imperialism

(noun)

The policy of forcefully extending a nation's authority by territorial gain or by the establishment of economic and political dominance over other nations. Some characterize American foreign policy as imperialism, while others argue that it is more aptly described as "hegemony" or "spreading democracy. "

Related Terms

Examples of imperialism in the following topics:

  • American Imperialism

    • American imperialism is a term that refers to the economic, military, and cultural influence of the United States internationally.
    • 'American imperialism' is a term that refers to the economic, military, and cultural influence of the United States on other countries.
    • The combination of these attitudes and other factors led the United States toward imperialism.
    • Meinig argues that the imperial behavior of the United States dates back to at least the Louisiana Purchase.
    • The League also argued that the Spanish-American War was a war of imperialism camouflaged as a war of liberation.

  • The Debate over American Imperialism

    • Some of these are explained, or used as examples for the various perceived forms of American imperialism .
    • Journalist Ashley Smith divides theories of the U.S. imperialism into five broad categories: (1) "Liberal" theories, (2) "social-democratic" theories, (3) "Leninist" theories, (4) theories of "super-imperialism," and (5) "Hardt-and-Negri-ite" theories.
    • Navy during the late nineteenth century, supported the notion of American imperialism in his 1890 book titled The Influence of Sea Power upon History.
    • Mahan's argument provides a context that also justifies imperialism by industrial nations such as the United States .
    • The League also argued that the Spanish-American War was a war of imperialism camouflaged as a war of liberation.

  • The Habit of Self-Government

    • In a self-governing colony such as Plymouth, elected rulers make most decisions without referring to the imperial power that nominally controls the colony.
    • A self-governing colony is a colony in which elected rulers are able to make most decisions without referring to the imperial power (such as England), with nominal control of the colony.
    • Colonies have sometimes been referred to as self-governing in situations where the executive has not been under the control of the imperial government; the term self-governing can refer to the direct rule of a Crown Colony by an executive governor elected under a limited franchise.

  • Empires in Conflict

    • Conflict among European imperial powers in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries led to violence in the North American colonies.
    • As various European imperial powers settled on the new continent of North America, their conflicts became transatlantic.
    • Describe how conflicts among European imperial powers shaped the North American colonies

  • Classical Liberalism

    • Additionally, classical liberals believed that unfettered commerce with other nations would eventually eliminate war and imperial conflicts.
    • Through peaceful, harmonious trade relationships, established by private merchants and companies without government interference, mutual national interest and prosperity would derive from commercial exchange rather than imperial territorial acquisition (which liberals saw as the root of all wars).

  • Conclusion: The Consequences of the British Parliamentary Acts

    • An increasing tide of unrest rose in the British American colonies from 1763-1774 as the British government imposed a series of imperial reform measures.
    • Over time, imperial reforms pushed many colonists toward separation from the British Empire.
    • Greater enforcement of imperial trade laws were put into place, and Parliament sought to raise revenue to pay off the crippling debt from the war and the cost of a standing army in America by implementing new taxes on the colonies.
    • While the architects of the Stamp Act saw the measure as a way to defray the costs of the British Empire, it nonetheless gave rise to the first major colonial protest against British imperial control as expressed in the famous slogan “no taxation without representation.”

  • Blue Water Imperialism

    • The dominant 17th and 18th-century British ideology of blue water imperialism was founded on the values of commerce and freedom—for some.
    • Therefore, blue water imperial ideology was not necessarily expansionist in terms of acquiring a territorial empire; rather, it aimed for an institutional framework of commercial, international trade in the Atlantic, which they believed would function as a mechanism for extending British imperial influence to the colonies.
    • British liberals considered this framework of blue water empire to be anti-despotic: the government sought trade markets abroad in order to extend imperial influence commercially, without arbitrary territorial expansion.

  • European Wars in the Colonies

    • As various European imperial powers settled on the new continent of North America, their conflicts became transatlantic.
    • The final imperial war, the French and Indian War (1754–1763), known as the Seven Years’ War in Europe, proved to be the decisive contest between Britain and France in America.
    • The war led Great Britain deeply into debt, and in the 1760s and 1770s, efforts to deal with the debt through imperial reforms would have the unintended consequence of causing stress and strain that threatened to tear the Empire apart.

  • Social Classes in the Colonies

    • However the growing strength of republicanism created a political ethos that resisted imperial taxation without local consent.

  • Portugal and West Africa

    • Before Portugal set its gaze on the New World, Africa was the site of commercial and imperial aspirations.