The Building of European Supremacy

International Baccalaureate History

Koushik Kasanagottu

Block 1A

AP European History

Chapter 24 – The Building of European Supremacy

Population Trends and Migration

European population increased exponentially during this time period.
Prolelarianization of work force and increased labor force was the chief aspects of this era.
Europe was busting with action.
Europeans were moving at a rapid rate and there was a boom in migration to other lands and across seas.
European colonies and separate countries over the seas were benefiting from this population changes in Europe.
Europe was once again a major influence over the world.

The Second Industrial Revolution

Europe was beginning to form into a superpower continent with Germany rising in power.
Germany has become a bigger power than Britain in military strength.

New Industries

Economic growth was spurred by the development of the railroads.
The second industrial revolution is associated with steel, chemicals, electricity, and oil while the first industrial revolution is associated with textiles, steam, and iron.
Henry Bessemer was a British engineer discovered a new way to process steel.
This increased steel production in European major powers.
The chemical industry also boomed through several new processes that made chemical production much easier.
The solway process replaced the alkali process.
Electricity was probably the most innovative and significant change during this time period.
The application of electricity to everyday appliances made things easy for normal people.
Electricity was easily transported and people could harness its power anywhere they like.
Gottlieb Daimler invented the first automobile engine using a internal combustion engine.
This time period can be considered the time of new inventions and ideologies.

Economic Difficulties

The economy was not booming completely because the agriculture was at a stand back.
It was beginning to be a huge economic drag.
Unemployment was still widely approved around Europe; in fact, the term was coined during this time period.
Consumer goods soon started to develop in Europe and brought them out of economic stagnation.
Soon, service jobs were created and the decreasing prices for food let them spend money on consumer goods and services.

The Middle Classes in Ascendancy

Before the WWI, the middle class were able to make some changes.

Social Distinctions within the Middle Cass

The middle class grew in power over the aristocracy and some were even appointed as the House of Lords.
Only a few people got this aristocratic prestige but most of the middle class had improved lives like professional jobs, elegant homes and extravagant furniture.
“White collar workers” or petite Bourgeoisie were lower middle class people that aspired to be middle class in class and prestige.
Social tensions and class struggles were ...

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The Middle Classes in Ascendancy

Before the WWI, the middle class were able to make some changes.

Social Distinctions within the Middle Cass

The middle class grew in power over the aristocracy and some were even appointed as the House of Lords.
Only a few people got this aristocratic prestige but most of the middle class had improved lives like professional jobs, elegant homes and extravagant furniture.
“White collar workers” or petite Bourgeoisie were lower middle class people that aspired to be middle class in class and prestige.
Social tensions and class struggles were some of the problems before World War I.

Late-Nineteenth-century Urban life

Urbanization resulted in ethnic and economic problems for many people including immigrants

The Redesign of cities

Cities were changed from being areas of places where people worked and lived to areas of leisure and work.
Few people lived in the cities and moved to the suburbs.
The biggest and famous of these transformations was Paris.
Georges Haussmann was the leader of Paris redesigning.
Paris had been the place of revolutions and destructions for nearly a decade but the plan made it into an economy and industrial center.
Napoleon III’s plan to redesign Paris was not only in economical interests but also political.
A tram, subway and easier transportation were built in cities around Europe.
Moreover, suburbs were invented during this time where city dwellers were looking for places to live in now that the city was transformed into a work area.
Railroads, subways and trams made it easier for people living the suburbs to be transported to the cities.

Urban Sanitation

1830s and 1840s – Big Cholera Epidemics
Cholera epidemics raised concern for health in the cities.
Health was taken to be a big concern for middle class reformers because they were in a good position now.
Cleanliness was the solution for better city health.
New water and sewer systems were created.
The biggest part in Haussmann’s plan was o create a new sewer system.
Health was used as an excuse by the government to involve them in public life.
Soon, officials could enter public homes in terms of poor health and detain lands for a sewer system.
The bacterial theory presented by health scientists including Louis Pasteur further increased the health tensions.

Housing reform and Middle-Class values.

Middle class reformers saw the poor as a health hazard.
They said that the poor should be given better housing instead of a disease infested house for 10.
A.V. Huber was a German housing reformer that suggested better housing for poor to increase health standards for people in all classes.
Jules Simon of France believed that better housing would provide for better health and increased patriotic feelings.
By the end of the 19th century and early 20th century, housing was very cheap and healthy for everyone in any class.

