Expansionism

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The full extent of the empire of Alexander the Great, assembled in the 4th century BCE as he strove to conquer the lands of Asia and the Mediterranean

Expansionism refers to states obtaining greater territory through military empire-building or colonialism.[1][2]

In the classical age of conquest moral justification for territorial expansion at the direct expense of another established polity (who often faced displacement, subjugation, slavery, rape and execution) was often as unapologetic as "because we can" treading on the philosophical grounds of might makes right.

As political conceptions of the

reunification or pan-nationalism
are sometimes used to justify and legitimize expansionism when the explicit goal is to reconquer territories that have been lost or to take over ancestral lands.

Lacking a viable historical claim of this nature, would-be expansionists may instead promote ideologies of promised lands (such as manifest destiny or a religious destiny in the form of a Promised Land), perhaps tinged with a self-interested pragmatism that targeted lands will eventually belong to the potential invader anyway.[3]

Theories

social cohesion or Asabiyyah, are able to seek "expansion to the limit."[4]

The Soviet economist Nikolai Kondratiev theorized that capitalism advances in 50-year expansion/stagnation cycles, driven by technological innovation. The UK, Germany, the US, Japan and now China have been at the forefront of successive waves.

Crane Brinton in The Anatomy of Revolution saw the revolution as a driver of expansionism in, for example, Stalinist Russia, the United States and the Napoleonic Empire.

Christopher Booker believed that wishful thinking can generate a "dream phase" of expansionism such as in the European Union, which is short-lived and unreliable.

According to a 2023 study, important historical instances of territorial expansion have frequently happened because actors on the periphery of a state have acted without authorization from their superiors at the center of the state. Leaders subsequently find it difficult to withdraw from the newly captured areas due to "sunk costs, domestic political pressure, and national honor."[5]

Examples

Expansion of the Mongol Empire from 1206 to 1294

Every part of the world has experienced expansionism.

Mehmed the Conqueror.[8]

The militarist and nationalistic reign of Russian

Pan-Slavist solidarity led to further war with Turkey (the sick man of Europe) in 1853 provoked Britain and France into invading Crimea.[9]

In Italy,

After 1937, Nazi Germany under Hitler laid claim to Sudetenland, unification (Anschluss) with Austria in 1938 and the occupation of the whole of the Czech lands the following year. After war broke out, Hitler and Stalin divided Poland between Germany and the Soviet Union. In a Drang nach Osten aimed at achieving Lebensraum for the German people, Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.[11]

Comparison of Africa in the years 1880 and 1913

).

In American politics after the

21st century

China

The

Republic of China.[13]

Israel

Israel and Israeli-occupied territories

Holocaust. Its government has occupied the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, the Golan Heights, and the Sinai Peninsula since the Six-Day War, although the Sinai was later returned to Egypt in 1982[14][15][16] and Israel disengaged from the Gaza Strip in 2005. Israel also occupied southern Lebanon from February 1985 to May 2000.[17]

Iran

Shi'ite state, has extended its influence across the entire Middle East, including Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen and Afghanistan by arming local militias.[18]

Russia

2022, with a red line marking the area of actual control by Russia
on 30 September 2022

military intervention in Syria
.

Turkey

Turkish presence in northern Iraq since 2018.[26]

United States

The US retains military bases in some of the sovereign countries that it once occupied on a notionally-voluntary basis, including in Germany, Italy, Japan, Greenland, Iceland, Iraq, and formerly in Afghanistan. Guantanamo Bay Naval Base is retained despite the protests of the Cuban government, and the US has military bases in various other countries with which it has allied.

Ideologies

In the 19th century, theories of racial unity evolved such as Pan-Germanism, Pan-Slavism, and Pan-Turkism and the related Turanism. In each case, the dominant nation (respectively, Prussia; the Russian Empire;[27] and the Ottoman Empire, especially under Enver Pasha) used those theories to legitimise their expansionist policies.

American ideology

Historical territorial expansion of the United States

In terms of explaining the results of American expansion, this goes back to the 19th century when

Frontier Thesis which made the case for the decisive role of American expansionism.[28][29] The free land enabled economic independence (as opposed to political dominance by landlords in Europe) and popular democracy in America.[30] The success of expansionism led to a deep belief in the superiority of the "American way of life," as shown by how it attracted tens of millions of immigrants. Economic success was supplemented by the confidence that Anglo Saxons were simply better at governing a nation.[31]

Further expansion far beyond the American continent, in the Philippines, at the turn of the century which was driven by a paternalistic United States as McKinley’s objectives, he declared in mid-1899, were fourfold: “Peace first, then a government of law and order honestly administered, full security to life, property, and occupation under the Stars and Stripes.”[32] However, the Philippines government was shared with the local political elite, which called for independence. In Washington Democrats rejected McKinley-style expansionism and in 1934 set the Philippines on the path to independence, which was achieved in 1946.[33]

It has also been posited that American leaders were pressured under traditional gender roles, which in turn made expansionism more likely. By the end of the 19th century President McKinley had been accustomed to being evaluated in terms of his manliness.[34] This also played in to the fact that in the late nineteenth century, men saw supporting the military as the ultimate test of being a man.[34] As a result, expansionism was a way of projecting manliness onto the electorate and in to society.

In popular culture

Stalin
's Soviet Union, of a new elite seizing power, establishing new rules and hierarchies, and expanding economically while they compromise their ideals.

