7.1 Shifting Power After 1900

• By the end of the 20th century, a new global order was established. One of these beginning global conflicts was The Russian Revolution. The Russian Revolution began because other countries surpassed Russia in wealth and power. Russia had a sluggish government and economy. Those in power in Russia refused to work in infrastructure, extend voting rights, and allow education to the masses of people. The people responded in protest against these injustices. During this protest, the Russian government shot the protesters in the Sunday Massacre of 1905. After this, Russia got into the Crimean War with the Ottomans. Russia lost in 1856. In 1905 they lost to the Japanese in the Russo-Japanese War. These all led to a group called the Bolsheviks being created. The Bolsheviks were a group that represented the oppressed working class in Russia. The Bolsheviks took over the government with their leader Vladimir Lenin. They used this overthrow of power to establish a communist government. They stole the crops from the peasants to feed the urban workers. The development of a communist government shocked the world.

• China was facing internal and external problems as well. They had ethnic tension. In the Qing Dynasty, Manchurians were not complete Chinese, so the Han felt their Manchurian leaders were not legitimate. This led to a long policy discrimination against the Han. They also faced famine. Food production did not keep up, and any storm or flood could destroy everything. The Qing Dynasty also had an extremely low tax revenue. They weren’t able to fund for infrastructure. Externally, China was losing their economic power to industrialized powers. Foreign powers had forced free trade agreements on them. They were able to do that because of their superior industrial and military capabilities. Sun Yat-Sen led a revolution to overthrow the Qing Dynasty. When he did, he kept Confucian beliefs. He changed the Qing Dynasty by making it more democratic, and he wanted to correct the unequal distribution of wealth in China. His idea was to allow power to govern to educated experts. His leadership ended in 2 months, when he failed to execute his rule. He handed over his power to military leaders. In the Ottoman Empire (the sick man of Europe) the Ottomans had attempted to modernize under a series of reforms called Tanzimat. These reforms were not successful. A group of young Turks rose up, and advocated for a constitution (defines the scope of government power, and guarantees certain civil liberties) style government made in the image of European style governments. Argued for turkification which as an effort to fore all citizens to accept Turkish culture. Turkish culture was heavily influenced by Islam religion, which affected Christians living by this rule. In Mexico, they were under control of Porfirio Diaz. He allowed foreign investors to control much of Mexico’s resources. 1% of Mexican people owned 90% of the land, which meant the majority was poor. Diaz imprisoned Francisco Medero (his presidental election opponent) and that became what started the beginning of the Mexican revolution. He ended up escaping prison and started a revolution against Diaz. This resulted in Diaz’s exile of Mexico. Mexico created a new resolution which solved a lot of problems created by Diaz. This led to equal land distribution, gender equal voting rights, and public education.