Synopses & Reviews
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.
Synopsis
Excellent, accessible textbook for courses in general and comparative colonial history. Includes not only overseas empires but also continental colonial expansion (USA, Latin America, South Africa, Australia and Russia). Most recent comprehensive book in the field.
About the Author
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