Robert Erskine Childers's novel The Riddle of the Sands
portrays the threatening nature of the German Empire.

Elspeth Huxley's novel Red Strangers shows the effects on local culture of colonial expansion into Sub-Saharan Africa.

See also

References

  1. ^ An alternative definition sees "expansionism" as "a desire to annex additional territory" for reasons such as perceived needs for Lebensraum or resources, the intimidation of rivals, or the projection of an ideology.May, Ronald James, ed. (1979). The Indonesia-Papua New Guinea Border: Irianese Nationalism and Small State Diplomacy. Department of Political and Social Change, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University. p. 43. . Retrieved 6 November 2020. At this point, however, we must define 'expansionism' a little more precisely. I am interpreting it to mean a desire to annex additional territory either
    1. for the sake of more lebensraum (living space) or resources (oil, copper, timber, etc.);
    2. for the sake of demonstrating the national power so as to intimidate neighbours;
    3. because of an ideology of national greatness, power
    [...]
  2. .
  3. ^ "Manifest Destiny | History, Examples, & Significance". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2019-05-07.
  4. ^ The Muqadimmah, 1377, pages 137-256
  5. S2CID 256390941
    .
  6. ^ See Abernethy (2009); Darwin (2008)
  7. ^ Wade, (2014).
  8. .
  9. ^ Orlando Figes, Crimea (Penguin, 2011), chapter one
  10. .
  11. ^ Sebastian Haffner, The Meaning of Hitler, Phoenix, 2000, chapters 2, 3 and 4
  12. ^ Beyreis, David (Summer 2018). "The Chaos of Conquest: The Bents and the Problem of American Expansion". Kansas History. 41 (2): 72–89 – via History Reference Center.
  13. ^ Simon Tisdall, 'Vietnam's fury at China's expansionism can be traced to a troubled history', The Guardian, 15/5/2004
  14. ^ "Carter Says Error Led U.S. to Vote Against Israelis". Washington Post. 4 March 1980. Retrieved 16 November 2021.
  15. ^ Masalha, Nur (2000). Imperial Israel and the Palestinians: politics of expansion. Sterling, VA: Pluto Press.
  16. ^ "Golan Heights Law". Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 14 December 1981. Retrieved 16 November 2021.
  17. JSTOR 2676479
    .
  18. ^ Arango, Tim (15 July 2017). "Iran Dominates in Iraq After U.S. 'Handed the Country Over'". New York Times. Retrieved 8 November 2019.
  19. ^ Walker, Peter (2015-02-20). "Russian expansionism may pose existential threat, says NATO general". The Guardian. Retrieved 2018-10-04.
  20. S2CID 158613563
    .
  21. ^ Danforth, Nick (23 October 2016). "Turkey's New Maps Are Reclaiming the Ottoman Empire". Foreign Policy. Retrieved 2020-10-08.
  22. ^ "Turkey's Dangerous New Exports: Pan-Islamist, Neo-Ottoman Visions and Regional Instability". Middle East Institute. 21 April 2020. Retrieved 4 May 2021.
  23. ^ Sinem Cengiz (7 May 2021). "Turkey's militarized foreign policy provokes Iraq". Arab News. Retrieved 9 May 2021.
  24. ^ Asya Akca (8 April 2019). "Neo-Ottomanism: Turkey's foreign policy approach to Africa". Center for Strategic and International Studies. Retrieved 13 May 2021.
  25. ^ Slaviša Milačić (23 October 2020). "The revival of neo-Ottomanism in Turkey". World Geostrategic Sights. Retrieved 13 May 2021.
  26. ^ Yousif Ismael (18 May 2020). "Turkey's Growing Military Presence in the Kurdish Region of Iraq". Washington Institute. Retrieved 1 October 2022.
  27. ^ Orlando Figes, Crimea, Penguin, 2011, p.89
  28. ^ Richard Hofstadter, “Turner and the Frontier Myth.” American Scholar 18#4 (1949), pp. 433–43. online
  29. .
  30. ^ Stanley Elkins and Eric McKitrick, "A Meaning for Turner’s Frontier: Part I: Democracy in the Old Northwest." Political Science Quarterly 69#3 (1954), pp. 321–53. online
  31. .
  32. .
  33. ^ Dean Kotlowski, "Independence or Not? Paul V. McNutt, Manuel L. Quezon, and the Re-examination of Philippine Independence, 1937–9" International History Review 32#3 (2010), pp. 501–531 online
  34. ^ .

Further reading

  • Abernethy, David B. The dynamics of global dominance: European overseas empires, 1415-1980 (Yale University Press, 2000).
  • Darwin, John. After Tamerlane: the global history of empire since 1405 ( Bloomsbury, 2008).
  • Edwards, Zophia, and Julian Go. "The Forces of Imperialism: Internalist and Global Explanations of the Anglo-European Empires, 1750–1960." Sociological Quarterly 60.4 (2019): 628–653.
  • MacKenzie, John M. "Empires in world history: characteristics, concepts, and consequences." in The Encyclopedia of Empire (2016): 1-25.
  • Wade, Geoff, ed. Asian Expansions: The Historical Experiences of Polity Expansion in Asia (Routledge, 2014).
  • Wesseling, Hendrik. The European Colonial Empires: 1815-1919 (Routledge, 2015).