Why Did Industrialized Nations Build World Empires In The Late 19th Century?

The massive land grab of the late 19th century began as a result of industrialized Nations competing. Industrialization had previously begun in Great Britain and was most likely due to the fact that Britain had easy access to raw materials like coal and was more accepting of the middle class moving up. The small population in Great Britain also brought about innovation as the need force laborers grew.
As Great Britain, Spain, France, Germany, Japan, Portugal, Italy and even the United States began to become more industrialized competition grew as each country did not want to be outdone by the other. The idea of imperialism along with being the primary way of showing off a country’s greatness, also had practical means. It was an easy way for these countries to gain raw material, cheap labor and a place to market their goods. This colonizing of new lands for social, economic or political reasons meant protecting those interest, so even more territories were taken to insulate and protect them.
As previously listed, the three reasons why the industrialized nations of the world began building world empires in the late 19th century were social, economic and political
ones.
The political reasons were simply to show prestige and power. During this time, it was a common thought that a great nation needed to own other lands as a means of showing their greatness. No industrialized country wanted to be left out or seem not as great as another so, imperialism became the order of the day.
The economic reasons for the building of empires was simply to have a source for raw materials, a place to market goods and a way to control population growth.
If an industrialized nation colonized an area, it could use the raw materials found there at no cost to create products, which intern it could force the very same colonized country to buy. Each colonized country added a new source of raw materials and a new market to the already existing ones. This created a constant source of raw material and revenue for the industrialized countries. Some raw materials were cotton, coffee, sugar cane, coal, gold, and let’s not forget cheap or in most cases free labor. The owning of new lands also meant that there were more places for their people to go and this also controlled the population in the home
country.
The industrialized nations saw it as their duty to teach their way of life to the countries of the unindustrialized world. This lead to the belief that it was their duty to modernized and civilize the rest of the world. To this end, Missionaries were sent out to teach religion and convert the savages or the uncivilized to Christianity. They also changed other aspects of their lives, their native languages, the way they dressed, their customs and their beliefs. In the industrialized nations’ view, if you were not like them you were inferior and needed to be brought out of darkness into the light even if it means by force.