A Global History of the Developing World

Christopher M. White, Christopher White

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9780415692106
• eBook ISBN: 9781134627929
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: 19th Century History
• Index: History

A Global History of the Developing World takes a sweeping look at the historical foundations of the problems of developing world society. Encompassing Asia, Latin America and Africa, the book centralizes the struggle for self-determination in an attempt to understand how the current nation-states have been formed and what their future may hold. Although concentrating on the modern era, its scope is broad: it covers geography, ancient and modern history, economics, politics and recent events.

The book features twelve chapters, organized into 4 thematic units, each containing one chapter on each of the three continents. These units cover different commonly-experienced phenomena among the peoples of the Developing World: imperialism, nationalism, globalization, and development. The first three are chronological, while the last surveys and analyzes the scholarly debates over the causes of development and underdevelopment. Through these chapters Christopher M. White presents a wide-ranging study of the major themes in studies of the developing world, including slavery, imperialism, religion, free and fair trade, democratization and economic development.

Including detailed profiles of key figures as well as maps and illustrations, A Global History of the Developing World vividly illustrates the culture, personalities and histories of a key subject area. A perfect introduction for all students interested in the developing world in a historical context.

Part I

Imperialism

1 Latin America and the Caribbean (1492–1898)

Timeline

1492	Columbus “discovers” the Americas
1500	Pedro Cabral “discovers” Brazil
1519	Hernan Cortez arrives in Mexico
1532	Francisco Pizarro arrives in Peru
1542	The New Laws pass, forbidding Indian slavery
1697	Treaty of Ryswick gives Haiti to French
1791–1804	Haitian war of Independence
1810–1826	Wars of Independence in all Spanish territories except the Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Puerto Rico
1822	Brazilian Independence achieved
1823	Monroe Doctrine declared
1846–1848	The Mexican American War
1868–1898	Cuban wars of Independence
1888	Slavery abolished in Brazil
1898	Spanish American War

1492 and the legacy of Christopher Columbus

Before embarking on the material from this chapter, take some time to consider the following questions:

1 What are your assumptions about Columbus’s role in history?

2 What sources inform your assumptions about him?

3 What level of legitimacy do you ascribe to those sources?

4 What do you gain from believing in these sources?

When Christopher Columbus secured funding for his expedition across the Atlantic Ocean in search of a westward route to Asia, he knew his name would go down in history as one of its greatest discoverers. Indeed, Columbus is considered the greatest discoverer in history by most observers, especially when one considers how often his name is accompanied by the words “discovered America,” but how much do we know about his actions and their consequences? The foregoing set of four questions serves the purpose of prompting students to think about Columbus as an agent of historical change in as many ways as possible. Did he actually “discover” the Americas, or would you use a different verb to describe what he did? Should he be admired for his accomplishments, or should he be vilified? Do you know how answers to these questions might vary within different ethnic groups in the Americas? Or, can you only assume what those answers might be?

October 12, 1992 was the 500th anniversary of Columbus’s arrival, and there were two major camps dedicated to recognizing this event. Anti-Columbus groups pointed to the near depopulation of the native peoples of the Americas and their displacement with Europeans, Africans, and an entire host of people of mixed races, whereas those who championed his legacy chose to focus on what his actions meant for “civilization” and “progress.”

If we examine what we know or think we know about Columbus, the answers are sure to range across the spectrum from positive to negative in a manner unlike many other historical figures whose actions also led to the deaths of millions. People such as Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin are less “controversial” than Columbus because it is next to impossible to make positive arguments about their legacies. The technological and economic advances they oversaw were dwarfed by the tens of millions of people they killed in such a short period of time. In the case of Columbus, we have a figure responsible for bringing the Western and Eastern hemispheres into permanent future contact, which has led to myriad results. Many see this single act as the beginning of the largest scale of human suffering to ever hit the planet. The near extinction of Native Americans and the enslavement of millions of Africans for European profit on the sugar and tobacco plantations, not to mention the silver, diamond, and gold mines of the Americas, is enough fodder for Columbus’s detractors. However, many also see Columbus representing the pinnacle of human progress during Europe’s surge toward global prominence, and they believe he deserves to be among the most celebrated people in history.

This chapter covers 400 years of what resulted from Columbus’s discovery. October 12, 1492, the Italian navigational expert believed he had finally spotted Asia. If he had, the planet would have been nearly half its actual circumference, and Columbus would have fulfilled his initial goal of establishing a trade route benefiting his benefactors, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain. Trade had flourished across the Eastern hemisphere for thousands of years, but the 8,000 mile overland distance from the Iberian Peninsula on the westernmost tip of Europe to the east coast of China has forever been a mountainous obstacle to trade and communication. Columbus did not know it even on his death bed in 1506, after four trips to the New World, but he had failed to complete his mission.

