The Rise of Nationalism
• Q What were the various stages in the rise
of nationalist movements in Asia and the
Middle East, and what challenges did they
face?
Wilson’s 14 Points & Paris Peace
Conference
• Colonies around the world encouraged by
Wilson’s 14 points and “self-determination”
of nations
• Great Britain & France obtained right to
rule as mandates of the League of Nations
– former German Territories in Africa
– Former Ottoman Turkish lands in the Middle
East
De-colonization Post WWI
• Liberation Movement begin to rise throughout the
world post WWI.
• Agitate for : Political, social, and economic
change to improve circumstances for working
people
– Addresses poverty created by colonization
– Challenges absolute governments &
authority(tzar, sultan, etc)
Intellectual Challenges to
Western Cultural Imperialism
• Sociologist, Lester Frank Ward
– Dynamic Sociology (1883)
• Criticized social Darwinism
• Argued the conservative social scientists
responsible for Social Darwinism, Herbert Spencer
& William Graham Sumner wrongly applied
evolutionary theory to human affairs
• Confused organic evolution with social evolution
Intellectual Challenges
• Edward Wilmot Blyden Black Spokesman
– 1832 – 1912
– West Indian Born, Liberian Statesman & ideologue
• His life’s work to dispel superiority and inferiority
myths
• To include Africa in Geopolitics
– Black Nationalism & pan-Africanism
– The African Personality
– Place of Islam and Arabic in Africa
• Pan-Africanism
Nationalism
• Political force at the turn of the century
19th C
– A learned emotional loyalty
– perceive common bonds
• Provides members a sense of membership &
belonging
• Nurtured by common bonds: language,
religion, social & institutional traditions,
territory, history
Factors in the Rise of Modern
nationalism
• New urban middle class of westernized
intellectuals (Merchants, clerk, students,
professionals educated in western schools)
– Resented foreigners and their arrogant contempt for
colonial peoples
– Dismayed between the ideals of western society and
the reality . Disparity between ideal and reality,
theory and practice
• Equality in economic opportunity non-existent
– Segregated societies hat privileged Europeans over
the colonial peoples
Anti-colonialism
• Educated natives organized political
parties
– Sought reforms
– Sought an end of foreign rule
– Sought a restoration of independence
• Middle class indigenous urban elite source
of anti-colonial sentiment
Gandhi & Indian Nationalism
High caste, English trained
Hindu
Hoped to speak for all
Indians
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Gandhi
• Young Hindu lawyer returned from south
Africa to become active in the INC, 1915
• Transformed the movement and
galvanized the struggle for independence
and identity
– Accepted need for reforms to end traditional
abuses like child marriage and sati
– Called for an Indian share in the governing
process more spending on economic
development and less on military campaigns
British Indian
Between
the wars
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The New Party
• British responded with a few concessions
• Disillusioned members split off and formed
the New Party
– called for use of terrorism and violence to
achieve national independence
• The INC also had a hard time reconciling
religious differences
– Reflected Hindu concerns
• A separate Muslim League was created to
represent the interests of the millions of Muslims
in Indian society
Jawaharlal Nehru, Mahatma Gandhi , and Muhammad Ali
Jinnah confer before the partition of India into Hindu and
Muslim states.
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Satyagraha
• “ Hold fast to” the truth”
– A policy of Non violent resistance
• Sought to improve the lot of the poor and grant
independence to India
• Goal to convert the British to his views
• Goal to strengthen the unity and self respect of his
compatriots
• Concerned about the untouchables, who he called
the harijans or “children of god”
– Use of civil disobedience against British suppression of
dissent
Civil Disobedience
• Ghandi “mahatma” or “great soul”
organized mass protests to achieve his
aims
– 1919 the British violently responded to the
protests
– Killed 100s of unarmed protesters in the
square in the city of Amristar in NW India
• Ghandi imprisoned for several years
Government of Indian Act
• British passed the Government of India
Act, 1921: Transformed the advisory
legislative council into a bicameral
parliament, 2/3rds of whose members
would be elected
– 5 million Indians were enfranchised
• (no longer enough for many INC members who
wanted full independence)
– British also increased the salt tax,
• prohibited Indian people from manufacturing or
harvesting their own salt
March to the Sea, 1930
• Ghandi led a
nonviolent movement
for Indian
independence from
British Rule with 78
followers.
