Industrialization: Government Role, Economics, and Reactions

Industrialization and the Role of Government

• Perspective on Global Learning and Adaptation: Emperor Meiji, in an $1871$ letter to President Ulysses Grant, stated it was Japan’s purpose to select institutions from "enlightened nations" that best suited Japanese conditions and to adapt them through gradual reforms to achieve equality with Western powers.
• Essential Question: What economic strategies did different states and empires adopt, and what were the causes and effects of those strategies?
• Global Spread of Technology: As Western technology and domination expanded, different nations faced competing pressures between preserving traditional values and modernizing.     * Egypt: Early adopters of industrial innovations like the steam engine to increase textile productivity.     * China: A weakened central government under European ascendency was unable to effectively promote industrialization during the $19th$ century.     * The Ottoman Empire: Known as the "sick man of Europe," the empire suffered from rampant corruption and ethnic nationalism. It did not initially adopt Enlightenment ideas or Western technology, leading to decline and eventual dismantling after World War I. It was replaced by the Republic of Turkey and other independent countries.     * Japan: Distinct from China, the Japanese central government grew stronger to maintain territorial integrity. It actively sought Western innovations to become the equal of Western countries.

Ottoman Industrialization and the Rise of Muhammad Ali

• State of the Empire: In the $1800s$, the Ottoman Empire suffered from overexpansion, declining trade, weakening leadership, and palace coups. It no longer held the territory it had under Suleiman the Magnificent (who reached the gates of Vienna in $1529$).
• Conflict in Egypt: Although technically part of the empire, Egypt was ruled by the Mamluks (a military class of former Turkish slaves) for over $600$ years. In $1801$, the Sultan sent an army to retake Egypt.
• Muhammad Ali: An Albanian Ottoman officer who rose to prominence during the conflict. Local leaders selected him as the governor. The Sultan, lacking power, was forced to agree.
• Ali’s Independent Reforms:     * Military: Modeled the military on European structures.     * Education: Established schools and sent officers to France for education.     * Media: Started the first official newspaper in the Islamic world.     * Land Reform: Taxed peasants at such high rates that they were forced to give up land to the state. This allowed the government to control cotton production and agricultural exports.     * Secularization: Secularized religious lands to put more agricultural produce in government hands, capitalizing on high wheat prices in Europe during the Napoleonic wars ($1799$-$1815$).     * State-Sponsored Industrialization: Ali had textile factories built to compete with Britain and France, armament factories built in Cairo, and ship-building facilities in Alexandria for a navy. Smaller shops produced locks, cloth, and uniform parts.

Japan and the Meiji Restoration

• Rapid Transformation: Japan transitioned into a modern industrialized nation in less than half a century, the fastest change of any country.
• End of Isolation: Between $1600$ and $1854$, Japan had minimal contact with the world. Imperial powers (Great Britain, Netherlands, Russia) wanted Japanese markets and refueling stations for coal-powered ships traveling to China.
• Commodore Matthew Perry: In $1853$, Perry led a naval squad into Yedo and Tokyo Bay to ask for trade. He returned in $1854$ with more ships, demanding trade. Faced with superior warships, Japan yielded, followed by similar concessions to other states.
• The Meiji Restoration ($1868$): Reformers feared for Japanese culture after seeing China's humiliation in the Opium Wars. They overthrew the shogun and restored power to the emperor to adopt Western technology while protecting traditional culture.
• Specific Meiji Reforms:     * Feudalism: Formally abolished in $1868$ via the Charter Oath.     * Governance: Established a constitutional monarchy based on the Prussian model.     * Legal: Established equality before the law and abolished cruel punishments.     * Military: Reorganized based on the Prussian army, built a navy, and instituted conscription.     * Education: Created a new system focused on technical fields.     * Infrastructure: Built railroads and roads.     * Subsidies: Supported key industries: tea, silk, weaponry, shipbuilding, and sake (rice wine).
• Financing and Consequences: Reforms were funded by a high agricultural tax, which stimulated growth and revenue for the bureaucracy in Tokyo. However, Japan replicated Western problems, such as the abuse and exploitation of female mill workers.
• Private Investment and Zaibatsu: Once industries flourished, they were sold to family business conglomerates known as zaibatsu. Innovation was encouraged; for example, the Toyoda Loom Works (founded by a carpenter in $1906$) evolved into the Toyota Motor Company.
• Statistical Growth of Japan ($1872$-$1914$):     * Coal Production in $1875$: $600,000$ metric tons; in $1913$: $21,300,000$ metric tons.     * Steamships in $1873$: $26$; in $1913$: $1,514$.     * Railroads in $1872$: $18$ miles; in $1914$: $7,100$ miles.

