IMPERIALISM AND
COLONIALISM
Imperialism is a policy of a nation to extend its control outside its own boundaries, by acquisition of colonies or dependencies or by jurisdiction over other races.
During the 17th and 18th centuries the policy of mercantilism became popular, which accentuated the importance of competition, for overseas trade and colonies.
The process of colonisation of Asia began towards the close of the 15th century, when Vasco da Gama discovered the sea route to India.
The weakness of the Chinese Empire became apparent during the first Opium war of 1840-42. At that time England occupied Hong Kong. In 1857-58, England and France forced China to subscribe to the Treaty of Tientsin according to which China had to give special facilities to Britain, France, Russia and America.
Taking advantage of the Chinese weakness, France took Cochin China under its protection, occupied Annam and Tonkin in 1882 and formed the protectorate of Indo-China.
In Central Asia, Russia and Britain tried to increase their influence. While the Northern part of Persia was to be controlled by Russia, the Southern part was opened for the British.
The motives of imperialism and empire building were selfish and the people in the colonies were frequently exploited for the benefit of the mother country.
Capitalism
Capitalism is a social system based on the principle of individual rights. Politically, it is the system of laissez-faire(freedom).
Following the demise of feudalism, capitalism became the dominant economic system in the Western world.
A remarkable confluence of advances in agriculture, cotton spinning and weaving iron manufacture and machine tool design and the harnessing of mechanical power began to alter the character of capitalism profoundly in the last years of the 18th century and the first decades of the 19th century.
The form of capitalism differs between nations, because the practice of it is embedded within cultures. Markets cater to national culture as much as national culture mutates to conform to the discipline of profit and loss.
The Great Depression of the 1930 brought the policy of laissez-faire (non-interference by the state in economic matters) to an end in most countries and for a time cast doubt on the capitalist system as a whole.
The performance of capitalism since World War Ii in the United States, the United Kingdom, West Germany and Japan however, has given evidence of its continued vitality.
Communism
Communism is the political and economic doctrine that aims to replace private property and a profit-based economy with public ownership, at least the major means of production. (e.g. mines, mills, factories) and the natural resources of a society.
Marx and Engels maintained that the poverty, disease and early death that afflicted the proletariat were endemic to capitalism. These problems could be resolved only by replacing capitalism with communism.
Under communism the major means of industrial production such as mines, mills, factories and railroads would be publicly owned and operated for the benefit of all.
Today, Mao’s version of Marxism-Leninism remains an active, but ambiguous force elsewhere in Asia, most notably in Nepal.
After a decade of armed struggle, Maoist insurgents in Nepal agreed in 2006 to lay down their arms and participated in national elections to choose an assembly to rewrite the Nepalese Constitution.
Socialism
Socialism as a political philosophy is the social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources.
The origins of socialism as a political movement lie in the Industrial revolution.
According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation, but live in cooperation with one another.
Everything that people produce is in some sense a social product and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it.
World War II forged an uneasy alliance between communities and socialists and between liberals and conservatives in their common struggle against fascism.
The terms such as African socialism and Arab socialism were frequently invoked in the 1950s and 60s, partly because the old colonial powers were identified with capitalist imperialism.
Nazism and Fascism
Adolf Hitler made his first appearance in the German political scene in 1923. Hitler’s Nazi Party conducted its activities with military fanfares. By November 1923, Hitler was in total control of Nazi Party.
Hitler followed a three fold plan to consolidate the Nazis in power. It involved capturing the legal authority to rule, crashing the country’s political opposition and eliminating rivals within his party.
Hitler infused the German people with the ideas of racism, which convinced them that they were superior people with the right to rule over inferior people.
Fascism was a political ideology antithetical to democracy, parliamentarism, individual liberty, freedom of expression and state control over businesses.
Mussolini organised the fasci di combattimento (Band of Combatants) in Milan in 1919, providing the basis for the rise of fascism.
Mussolini won popularity among the ordinary masses of Italians by starting huge public projects.
Fascism contributed significantly to the unstable security environment of Europe, which took the world towards World War II.
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