– Destination: Dandi,240
miles away.
March to the Sea, 1930
– “civil disobedience is
the inherent right of a
citizen. He dare not
give it up without
ceasing to be a man.”
– 1000’s joined, each
picked up a pinch of
salt as an act of
disobedience in
protest of the British
monopoly on salt.
Women’s Rights
– Indian women active in
the movement
• First 2 organizations to
promote women’s rights
had been established
in the early years of the
century
– Became involved to
bring about reforms
• Women accounted for
about 20,0000, or 10%
of the people arrested
and jailed for
demonstrating during
the interwar period
Women’s Rights
•Promoted women’s
education,
•introduction of birth
control,
•abolition of child
marriage,
•universal suffrage
•1929 the Sarda Act
raised the minimum
age of marriage to 14
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Jawaharlal Nehru
• Educated in the law in Great Britian,
Brahmin by birth
• He personified the new anglo-indian politician:
secular, rational, upper class intellectual
• Movement embarked on a second path
from Ghandi’s movement
– Religious and secular/Native and western
• strengthened the movement , united 2 primary
impulses behind the desire for independence
– Elite nationalism and the primal force of Indian
traditionalism
Pakistan
• 1940, the Muslim
League called for the
creation of a separate
Muslim state of
Pakistan
• British Viceroy, Lord
Mountbatten of
Burma insturmental
• (“land of the pure”)
• 1947
Partition aftermath
• Violent process
– 12.5 million displaced or homeless
•
•
•
•
•
14.5 million moved to Pakistan
7 million Hindus and Sikhs moved to india
7 million others moved to other regions
1 million dead
83,000 women abducted during riots and killings
• Legacy of religious division and
intolerance
Ottoman Empire & Turkish
Nationalism
• Multi-cultural make-up of the Ottoman
empire.
• All subjected to massacres ordered by the
“Red Sultan” in response to protests against
his tyranny
– Young Turks led the protests, promised reform
and peace for all
First Waves of Liberation
• Young Turks (1908 – 1918)
– Nationalist Reform Party
– Begun by intelligentsia and military cadets
• Advocated Pan-Turkism & disliked multiculturalism
Armenian Genocide
• Allied with
Germany
during WWI
against Britain
– Ethnic
cleansing
– 1.5 Million
Armenians
tortured, killed
Allied Triumph over the Ottoman
• British declared an official protectorate over
Egypt
• 1916 local governor of Mecca, encouraged
by British, declared Arabia independent
from Ottoman rule
• British troops seized Palestine
– 0ct 1918 with 300,000 casualties from the war,
negotiated an armistice with the allied powers
Mustafa Kemal,
president of the
new republic,
Ataturk
‘‘Father Turk’’
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Mustafa Kemal and the
Modernization of Turkey
• Kemal convoked a National congress
• Called for an elected government
• Goal to preserve remainder of territories of
old Empire to create the Republic of Turkey
• Republic established in 1923
Republic of Turkey
• Trappings of a democratic system were put
into place
– suppressed critics of his rule
• Turkish nationalism emphasized
• Popular education was emphasized
• Old aristocratic titles abolished
–
–
–
–
He attempted to break the power of Islamic clerics
Transform turkey into a secular state
Caliphate was abolished in 1924
The Shari’a was replaced with the Swiss law code
revised
Modernized the Economy
• established light industrial sector
• Institute a 5 year plan on the soviet model to
provide for state direction over the economy
• Modernization of agricultural sector:
training institutions and model farms
• State was a from of state capitalism,
Women’s Reforms in Turkey
• women discouraged from wearing the veil
• right to vote
• legally guaranteed equal rights with en in all
aspects of marriage and inheritance in 1934
• Education and the professions open to both
sexes
• Women entered politics
• Freedom of religion and conversion
Persia – Qajar Dynasty
(1794-1925)
• Growing western influence – Russia &
Great Britain
– Discovery of oil reserves in 1908
– Division of spheres of influence
• Internal divisions
• Led to growth of indigenous Persian
Nationalist Movement
– By 1906 Shah forced to grant a constitution
based on a western model
Pahlavi Dynasty, 1925
• Established by Reza Khan – new Shah
• Attempted to establish a Republic
• Reforms:
–
–
–
–
–
Strengthened central government
Modernized the civilian & military bureaucracy
Modern economic infrastructure
Western educational model
Forbade veiling in public
• Name of nation changed to Iran, 1935
• Occupied by Soviet & British troops during WWII
Division of Iran by Soviet Union and Britain
during WWII and occupation
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Iraq
• Established after the collapse of the
Ottoman Empire
– Kurdish, Sunni and Shi’ite population
• Occupied by British in WWI to protect oil
reserved from German Expansion
–
–
–
–
–
Placed under British mandate in 1920
Ruled through minority Shi’ite population
Repressed anti-western resistance by 1921
More Oil discovered in Kirkuk in 1927
Britain supported Syrian rule of King Faisal &
maintained heavy influence
Saudi Arabia
• 1920s, Ibn Saud of the Wahhabi Movement
united Arab tribes to drive out Ottoman
Rule
• Established the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,
1932
• Traditionally poor, Standard Oil struck oil
in 1938 at Dhahran on the Gulf.