He had, in fact, found a route to an unknown continent (except that the Vikings had settled in modern-day Newfoundland about 500 years prior and then left). Columbus’s letters to Spain spoke of the abundance of gold and the docility of the people he found in the Caribbean islands, which he assumed to be islands just off the coast of Asia. Gold was especially important because it served as currency in the Old World. Elated at the prospect of acquiring both large gold deposits and new souls for conversion to the Catholic faith, the Spanish Crown felt a compulsion to exploit Columbus’ discovery by supporting further voyages. As is well known by now, the resulting influx of European settlers led to armed conflict with the Indigenous peoples of the Caribbean (the Arawaks, Caribs, and Tainos). Though the Europeans held the advantage, this was not due to mere superiority of weapons, intelligence, or military tactics; in fact, 90 percent to 95 percent of all Indigenous peoples died as a result of communicable diseases against which they possessed virtually no immunities. This experience was unique to the colonization of the Americas, for when Europeans conquered much of Africa in the nineteenth century, it was not the Indigenous Africans who died due to European diseases but the other way around.

Pre-Columbian history

The most well-known Latin American civilization was the Olmec, which thrived from approximately 1500 BC to 400 BC in Mexico. The Olmecs also influenced future generations of Mexican and Central American civilizations for centuries to come. The first recorded use of the zero occurred in the Olmec region of influence, known as Mesoamerica in 32 BC and, by this time, the Olmec had faded, and the Maya had risen in its place. The Europeans who later deemed Native Americans inferior failed to see the thousands of examples of the Indigenous peoples, many of which are readily available for observation in archeological sites, museums and books today.

The Olmec cities such as Tres Zapotes and the rest were abandoned in last centuries BC, giving rise to the Maya (in southern Mexico, Yucatan, and northern Central America) and the Teotihuacanos of the Central Valley of Mexico. Large city-states containing enormous pyramids were used for religious and political purposes, demonstrating the intricacies of these new civilizations. The Maya and the Teotihuacanos in particular were known for their trade networks (with Teotihuacan at the center until the seventh century AD), art, and literacy. Teotihuacan is one of the most visited archeological sites in the world today. Just situated outside of Mexico City, it boasted a population of more than 200,000 in the first centuries AD. The Maya had many more cities, however, with a wide variety of structures still intact in Palenque (Mexico), Tikal (Guatemala), and Copan (Honduras), which are visited every day by tourists and researchers. The period in which Teotihuacan and the Maya city states thrived was 300 to 900 AD (the Classic era), and when these cities were abandoned between the eighth and ninth centuries, there began a new era, the Post-Classic Era (1000–1450 AD).

Were these the only major city complexes to speak of in Latin America, they would indeed stand out as exceptional for their uniqueness alone; however, the vast array of ruins left behind by the Inca and pre-Inca peoples of the Andes shatters that notion entirely. One has only to glimpse the stone aqueducts created by the Chavin de Huantar civilization in northern Peru more than 2,900 years ago to understand this. These peoples harnessed the power of hydraulics as they tapped into the water sources of the Andes at heights of up to 14,000 ft. above sea level to divert water for irrigation to the valleys below.

The Chavin peoples ruled northern Peru from 900 BC to 200 BC and included a wide variety of city complexes that helped set in motion a wave of civilization, which was augmented in the south and west by other groups. Eventually, the Inca Empire came to dominate Peru, along with most of Bolivia, Ecuador, and parts of Chile, Colombia, and Argentina. They expanded their reach over the course of one century (1435–1532) and produced such architectural marvels as Cuzco, Sacsayhuaman, Pisac, Ollantaytambo, Machu Picchu, and many others. These were a combination of urban and rural peoples who had adapted extremely well to a harsh environment, again demonstrating how far Native Americans had climbed on the eve of Columbus’s arrival.

The Conquest of the Americas

Hernan Cortez became the most well-known conquistador of his day. A conquistador could be either praised or hated, depending on those whose story was heard the loudest. In the case of Cortez, a strong commander seeking glory for Spain and for himself, the year 1519 would place him in the history books. His 1519–1521 expedition to Mexico by way of Cuba quickly brought down the Aztec Empire so that Spain could enhance its own imperial domain and status within Europe. Cortez and his 500 conquistadors arrived in Mexico in 1519 and soon followed a path through the dense mountain passes and jungles between Veracruz and Mexico City, finally arriving in 1520 at the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. Along the way, Cortez acquired more Indian assistance from people seeking to resist the rule of the Triple Alliance (Aztecs). Most important among them were the fierce Tlaxcalans, who fought Cortez initially and then decided to join forces, adding thousands to the conquistador’s cause. Upon arrival in Tenochtitlan, the Spaniards quickly kidnapped the Triple Alliance ruler, Moctezuma, and used him as a puppet king until fighting broke out between both sides. Moctezuma was killed either by the Spanish or by his own people. Soon, the people of Tenochtitlan drove out the Spanish occupants, killing two-thirds of them in the process.

