The Rise and Domination of Western Civilization

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Transformations throughout Europe over time allowed the “west” to eventually dominate the economic, political, and cultural dominance that the west began to achieve on a larger and faster scale than the rest of the world. The dominance of western civilization lied in several aspects of superiorities. Not only were Europe and America already greatly superior in the aspects of technology, art, policies of society, and several other aspects of society, they gained superiority over several different areas through several different tactics.
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Some of the great things that came out of this dominance was a constant competition to become better than one another between civilizations, causing great advancements in each area of expertise.
This, unfortunately, also caused War, superiority and inequality, and loss of life. All in all, Western dominance was a good thing, despite the losses and risks taken to achieve it. As well as their general dominance, Europe and the Americas began to inhabit other lands by the 19th century.

For Example, by 1914, nearly the entirety of Africa was dominated by several different European areas. Many Europe explorers set the wonders of Africa high on their lists to uncover. This put extreme curiosity on unexplored lands. Because of this, Belgium set an expedition to begin commercial activities in Africa.
Naturally, this sparked a large competition for Africa. This fight was between Britain, France, Germany, Belgium and Italy. Not only did Europe and the Americas prosper greatly, other areas seemingly fell apart. Starting to become prominent and noticeable throughout the 19th century, problems with the Qing Dynasty throughout China seemingly destroyed China’s prosperity.

Being tied to outdated testaments, including necessary defense and the attempt to persistently keep transportation and communication lined open, the government and the residents of China were experiencing serious strain. This, among other things, caused revolts from minorities. Because of these old world testaments and the seemingly restrictive and unorganized government, Emperor Qianlong became worried about Europe’s prominence in China and decided to restrict all European commercial activities to one port in China known as Guangzhou. Trade with Europeans was very closely supervised by authorities making sure government instilled price requirements were being met.
Unfortunately, trade was also very uneven due to the Chinese’s lack of desire for European goods and the Europeans need for China’s goods. The British wanted nothing to do with a non-profitable trade, so they decided to grow a great amount of Opium in India, a country over with Europe as influence as well. They then shipped it to China, hoping it would be more desirable to Chinese people and cause a more fair trade exchange. Their hopes coming true, trade exploded throughout China. Opium, being a quite addictive drug, became a necessity to Chinese life.
The Qing government, the likes of which had grown very week by this time, turned a blind eye towards more seemingly important issues. They had become so corrupt at this point, some of the Chinese officials began taking bribes to stay quiet about the situation. Forcing notice, about 40,000 crates of Opium were sent into Guangzhou by the British over the course of a single year. Noticing the issue that was becoming more and more prominent and deciding to pay mind to it, the government decided to take action ad place a ban on trade. The following explosion of conflict was eventually referred to as the Opium Wars.
The British greatly protested the ban on trade placed by the Qing government and the Qing ignored the attempts for peaceful protest set by the British. The British, as a last resort, decided to attack the Chinese coastal villages. Eventually towns and Cities along the Great Canal were targeted. The British, using the Canal to reach further inland, gave them a great advantage over the villagers of China, considering the superiority of technology and attack tactics that the British held. The Qing unsurprisingly surrendered.
The British decided not to take over the government, but they did decide to make trade legal and because Europe did technically defeat China during the Opium wars, Europe held an unspoken dominance over the quite weak empire. In conclusion, Europe and the Americas not only were naturally ahead of the time because of the advancements brought on by the Renaissance in arts, sciences, and technologies, and the advancements brought on by the Wars in militia, economy, and politics, they dominated greatly by the simple desire to get ahead and explore.

Marion Briggs

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