– Arabian-American oil or ARAMCO established
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Palestine
• British Mandate following WWI
• Zionist Movement, Theodor Herzl est. 1897
• Jewish immigration accepted in Palestine
prior to and during WWI
– 85,000 or 10% of the population were Jewish
by the War
– Majority Muslim Arabs
– Balfour Declaration of 1917 declared Palestine
a national home for Jews
European Jewish Refugees continued
to emigrate after World War I
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Division of Palestine & Creation
of Jordan
• Post WWI Britain created a separate state or
Emirate of Trans-Jordan out of the eastern
portion of Palestine
• WWII, became the independent kingdom of
Jordan
– Arab-Palestine conflict today & the Apartheid
state that exists is a product of these British
interventions
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Revolution in Egypt
• Britain faced a fully developed nationalist
movement
• Egyptians led by Saad Zaglhlul formed a
delegation or Wafd
– Asked for independence after the war
– Egyptian demands were thwarted by British
Determination to control the Suez Canal 1919
• Full scale revolution erupted
Wafd Party
• Leaders exiled
• Wafd party became chief political &
nationalist organization 1919-1952
• Revolts persisted/power struggle
– Conflict between
• British
• King Fu’ad & his successor King Faruk
• The Wafd
Egyptian “Independence”
• Britain wanted to maintain presence
• & to undercut the nationalist movement
• Unilaterally proclaimed Egyptian
independence under the constitutional
monarchy of King Fu’ad 1922
– British continued to hold the Canal
– Based soldiers in Egyptian territory
– Exercised widespread influence over Egyptian
political life
Egypt
• Nationalist demands for complete
independence failed
• Monarchy & Wafd became corrupt
• Lost support from Egyptian population
– Result was that the people turned to more
radical groups from the “left” and the “right”
finally the army to realize their nationalist
aspirations
West African
• African colonies had given their loyal
support to Britain in the war effort
• 1,000’s had died
• Efforts not recognized or rewarded socially,
politically or economically
• Disgruntled solders joined nationalist
efforts
Colonial Division’s
• Colonial state often tried to manipulate people
through their feelings of ethnic identity
– Language, religion, race, class, territory, economic or
political advantage
• French used language to divide
– Fearing Arabic unity gave special privilege to Berber traditional
law over Muslim Sharia
– Backfired and rallied Muslims to anti-colonial movement
• British/Afrikaner South Africa
– Since 1948 Afrikaners attempted to create Homelands or later
Bantustans to reinforce ethnic feelings of Xhosa or Zulu and
reduce unity of Africans
Interwar Resistance in Africa
• Sources of Solidarity
– Desire for indepence
• Self –governmnet
• End of economic exploitation by foriegners
– Common Religion
• Islam (Egypt, Algeria, French Sudan)
• Christianity (Nyasaland (today’s Malawi)
– Gender
• 1925 – 1930 Aba Women’s War in S.E.