Varieties of Late-Nineteenth century Women’s Experiences

Social Disabilities confronted by all women

By the middle of 19th century, women experienced social and legal disabilities in property rights, family laws and education.
Women started to earn little freedom about owning property by the end of the 19th century.
Women could now own land under their own rights, not their husbands.
Moreover, women were subjugated under family laws.
Women could not get a divorce unless she could prove her husband of committing adultery and other serious crimes while the husband just has to prove his wife of committing adultery.
Also, husbands had total control over the children and some countries even let them force their daughters in marrying someone.
Women were even at a disadvantage when appealing for rape.
Last but not least, education was a big barrier for women.
Women were not allowed to learn in a good school because they were usually reserved for men.
By the end of 19th century, women were allowed into some colleges and universities and could earn a degree equal to that of a man.
Men were now starting to experience the competition of women even though women were still being subjugated in some areas.

New Employment Patterns For Women

Women now have many more jobs available through new innovations like the telephone.
Women can now work as phone operators, teachers, or shop assistants.
However good these new advancements for women were, women were still being paid low wages.
Due to the new innovations, women did not have to work after marriage because their husbands were living longer and they had more money for the family than they need.
This resulted in fewer women in the workforce.

Working-Class Women

The textile and garment industries were less dominant than they used to be but they still continue to employ women.
Putting-out is the start of the creations of department stores to sell things instead of in factories.
Women workforce was beginning to diminish as their need in the textile industry was halted.
Women soon became stay at home moms.
Moreover, women had a stigma of being casual workers throughout Europe.

Poverty and Prostitution

Women who were not a wife or daughter that couldn’t find a job were usually in poverty or a prostitute because they had no source of income for them.
Women became prostitutes to gain some sort of income.

Women of the Middle Class

Women were also trying to gain middle class status.
Women were branded as domestic people so they could not grow to a middle-class status.
Women began to do religious and charitable activities and talking care of children.
Charity was a good job for women who had the time and money that they could use to avoid boredom.
Family was very important for middle-class families because it was their center of life.

The rise of political feminism

Females did not have strong liberal values even though liberals supported women rights.
John Stuart Mill wrote a book with his wife Harriet Taylor questioning the logic of liberal freedom to the position of women.
Feminists – Catholic conservatives
Feminists had many obstacles including female’s alleged “unable to work like a man.”
Millicent Fawcett is a British feminist that led to Britain’s suffrage movement.
Fawcett attacked feminist laws in the parliament to get justice.

Jewish Emancipation

Differing Degrees of Citizenship

Jews experienced discrimination but the end of 19th century made some drastic changes to give them equality.
However, in some countries like Russia, Jews were still treated with extreme persecution.

Broadened Opportunities

Revolutions of 1848 improved the lives of Jews everywhere
Jews now had equal rights
This peaceful time began to erode when anti-Semitists started growing again and organizing Zionism.

Labor, Socialism, and Politics to WWI

Workers start to end any injustice by using trade unions, democratic political parties and socialism.

Trade Unionism

Unions come into effect because government gave legal protections to the labor force and new freedoms.
Trade unions achieved many reforms to help their class status.

Democracy and Political Parties

Political parties formed to enforce the policies of democracy.
A political party began to represent the people and use their suggestions to make amends to the country.

Karl Marx and The First International

The first international was a trade union founded by the British and French trade unionists.
Marx commented that The First International and the Paris Commune were the Proletariat’s uprising.
Marx’s ideas and reactions to these two events led to the build up of World War I.

Great Britain: Fabianism and Early Welfare Programs

Fabian society - Britain’s most influential socialist group.
Its leading members were the Webbs, H.G. Wells and Graham Wallas.
They were very strong about democracy and tried to follow its principles.
British government reacted to the ideas of the Fabian through a series of unsuccessful reforms.

France: “Opportunism” rejected

Jean Jaurès and Jules Guesde led two major factions of French socialists.
Socialism was gaining power in France

Germany: Social Democrats and Revisionism

Germany had SDP, German Social Democratic Party.
SDP was led by Ferdinand LaSalle, and later Wilhelm Liebknecht and August Bebel.
Bismarck dissolved the SDP through his persecution of socialist beliefs.

Russia: Industrial development and the Birth of Bolshevism

Russia had many unsatisfied citizens like the Kulaks, peasant farmers.
Zemstovs - Local councils that controlled small parts of the mir, village, government
Lenin was a deep Marxist who joined the Russian Social Democrats.
Their policies were very different from Marxism but they considered themselves Marxist.
Lenin soon created a Political party called the Bolsheviks, majority, and their rivals; Mensheviks, minority.
Lenin’s two principles – and elite party and a dual social revolution led future Bolsheviks.
Later, Nicholas II took role as leader and assumed a very conservative role.
He dissolved trade unions and destroyed all the trade freedoms.
Bloody Sunday is the beginning of labor revolutions asking for better work conditions.
Soviets – Worker groups that controlled the cities.
The Duma was created by Nicholas II as an act of compromise for the revolutionaries.

The Building of European Supremacy

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