Getting Connected: Colonialism

Early Connections - The story of Tenochtitlan

A connection is how places and people are linked together, e.g. trade, transport and information links or political control
Tenochtitlan was the Aztech capital and the site of future Mexico City, when the Spanish first colonisde it in 1519
It had 300,000 residents, five times more than London
Within one genereation under the Spanish ruling, a negative spiral begn to take shape
The crops began to fail and food shortages occured
The natives lost their land to rich Spanish land owners, these natives lived in poor areas
The Spanish cleared forest to make way for farm and housing land

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European countries became wealthy by trading with their colonies, which supplied raw materials, food and labour to their colonisers
The European nations became the leading manufactures of these goods recieved from the colonies
The colonies had considerable impacts;
By 1560, Spain had overthrown the powerful Aztec and Inca empires of Central and South America, gaining precious land and metals
In the Caribbean, profitable sugar cane plantations replaced subsistence food crops grown for local people. Britain and France controlled most of the Caribbean islands, using slaves from Africa to work the land
In Latin America, 8 million slaves were brought to Brazil alone between 1550 and 1850. The impact of removing millions of young men and women was to impoverish (make a person or area poor) formerly wealthy and powerful African empires

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It is used to explain the processw by which some countries become wealthy and others poor
Global core areas include; North America, Europe and Japan
They own 80% of global goods and services
Earns the highest incomes
Makes the most decisions about th global economy
Provides global investment
yet, the perphery is usally distant from core markets, they;
Consume 20% of global goods and services
erans the lowest incomes (2.5 billion live under $2 a day)
Makes the fewest decisions about global economy
Provides little global investment
Recent shifts in industry mean that manufactoring has fallen in core areas and has moved to periphery areas (the fall of primary and secondary jobs in core called deurbanisation) this is because it provides cheaper labour
Also, due to the new global connections, the periphery do have all the raw materials and manufactoring factories but these are owned mostly by TNC's (Transnational Companies) who are mostly based in the coremeanig the invesment and decision making remains in the core too

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Disconnected means that some countres become less influential and less involved in economic decision-making
The flow of wealth from colonisers into their colonies prevented them from developing beyond the colonisers, making them economically disconnected
Core nations depend on their investments in the periphery for increased wealth
The periphery nations depend on the core nations for their development and grew export goods like tobacco and cloth, instead of subsistence food crops - they depend on each other, this is known as the dependancy theory
A few side effects of colonalism has been beneifical, such as India's extensive railway system, that the English built
But those with colonial ties have not gone far with their independence, today most African states are dependant on Europe for their trade
In the 1980's, 75% of Guatemala's cotton crop was exported. The money was used to buy pesticides, machines and equipment for next years crop
However, if Guatemala had processed the raw cotton into finished clothes, and then exported them instead, the country would have made far more profit
Only 1% of the land devoted to growing cotton would have been needed to produce the same income as just selling the raw cotton
With this they could have grown subsistence crops, but now cheaper suppliers have killed their trade and cotton is now exported into Guatemala for clothes making

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The end of WW2 led to the spread of Communism is Eastern Europe, China and North Korea, the US attempted to tackle it with its Modernisation theory. This is the means by which the world would be more economically uniform, suing Western investment which aimed to reduce poverty
American overseas aid, invesment and loans were granted to those countries "at risk" from communism, this included Japan, South Korea, Mexico, the Philippeans, Tawian and Thailand, many of whom were ex-colonies and their economic development inproved rapidly
India introduced the Green Revolution during the 1940's-1970's with high-yielding cereals and modern farming techniques. Although tying farmers into buying machinary, fertilisers and seeds from the US, it increased output and input incomes and helped prevent communist revolution

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There was a rapid increase in population in developing countries, largely due to aid, this included;
A rapid decline in death rates and increased life expectancy
Vaccinations, improved water supplies and diets decreased infant mortailty
Birth rates falling more slowly than death rates
Growing youhtful populations, which provided a large work force
Children being seen as economic assets (120 million chidlren are in the work force in developing countries)

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