THE WORLD ATLAS

Chapter · Age of Imperialism

Dawn of a New Century

The world in 1900

In 1900 European empires are at their height and almost the whole of Africa has been divided among them in just twenty years. Britain still leads, but it is bogged down in a costly war against the Boer republics in South Africa, and rivals are rising fast.

Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm II is building a great navy, the United States has become a world power by seizing Spain's colonies, and Japan has defeated China and is eyeing Korea. In China, the anti-foreign Boxer uprising besieged the foreign legations in Beijing until an eight-nation army stormed the city in August. Paris celebrates the new century with a giant world's fair showing off electricity, moving pictures and the Metro. Industrial cities are booming, and millions of Europeans are emigrating to the Americas, while colonised peoples from Aceh to the Philippines resist foreign rule. Queen Victoria, now 81, is nearing the end of a reign of 63 years.

Open the map in 1900

The great powers

Region by region

Southern Africa

The Second Boer War (1899-1902) is raging: British forces under Lord Roberts captured the Boer capitals Bloemfontein and Pretoria in 1900 and annexed the Orange Free State and Transvaal, but Boer commandos fight on as guerrillas. Rhodesia is run by Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company, the Congo Free State is the private property of King Leopold II and notorious for forced rubber labour, and Germany holds German South-West Africa and German East Africa. Portugal rules Angola and Mozambique, and France has made Madagascar a colony, exiling its last queen, Ranavalona III.

Northern Africa

The 'Scramble for Africa' is almost complete: France holds Algeria, Tunisia and a vast French West Africa, where it killed the warlord Rabih at Kousseri in April 1900, and Britain rules Egypt through Lord Cromer under Khedive Abbas II. The Sudan became an Anglo-Egyptian condominium after the British victory at Omdurman (1898), and Britain proclaimed a protectorate over Northern Nigeria in 1900. Only Ethiopia, whose Emperor Menelik II crushed Italy at Adwa in 1896, Liberia and Morocco under the young Sultan Abdelaziz remain independent. Italy holds Eritrea and part of Somalia, and the Ottomans still hold Libya.

Europe

Europe is divided into two camps: the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy, and the Franco-Russian alliance, with Britain standing apart. Kaiser Wilhelm II passed a Second Naval Law in 1900 to challenge British sea power, Emperor Franz Joseph rules a restless multinational Austria-Hungary, and Tsar Nicholas II rules an autocratic Russia that is industrialising fast. In Italy King Umberto I was assassinated in July 1900 and succeeded by Victor Emmanuel III. France, under President Emile Loubet, hosts the Paris Exposition, and Sweden and Norway share King Oscar II.

Middle East & South Asia

Sultan Abdul Hamid II rules the Ottoman Empire autocratically and began the Hejaz Railway in 1900 to link Damascus with Mecca. Persia is ruled by Mozaffar ad-Din Shah Qajar, Afghanistan by Abdur Rahman Khan, and Kuwait has accepted British protection (1899), while the exiled young Ibn Saud prepares to retake Riyadh from the Rashidis. In India, Viceroy Lord Curzon governs the British Raj for Queen Victoria; a devastating famine in 1899-1900 kills an estimated 1 to 4.5 million people, and the Indian National Congress is calling for more self-government.

Northern & Central Asia

All of Central Asia's steppe and oases are under Russian control: Russian Turkestan is ruled from Tashkent, while the emir of Bukhara and the khan of Khiva are Russian vassals. The Trans-Caspian and Trans-Siberian railways are bringing Russian settlers, soldiers and cotton merchants, and during the Boxer crisis of 1900 Russian troops occupied Manchuria. Siberia is being settled by Russian peasants along the new railway line.

East Asia

The Boxer Rebellion swept northern China in 1900; after the siege of the Beijing legations, an Eight-Nation Alliance captured the capital in August, and Empress Dowager Cixi fled to Xi'an with the Guangxu Emperor. Foreign powers hold leased ports: Germany at Qingdao, Russia at Port Arthur, Britain at Weihaiwei and Hong Kong's New Territories, and France at Guangzhouwan. Meiji Japan, victorious over China in 1895, has taken Taiwan, while Korea, renamed the Korean Empire under Emperor Gojong, is contested between Japan and Russia. Tibet is governed by the 13th Dalai Lama.

Southeast Asia

The United States is fighting a bitter war against Filipino nationalists led by Emilio Aguinaldo after taking the Philippines from Spain in 1898. France rules French Indochina (Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos) under Governor-General Paul Doumer, and Britain rules Burma as part of India and the Federated Malay States. The Dutch are still fighting in Aceh as they tighten control over the East Indies. Siam, under King Chulalongkorn, survives as an independent buffer between British and French territory.

Northern North America

Canada, led by its first French-Canadian prime minister, Wilfrid Laurier, is booming, with wheat farmers settling the Prairies and the Klondike gold rush having created the Yukon Territory (1898). Canadian volunteers are fighting for Britain in South Africa. Alaska, a US possession, is in the grip of the Nome gold rush, Newfoundland remains a separate British colony, and Denmark rules Greenland.

Southern North America

The United States, under President William McKinley, re-elected in November 1900 with Theodore Roosevelt as vice-president, has become an imperial power, taking Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines from Spain and annexing Hawaii. Cuba is under US military occupation until 1902. Mexico has been ruled for over two decades by the dictator Porfirio Diaz, who welcomes foreign investment in railways and mines while most Mexicans remain poor landless peasants.

Northern South America

Brazil has been a republic since Emperor Pedro II was overthrown in 1889 and is now governed by President Campos Sales; its Amazon rubber boom is at its peak. Colombia, which still includes Panama, is torn apart by the Thousand Days' War (1899-1902). Cipriano Castro has seized power in Venezuela, Eloy Alfaro leads a Liberal revolution in Ecuador, and Bolivia, having lost its coast to Chile, now governs from La Paz. Britain, the Netherlands and France hold the Guianas.

Southern Cone

Argentina, under President Julio Argentino Roca in his second term, is one of the world's richest countries thanks to beef and wheat exports and is absorbing millions of European immigrants. Chile, enriched by nitrate from the lands it won in the War of the Pacific, is governed by President Federico Errazuriz Echaurren, and its Andean border with Argentina is under British arbitration. Uruguay and Paraguay are smaller agrarian republics recovering from civil strife.

Australasia & Oceania

Australia's six colonies have agreed to federate, and in July 1900 the British Parliament passed the act creating the Commonwealth of Australia, to begin on 1 January 1901. New Zealand, led by Premier Richard Seddon, is a pioneering democracy that gave women the vote in 1893. Hawaii has become a US territory, Samoa was split between Germany and the United States in 1899, and New Guinea is divided among the Dutch, Germans and British.

Events

  1. Berlin Conference sets rules for the European partition of Africa
  2. Japan defeats China and takes Taiwan
  3. Ethiopia defeats Italy at the Battle of Adwa
  4. Spanish-American War: the US occupies Cuba and takes Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines
  5. Second Boer War begins in South Africa
  6. Boxer Rebellion; foreign troops capture Beijing
  7. Paris Exposition Universelle and the second modern Olympic Games
  8. Commonwealth of Australia founded; Queen Victoria dies

Moments of this period

More chapters

Sources