WATCH: Unit 5 Overview – Revolutions

In May of 1905, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia was  playing tennis. An aide handed him a telegram   informing the tsar that his pacific fleet had  been defeated and surrendered to the Japanese.   It was a disaster that ended Russia's  imperial ambitions in the Pacific Ocean.   Without emotion, Nicholas stuck  the telegram in his pocket   and asked for his racket. Despite the tsar's apathy, this news shook the foundations of global power.   The Russo-Japanese war started in 1904 as both  countries competed to expand their empires in Asia.   Tsar Nicholas had ordered an entire fleet to sail  to Japan, a difficult six-month voyage in which   they... mistakenly shot British fishing boats, picked  up crocodiles and snakes as mascots in Madagascar   to become the world's largest floating zoo, blew  up one of their own cruisers during a funeral, and...   almost ran out of ammunition before they finally  found and engaged the Japanese Navy. What followed   is known as the Battle of Tsushima. There, the  highly disciplined and modern Japanese fleet   won victories over the Russian ships, which  were mostly either sunk or surrendered. For   the first time in history, an Asian country  had defeated an industrialized European empire.   This turn of events was particularly  shocking, given that just 50 years earlier   Japan had a feudal government, had isolated  itself from most foreign countries, had no   standing national army, and Japanese soldiers  were more often equipped with swords and spears   than modern firearms. Japan's victory sent  shockwaves around the world and led many   colonized people to question European claims  of superiority. It also caused unrest in Russia,   contributing to a revolution that would  depose and kill Tsar Nicholas 12 years later.   So...how did Japan transform from an isolated  feudalist country to a great imperial power   in just a few decades? For that answer, we need  to examine a stunning period of revolution   known as the Meiji Restoration. Now, the  Meiji Restoration (I said it twice on purpose)   was when Japan capitalized on the  revolutions of the long 19th century. Hi, I'm Rachel Hansen, and this  is Unit 5 Revolutions 1750-1900.   You'll remember that the formation of  trans-oceanic connections kicked off   massive changes as people moved and new empires  emerged. In this unit, we're going to explore   some of the consequences of those developments:  revolutions that would create the modern world.   Historians have identified at least two  major types of revolutions produced by the   long 19th century: political and industrial. They  started in only a few places at first, but they   were ultimately global revolutions destined to  remake human societies in every part of our world.   The first type of revolutions were political  revolutions. The world in 1750 was a world of   empires and of kings, one thing almost all  humans shared in 1750 (whether they lived   in a small community or a large empire) was an  understanding that they were somebody's subjects.   They shared a sense of not really having much  political authority or standing of their own.   Rather, they owed their allegiance to a chief or  prince or ruler of some sort. That ruler had the   right, or at least the power, to make decisions for  their subjects. But the world of 1750 was about to   become a revolutionary world. A world where, some  people in some places, were ready to shrug off   the title of subject, first in the Atlantic world  and then beyond. Political revolutionaries rejected   the authority of kings, emperors, and religious  leaders, embracing new ideas about government,   people's rights, and more. At the same time,  the Industrial Revolution began. Centered   first in Britain, this revolution happened when  people learned to harness a new form of energy:   coal. Coal-powered machines quickly came to do  much of the work involved in manufacturing and   transportation and this had a huge effect on how  people lived, worked, ate, and even how they thought.   Industrialization, which was happening quickly  in some places and more gradually in others,   reshaped life everywhere, creating the world we  live in today. These two revolutions combined   to create an era of great change. Yet, not  everyone shared equally in these revolutions.   Even after revolutions created the first nation  states in France, Haiti, the United States, and Latin   America, the new freedoms spread gradually and  unevenly, at first enjoyed only by a privileged few.   It was the labor of the working class,  colonized people, and enslaved people that   drove the economic engines of industry, but these  classes of people rarely shared in the profits. As a result, one of the ways to study this  period is through social hierarchies, the   ways industrial societies organize  themselves unevenly and unequally. In Unit 4, you explored some of the new social  hierarchies created by trans-oceanic empires.   In this unit, you'll see how enlightenment thinkers  challenged traditional hierarchies and authority.   These ideas provided the ideological  basis for many of the revolutions   that are discussed in this unit. Two ideas in  particular reshaped governance in this period:   they are... national sovereignty, the idea that  people—together—have the right to make political   decisions and exercise leadership, and nationalism,  the belief that a people governing themselves have   the right to a homeland. These ideas helped create  a new form of governance called the nation-state.   A nation is a self-governing group of people. A  state is a legal unit and a piece of territory.   When a state coincides with a nation—boom. You  have a nation-state. New ideas also helped propel   industrialization. This was an era of innovation in  technology. New technologies created new economic   ideas about how to organize and use labor and  money. The resulting changes in how people lived   and worked also helped people move farther and  communicate faster, accelerating change. Of course,   all of these new technologies also let people  change their environments more than ever before,   not always with positive results. Together,  these revolutions in politics and technology   allowed some countries to become very powerful.  Nationalism, and the concept of the nation-state,   allowed states to better motivate and mobilize  their citizens. Industrialization, meanwhile,   helped states control larger and more distant  territory and produce new deadlier weapons. Which brings us back to the Meiji Restoration in  Japan, and the reason I keep saying it. The Meiji   Restoration is, in many ways, the perfect example  of how some states harnessed the power of these   two revolutions. In the middle of the long 19th  century, Japan was decentralized, unindustrialized,   and governed by a military dictator, the Shogun.  By the end of the 19th century, Japan was one of   the most industrialized nations on Earth, with  an economy and military that could challenge   some of the world's greatest empires. This  transformation was based on some gradual changes   in Japanese society that had been going on for a  century, but they were given a kickstart in 1852.   In that year, a fleet of American warships sailed  into Edo Bay, seeking to sign a treaty and open   Japanese ports to American trade. The site of these  industrial modern ships sent a shockwave through   Japanese society by highlighting how far behind  Japanese technology had lagged compared to that of   the western imperialist nations. This realization  created discontent and a group of revolutionaries   launched the—say it with me—Meiji Restoration. This  was aimed at restoring the Japanese emperor to   power, industrializing the economy, and reforming  the government. Civil war followed, but the   supporters of the emperor prevailed, and beginning  in 1868, launched a series of reforms intended to   modernize Japan's industry and military enough  that it could match the European model while   still retaining Japanese culture. The leaders  of the Meiji Restoration sent representatives   abroad to Europe and the United States to  learn western methods and create connections.   These experts helped the government centralize state  power, establish a constitution, institute public   education, modernize the military, and industrialize  the economy. Industrialization increased Japan's   economic production which in turn allowed the  nation to emerge as a major military power.   Then, in 1895, Japan began an imperial expansion  in East Asia and the pacific. The Japanese Empire   engaged in colonization strategies that were just  as unequal and exploitative as those practiced by   European empires. That's when many of those empires  like Russia began to recognize Japan as a major   rival. New political ideas allowed the Japanese  revolutionaries to build a powerful nation-state.   With that political power, they were able  to direct the course of industrialization,   channeling national resources into industries that  would further empower the state and enrich the   economy, including the state-of-the-art warships  that sunk Tzar Nicholas's fleet. Game, set, match.