Economic Developments and Innovations

• Foundational Philosophies: Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations ($1776$) argued humans are naturally transactional. This supported capitalism and private entrepreneurship.
• Laissez-faire: Mercantilism was replaced by laissez-faire ("leave alone") policies, promoting minimal government involvement and reduced tariffs.
• Transnational Institutions: As trade increased, institutions like the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) and manufacturers like Unilever emerged.
• Evolution of Business Structures:     * Corporations: Legal entities chartered by governments, owned by stockholders. Stockholders receive dividends but have limited liability; they only lose what they invested.     * Monopolies: Control of a specific business by one seller, eliminating competition. Examples include Alfred Krupp (German steel via the Bessemer process) and John D. Rockefeller (U.S. oil).     * Transnational Companies: Companies operating across national boundaries.         * Cecil Rhodes: Founder of De Beers Diamonds, attempted to build a Cape Town-to-Cairo railroad to ease governance and war-making. Native workers were paid much lower wages than Europeans.         * Unilever: A British and Dutch venture focused on household goods like soap, sourcing palm oil from British West Africa and the Belgian Congo.
• The Four Features of a Corporation:     1. Limited Liability: Investors' losses are limited to their investment amount.     2. Transferability of Shares: Voting rights/ownership can be easily transferred.     3. Juridical Personality: The corporation is a legal "person" that can sue, be sued, and hold property.     4. Indefinite Duration: The corporation's life extends beyond its original founders.

Mass Culture and Leisure

• Consumerism: Advertising targeted the middle class who had disposable income.
• Leisure Activities: Biking (transitioning from the dangerous penny-farthing to the chain-driven safety bicycle in the $1880s$) and boating became popular.
• Athletics: Companies encouraged sports to foster virtues like self-discipline. Soccer (football) was popular in Europe, while baseball dominated the United States.
• Class Divisions in Sport: Tennis and golf were for the upper classes in England; certain types of rugby were for the lower classes.
• Public Culture: Music halls and public parks were built to mingle classes, with the hope that the lower classes would emulate the "civilized" behavior of the upper classes.

Reactions to the Industrial Economy

• Labor Reform Movements: Activists like "Mother" Jones and the Sadler Report ($1833$) exposed the harsh, unsanitary, and dangerous conditions of factories and mines.
• Labor Unions: Workers organized to bargain for contracts. Historically treated as enemies of trade in Great Britain, they later won minimum wage laws, limited hours, overtime pay, and the five-day work week.
• Expanding the Franchise: British reform bills in $1832$, $1867$, and $1884$ reduced property requirements for voting. Men achieved universal suffrage in $1918$; women in $1928$.
• Child Labor Laws: In $1843$, children under $10$ were banned from coal mines. In $1881$, education became mandatory for children ages $5$ to $10$.
• Intellectual Shifts:     * John Stuart Mill and Utilitarianism: Championed "the greatest good for the greatest number." He advocated for labor unions, child labor limits, and factory safety as a moderate alternative to replacing capitalism.     * Karl Marx and Scientific Socialism: Along with Friedrich Engels, published the Communist Manifesto ($1848$). Marx argued capitalism divided society into the Proletariat (working class) and the Bourgeoisie (middle class/investors who owned the means of production). He predicted socialism would replace capitalism, eventually leading to communism and the end of class distinctions.

State-Led Reform and Resistance: Ottomans and China

• Ottoman Reforms (Mahmud II): Ruled $1808$-$1839$. He abolished the Janissaries in $1826$, secularized tax collection, built roads, and established a postal service and European-style ministries.
• Tanzimat ($1839$-$1876$):     * Rooted out corruption.     * Created secular primary, secondary, and specialized colleges (military, engineering, etc.).     * Codified Ottoman laws (Commercial Code $1850$; Penal Code $1858$).     * Hatt-i Humayun ($1856$): Declared equality for all men in education and justice regardless of religion/ethnicity. This regulated the millets (religious courts), causing protest from both Christians (fearing lost autonomy) and Muslims (viewing it as a conflict with tradition).
• Ottoman Women: Industrialization and secular legal reforms often marginalized women. Under Shariah, women had property and inheritance rights; secular Tanzimat courts initially ended many of these indirect controls. The reforms of $1839$ did not mention women.
• Abdulhamid (The Red Sultan): Initially supported reform but became conservative and fearful of "seditious" talk. He exiled the "Young Turks" and oversaw the Hamidian massacres ($1894$-$1896$), where between $100,000$ and $250,000$ Armenians were killed.
• Chinese Reforms:     * Self-Strengthening Movement: Focused on military technology and training artisans with help from French and British advisors.     * Hundred Days of Reform: Led by Kang Youwei and Emperor Guangxu after the Sino-Japanese War ($1894$-$1895$). Aimed to abolish the civil service exam and establish Western-style systems.     * Empress Dowager Cixi: A conservative who imprisoned the emperor in a coup, repealed reforms, and blocked railroads/telegraphs. She eventually abolished the $2,500$-year-old civil service system due to corruption, but too late to save the Qing Dynasty.     * Republic: China became a republic in $1911$. Territorial integrity was partially aided by the U.S. Treaty of Portsmouth ($1905$), negotiated by Theodore Roosevelt to limit Japanese encroachment.

Resistance to Reform in Japan

• Abolition of the Samurai: In $1871$, the government gave samurai a final lump-sum payment and dissolved their position. They were forbidden from carrying swords, and the bushido code became a private matter.
• Genros: Some samurai became elder statesmen; others from Satsuma and Choshu provinces resisted. The last battle between samurai forces and the emperor occurred in the $1870s$.
• Fluctuating Liberalization: While Japan achieved high literacy and initially grew toward democracy (labor unions, free press), by the $1920s$, army officers began to dominate the government once again.