A Short History of Colonialism

by Reinhard, Wolfgang

• ISBN13: 9780719083280
• ISBN10: 0719083281
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-09-01
• Publisher: MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS

Summary

This well-written and comprehensive book by an outstanding expert provides students of history and the general reader with reliable, up-to-date information on an essential part of the history of mankind: the global impact of European colonial expansion from the late Middle Ages to the present. It deals with the discoveries; with Portuguese, Dutch, and English trade systems in Asia; with the Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, French, and British Colonies in America; the American plantation economy and the trade in African slaves; with settler colonies in the southern hemisphere; with US, Russian, and Chinese continental imperialism; with Western colonial rule in Asia and Africa; and the several waves of decolonization between 1775 and 1989. Twenty-four maps illustrate the narrative. A useful teaching text, it combines traditional and more recent perspectives to produce a final balance sheet of Western colonialism and its global heritage. A carefully selected bibliography encourages further reading.

Author Biography

Wolfgang Reinhard is Professor Emeritus of Modern History at the University of Freiburg, Germany.

Table of Contents

Colonies and colonialism * The European Atlantic * Europeans and Asians * Portuguese ‘Crown capitalism’ * Dutch mercantile capitalism * English mercantile capitalism, its European competitors and the Asian commodity cycles * European mission, mutual perceptions of Europeans and Asians, new discoveries * The Iberian Atlantic * Spanish conquest and rule * The economy and society of Spanish America * Brazil and its gold cycle * Plantation America and the African Atlantic * Portuguese and Dutch Brazil in the sugar cycle * Sugar and new powers in the Caribbean * The African Atlantic * New Europes on the North Atlantic and the first decolonisation * New France in Canada and New Netherland on the Hudson * New England and the building of British North America * The economy and society of British North America * The first decolonisation * New Europes in the southern hemisphere and the second decolonisation * The Southern Cone: Argentina, Chile, Uruguay * South Africa * Australia * New Zealand * The second decolonisation: The British Commonwealth of Nations * Continental imperialism * The United States of America * Russia * China * Overseas imperialism in Asia * From trade to rule * British India * The Dutch East Indies * The ‘opening’ and ‘modernisation’ of China * The ‘opening’ and ‘modernisation’ of Japan * High-imperialist power rivalry in China * From free-trade imperialism to high imperialism * High-imperialist colonies in Asia and the Pacific * Imperialism in Africa * European free-trade imperialism and African expansion * The ‘Scramble for Africa’ in high imperialism: The transition to rule * The ‘Scramble for Africa’ in high imperialism: The division of the continent * Colonial rule in Africa * The colonial economy in Africa * Social change in Africa * Late imperialism and the great decolonisation * The Oriental question and the First World War * Israel: Colonisation and colonialism * Japanese imperialism and the Second World War * Decolonisation in Asia * Decolonisation in Africa * Neocolonialism and Portuguese decolonisation * Decolonisation in Russia and South Africa, blocked decolonisation in Israel, non-decolonised territories * A balance-sheet of colonialism * Bibliography * Index