Land Based Empires

Empires

• Ottoman Empire
• Qing China
• Russia
• Japan
• All maintained formal independence

Commonalities

• military confrontations with West
• Western powers forced concessions
• Internal vulerabilities
• Attempted reforms

Ottoman Empire

• Already in decline; still land in M.E., N.A., E.E.
• Absolutist
• Conservatism
• Provincial governors
• Egypt, Algeria, Europeans

Military Weakness

• Janissaries
• Slow to adapt new military technology

Ottoman Threats

• Russia
• Greek/Serbian Nationalism
• Christian Europe vs Muslim Middle East
• Egyptian Nationalism
• Crimean War

Egypt

• Muhammad Ali
• military reform/industrialization
• Suez Canal- foreign investment
• Autonomy
• British occupied in 1882

Crimean War

• Russian expansion
• France/Britain help Ottomans
• New war
• End of Janissaries
• Ottomans- weak

Reform

• Education
• Government ministries
• Tanzimat= reorganization
• Criticism from both sides
• Coup 1876- Abd al-Hamid II

Reaction

• Constitutional monarchy --> autocracy
• The Young Turks
• Sick Man of Europe

Qing China

• Started strong, but corruption/cheating
• Floods, food shortages, banditry
• Losing Mandate of Heaven?

Macartney Mission

• Huge trade deficit
• Canton System
• Ethnocentrism- both

Opium Wars

• British East India Company
• "violation of free trade"
• Huge military technology gap

Unequal treaties

• Treaty of Nanking
• opened 5 ports
• Hong Kong
• Extraterritoriality
• reparations; spheres of influence

Taiping Rebellion

• Hong Xiuquan
• Drive out emperor
• took southeastern China- Nanjing
• 20-30 million dead
• Gov + gentry + Europeans

Self-Strengthening

• modernize from within
• help from Europeans
• Cixi
• Sino-Japanese War
• Boxer Rebellion

Russia

• Peter the Great
• Catherine the Great
• Conservatism
• Decemberist Revolt
• Crimean War as wake up call

Reform

• Alexander II
• serfs emancipated- no rights; had to pay
• Trans-Siberian Railroad
• instability- revolution to come...

End of Tokugawa

• Decentralized
• urban/commercial growth
• Samurai

Matthew Perry

• Black Ships
• Letter from President Fillmore
• Treaty of Kanagawa
• Civil War

Meiji Restoration

• Daimyo
• "enlightened rule"
• oligarchs
• cult of the emperor
• Goals

Revolutionary policies

• Education
• Military Organization
• Political Policies and structures
• Industrialization

Foreign Success

• Taiwan
• Korea
• Unequal Treaties
• Russo-Japanese War