Strayer, Chapter 21

History is known as a repetitive cycle. For many things such as wars have regularly repeated which have shaped the way the twentieth century is. In this chapter it talks about Europe and how it recovered from its collapse. By the 1900s Europe controlled majority of the world with having such a strong growing military and scientific and industrial revolutions. What collapsed Europe, was World War I or other wise known as the Great War. "At the beginning, most military experts expected a war of movement and attack, but it soon bogged down on the western front into a war of attrition, in which "trench warfare"."(Strayer,pg630) For many years Europeans didn't see in wrong in the war until the outcome was coming out to be economically a problem. This was a comparison to the enlightenment. After the war was over the aftermath was known as the great depression. Meaning social and cultural changed to the Americans and the Europeans. Tradition was looked s a new way, for instance mothers day was now a profound holiday during the great depression and has now stuck with the Americans till present day. But the most that the great depression showed was the failing of the economic system. Unemployment began to rise and the rich were now trying to find new ways of making more money. Prior to this was the Holocaust which was ran by Hitler and was the plan on getting rid of all Jews. The main three factors that led to the recovery of Europe were: industrial society, bettering the economy and thirdly extension with the United States of America.

Strayer, Chapter 20 (pp.607-614)

While the colonial era was going it erupted into cultural changes. For instance education, religion and race became a major impact in their countries. "..western education, obtained through missionary or government schools, that generate a new identity." (pg 607) This help them obtain a great education that they were able to communicate with government officials and try to import goods. "Moreover, education often provided social mobility and elite status within their own communities and an opportunity to achieve, or at least approach, equality with whites in racially defines societies." (pg 607) The next thing was religion. This started the religion of "african reformation" where christianity became Africanzied. Not only did they allow Christianity into their culture but they began to make it apart of them. In India they made christianity into Hinduism. The last impact was "race". This was when Africa defined themselves as "Africans".

Strayer, Chapter 20 (pp. 589-606)

Colonial Encounters. This was the notion of the "Americans and Asians being ruled by the British, French, German, Italians, Belgians, Portuguese, Russians or Americans." (pg 590) The first phase were the Europeans taking over the Americans. The preferred informal control because it was cheaper and didn't provoke wars.  Eventually through out the years the Europeans had advantage due to firepower, rifles and machine guns. This was their ability to conquer more because other places weren't well developed.  The main thing that was affected by colonial rules were the way people work. "The colonial state- with its power to tax, to seize land for European enterprise, to compel labor, and to build railroads, ports and roads-played an important role in these transformations." (pg598) Having money be an outstanding factor, by raising prices and increase production of products made it harder for workers. This is the kind of process that is going on today. Taxes are raising in the United States but minimum wage is still not acceptable in a lot of places which makes it harder for people to live because they have to get more jobs in order to survive.                                        

Communist Manifesto (Chapter 1)

"We see, therefore, how the modern bourgeoisie is itself the product of a long course of development, of a series of revolutions in the modes of production and of exchange." (Chapter I. Bourgeois and Proletarians) With this saying this was the production of the 2 classes. We have the the poor middle class and the lower case as the manufacture workers. The bourgeoisie eventually used its higher class known as the physician, lawyer and priest to become paid wage laborers. This was all due to the notion of labor and money. Eventually this became a production, relocating individuals just so they are able to go to work. This is exactly how the work force for many big productions are. They are known as sweat shops, where the youngest child is in there working day and night for a very cheap amount. Lots of human rights taken advantage of and much more. This is the big separation of class due to the wealth level. I feel it is unfair to base people on how much they make in their life. Sometimes people have lived in a certain lifestyle their whole life and feel more comfortable in living that way. For instance a family that is use to farming, has never seen any other type of work force. The separation also brings conspiracy towards others and discrimination.

The Industrial Revolution was a main reason of the European transformation. With the dominance that Europe already had this brought them more to a global dominance. hThe Industrial Revolution was a period in which there were  changes  in agriculture, textile and manufacturing, transportation, economic policies and the social structure. This was an echo of the scientific revolution because of the application of science to production. With Europe beginning their new transformation, other countries such as India, China and many others began to also develop their on industrial revolution. This revolution also changed the way people worked. People began to develop factories so you have multiple items being made at once, rather then just a small business where it is one person doing the main job.  With the start of many other countries developing it began a competition for many things such as clothing, and cars and many main necessities. I feel that without the industrial revolution a lot of things that we use today would not be how they are. Technology would not be the same nor would things such as cars.

Strayer pp 507-524

In this chapter it talked about the Haiti, Spanish, abolition, nationalism and feminism revolution. What all of these revolutions have in common is the notion of equality. The Haiti revolution was from 1791-1804. It was the only successful rebellion in history. One of their biggest legacy was the saying "remember Haiti". This is in comparison of the abolition revolution. In order to fulfill this they dealt with awareness,boycotting and work through the government. The feminist revolution was one of the most touching moments for me. In the book it states that " from the beginning, feminism was a transatlantic movement in which European and American women attended the same conferences, corresponded regularly, and read one another's work."(page 521) Combining multiple women groups together they are able to grow as a bigger nation to make the feminist revolution stronger.

Strayer, Chapter 17 pp 504-507

The French Revolution. In the beginning I was very confused on why this revolution even took place. It stated about the different estates and how the third estate organized themselves as the National Assembly. This estate made all the laws for the country, " men are born and remain free and equal in rights" (page 504), and this was the beginning of the revolution. Money began to be a big problem during this time. Churches were sold to raise revenue, priest were under government authority, even small things such as bread was raised. With all the violence going around the next option was to start fresh. In my opinion this revolution was pointless. It resulted in unnecessary violence and begin wars with others that could have been left alone.