Nigeria
– Economic interest
• Consumers united against high prices and
low quality
• Trade unions organized for better wages
Kenya
• British settlement of Highlands
– Land & privilege
• Indian immigration encouraged
– Merchant class
• Kikuyu
– Dispossession & Taxes
Kenya
• Prime Example of the contradictions and
failures of British Imperial policies
• Racial & class divisions among the diverse
population led to ongoing conflict
– Indians from the subcontinent had been
encouraged by the British to settle in large
numbers in Uganda & Kenya
– Became dominant merchants
– Provided superior social & economic status
within the British Imperial system
Kenya
• 1920’s African Nationalists responded
– Formed several groups
• Kikuyu Central Association (1924)
– British Repression
– 1928 repression created more support
• Leader Jomo Kenyatta
• Returned to lead Mau Mau Rebellion, (1953)
– emerged to enforce unity, secrecy and discipline
– Kikuyu feelings of ethnicity created by the colonial
experience reinforced by new intercommunication in the
Urban setting
Revolts in North Africa
• Nationalist Political movements
– Morocco
• Rif Rebellion led by Krim Brothers
• Brutally crushed by French and Spanish forces
– Algeria
– Libya
• Italians bombed rebellion
– Tunisia
• French crushed movements in early 1900s
National Congress of West Africa
• British Held Ghana (God Coast)
– Casely Hayford led other educated Africans
from 4 British colonies in demand for greater
autonomy
– Met in West Africa, Accra, capital of Gold
Coast, 1920
• Discussed implementation of reforms that would
lead to independence
• Would meet over the next decade to agitate for
independence
Nigeria
• Largest of British colonies
– Women merchants led demonstrations & riots
– 1919, 1928 in opposition to British
Domination
– Leadership of Herbert Macaulay, Lagos, the
capital
– Center of well-organized & effective
nationalist opposition
Nigerian National Democratic Party
• 1923 Mcaulay organized the NNDP
– Agitated for Nigerian participation within the
British political system
Senegal
• Blaise Diagne, customs official
• First African to be elected to the French
Chamber of Deputies
• Pushed for National causes in French held
Senegal
Belgian Congo
• Nationalist Movement
– Belgians established a local school system
• Few graduates went on to western universities
– Continued to pursue a very paternalistic policy
in the Congo
– Repressive tactics by Belgians increased the
number of nationalist sympathizers
• Authoritarian system repressed nationalistic drive
British East Africa
• Uganda
– British authorities worked through local
leaders who exercised local government
duties
– Nationalist demonstrations were rare
East Africa
• Portuguese colonies
– Angola
– Mozambique
•
•
•
•
Prazos – feudal Estates
Held by small white majority
Dominated agricultural and Business activities
Major force behind authoritarian Portuguese
politics
Racial Caste & Apartheid
• Mozambique
• Angola
• Rhodesia
– British held economic and political power
– Black majority in subordinate position
– Deprived of political participation
– Poverty & economic independence prevented
them from forming effective nationalist
organizations
South African: Nationalist Versus
White Settler Rule
• British won war with Boers during WWI
• Government incorporated Boer territory
and granted them dominion status with the
commonwealth
– Position implied an equal partnership with the
mother country
– Program of economic rehabilitation &
assimilation of the Boers
– Afrikaner culture emerged
• South African of Dutch Origin Nationalism
Afrikaners
• Formed political parties
– Heroes of Boer War
– Moved to maintain their superior political &
economic status through the United Party
(1934)
• Formed by Generals Jan Christian Smuts
• James Hertzog
– By 1934 segregationist policies that formed the
foundation for Apartheid had become apparent
South Africa
• Rich agricultural land
• Minerals
• Water
–
–
–
–
Union of South Africa
Dominated by Boers
Prospered
Bantu Peoples
• 80% of the population
• Tenant farmers, manual laborers, workers in mines &
factories
• disenfranchised
South African Native National
Congress
• Educated black South Africans
– Formed the SANNC in 1912
– Opposed to removal of native farmers from
their ancestral lands
– Sought to redress grievances
– Leadership was conservative & wanted to
negotiate with white minority
Africa National Congress of SA
• 1923 changed its name & became a major
nationalist organization for black
participation and self determination
– Boers continued a policy of divide and rule
– Encouraged intertribal differences
Pan-Africanism
• African leaders, alienated by European
economic, political and cultural domination
called for unity of all Africans
• Henry Sylvester-Williams called the first
Pan-African Conference in London 1900
• Later held in Latin America & United
States
Post War Era
• British & French Refusals to grant
autonomy fueled nationalist upheavals in
Africa & middle east
• Imperial governments determined to
control middle eastern oil fields, strategic
Suez Canal & the Persian Gulf
Rise of Radicalism
• When Political parties & nationalist parties
failed to make gains
• Many turned to military solution to achieve
national liberation