The Spaniards had left behind an unseen and silent killer. Smallpox spread throughout the city over the course of the next few months, killing one-third of the city’s population. As the epidemic progressed, Cortez recovered his army’s strength by recruiting thousands of Indigenous enemies of the Triple Alliance and building ships. The great battle for Tenochtitlan lasted throughout the summer of 1521 until the Spanish captured the last emperor, Cuauhtemoc, and the city with him. He was tortured and executed soon after.

History is almost always told by the victors but, in this case, we have records from both sides. One of Cortez’s men, Bernal Diaz del Castillo, chronicled his perspective in his book, The Discovery and Conquest of Mexico, 1517–1521. From the Triple Alliance side, we have the Mexican scholar Miguel Leon-Portilla’s rendition of the conquest through his use of native documents and accounts given to sixteenth century Spanish chroniclers. His book, The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico, should be read as a companion piece to Castillo’s.

There were several key differences between the conquests and subsequent colonization efforts carried out against the Aztecs and the Maya. After completing the conquest of Tenochtitlan, the conquistadors had a foothold for conquering the rest of Mexico and Central America. The conquest of the Maya of the Yucatan Peninsula and Central America, however, differed from that of the Triple Alliance because the Maya lived in small city-states and hunter-gatherer tribes. Thus, one definitive battle against a centralized authority would not take place outside of Tenochtitlan. As a result, Spanish control was limited in the Yucatan and, therefore, concentrated much more on the subjugation of Central American and central Mexican Indigenous peoples, and the conquest of the Maya took all of the 1520s to complete.

Cortez’s example was quickly followed in the conquest of the Incas in South America. South America’s greatest civilizations cropped up in the Andes mountains. The Incas were only the latest empire to dominate a large region of the Andes by the time of the arrival of the conquistadors in 1532. The Incas, however, set the bar higher than all of the other Indigenous empires before. Their control stretched more than 3,000 miles from Colombia to Chile along the spine of the Andes. An 18,000-mile road system connected all regions of the Empire to the capital of Cuzco, Peru.

It was not until the arrival of the smallpox epidemic in the 1520s, which had begun in Mexico and made its way south through Central America and finally to South America, that the beginning of the end was signaled. This epidemic killed untold numbers of Incas in the decade prior to Pizarro’s arrival. Both the Inca king and his heir apparent died in quick succession from the epidemic, and the ensuing battle over succession between the brothers Huascar and Atahualpa provided an opportunity for the newly arrived conquistadors serving under Francisco Pizarro to exploit.

Pizarro’s 1532 entrance in the midst of the Inca civil war was one of history’s precipitous moments. Atahualpa, fresh from victory over his brother, no doubt was at the height of his confidence when Pizarro challenged his authority. Atahualpa agreed to meet with the Spaniard in Cajamarca on November 16. There, the Inca lost thousands of men and his own freedom to a Spanish surprise attack. Pizarro had only 165 men, but he had the element of surprise and firearms.

Atahualpa was taken captive, much as Cortez had done with Montezuma in Mexico, and the following year had him executed. With the Inca gone, the Spanish quickly established authority over the former empire. As disease spread throughout the land at a quickening pace throughout the sixteenth century, 90 percent to 95 percent of the Inca’s former subjects perished. The Spanish also forcibly took Inca lands for themselves, often enslaving the Indians to be used for mining and agriculture as they had done in the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central America. By the 1540s, the Spanish had explored and conquered lands throughout the Andes and the west coast of South America, and the Portuguese had control over the east coast of Brazil.

The conquest of the Americas set in motion the Christianization of the native peoples, further empowering the Catholic Church. It also initiated the widespread loss of native lives and territories. The conquest also gained a foothold for Spanish and Portuguese po...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of illustrations
• Introduction: overview of Latin America, Asia, and Africa
• Part I: Imperialism
• Part II: Nationalism
• Part III: Globalization
• Part IV: Development
• Appendix: twentieth-century deaths from major conflicts, repression, genocides, and interventions in the developing world
• Glossary of terms
• Index