many countries

Labor force

Industrial labor force – major change in societies that had been largely rural

Labor forces (such as this 1870s shoe factory) contained adults and children – poor families resisted the enforcement of child labor laws

Child labor

Photography documented the hard lives of many workers

Photography

Riis

German immigrant Jacob Riis – photos of poverty in New York

Riis photos ran in newspapers and in his book, prompting new efforts at “social justice Social justice

Poverty

There was still considerable poverty, and beggars were common sights on the streets of major cities and towns.

Socialism

In 1891, Leo XIII, a conservative, issued the Rerum Novarum – a call for “just wages” and the recognition of trade unions. Laborers called him the “Workers’ Pope.”

Marxism

Marxism called for the violent overthrow of wealth and capitalism and the establishment of a “workers’ state.”

Socialism

Various forms of “gradual socialism” were proposed in place of Marxism – creating a better society through political parties, voting and government regulation of the state and the economy

Marxists and socialists generally opposed war, arguing that military costs prevented the improvement of the economy.

British battleship, HMS Dreadnought

Military Costs

Mass Communications

Politics was now influenced by mass communications; newspapers could alter public opinion and government policies.

Spanish-American War

The war in Cuba made a national hero (and eventually president) of Theodore Roosevelt

TR

Trains

Modern armies could be speedily deployed by trains and directed by telegraph

Colonies –modern technology enabled

European nations to control colonies around the world

U.S. had “territories rather than colonies

Absolute faith in modern technology was seriously shaken in 1912.

Titanic

In 1904, tensions between Russia and Japan (over China) led to war.

Russo-Japanese war

Russian defeat

Russia’s defeat in the war shocked the entire world

“Modernity”Old ideas:

Authority derived from faith or ancient wisdomBehavior a matter of good and evilThe universe was a matter of mechanics – “laws of motion”

New ideas:

Old wisdom is now questioned, frequently discardedBehavior is a matter of “hidden, biological impulses” The universe is much more complex and “chance” plays a a large part in it – Does God play dice with the universe?

Since the 1860s, Darwin’s theories of evolution had frightened the traditional basis of western religion.

Darwin

The research of Freud questioned the traditional “good-evil” basis of behavior

Freud

Laws of physical

dynamics

Bohr’s concept of the atom, Einstein’s theory of relativity, and the idea of “quantum mechanics” made understanding the universe difficult

SUMMARY

• The major nations of Europe are ‘modern” but the pace of change has created much tension

• Rivalries among powers are intense• Social differences within nations are often

intensified by ethnic differences• Alliances exist that could trigger a

widespread war

The Spark