Effects Of Technology On European Imperialism

European Technological Advances Countries have always wanted to control the most amount of land that they possibly could. It is in the nature of the people to want more and more. This obsession of wanting to control more land forged a time known as Imperialism. This could not be possible if it wasn’t for technology. Philip Curtin states in his novel, The Rise and Fall of the Plantation Complex that, "The pace of change in technology became more rapid than it had ever been in the past, and the pace of change in all aspects of human society seemed to accelerate. The coming of industrial technology therefore took on the appearance of a permanent revolution." The Europeans advances in technology definitely helped them in their quest to be the most
There is no doubt that technology during the time of Imperialism shaped the world as it is today. Headrick states, “It is sometimes asserted that the rapid progress of Western technology in the 19th century was a major determinant of the imperialist drive. . . . Western superiority in ships, navigational techniques, and firearms was a fact of long standing.” The rapid progress that technology shaped the period of Imperialism. Without the advances and upgrades to the ships and the firearms, the Europeans would not have been able to go around and dominate nations as they did. The ships evolved from wood to the point where they were made out of steel and had weapons equipped to them. The guns evolved from single shooting weapons to a rapid firing weapons. Without the raw material and sources of energy they would not have been able to complete the technological advances that made the Europeans the strongest nation during the time of Imperialism. The advances in technology brought about a revolutionary change to the world. If it had not been for these advances, the world may have been completely