East Asian Reaction to European Presence Essay

Before the arrival of western powers, China was very stable, agricultural, and ethnocentric. They had many factories that produced silk, cotton, and porcelain with their natural resources: salt, tin, silver, and iron mines. They had no interest of trade or interaction with foreigners. From the early eighteenth century, European and American Imperialism spread throughout China with a goal to extend their nation’s power. China was one of many territories that undertook the changes of New Imperialism. By 1912, the country was governed by outside nations: Great Britain (mostly), Russia, Germany, France, and Japan. Their influence on China resulted malignantly on the country’s economy, political ties, and lifestyle; in spite of the few

While differing ecomically and politically in their responses to western penetration, Japan and China had similarities in the way of geography. China only allowed Europeans to trade with it in a limited number of ports and cities, which limited the amount of goods Europeans were allowed to transfer overseas. Japan isolated itself as a whole from trade for an entire decade, and when it did open it was cautious towards westerners. Additionally, both were bordered by the ocean at least to a certain extent – Japan was surrounded entirely, being an island, by water, and a large percentage of China’s borders was water. It is because of this that the third similarity arose – both did trade by ocean. China with Britain, simply because it was the easiest, cheapest, and most efficient form of travel between the two, and Japan because there was obviously no choice considering Japan is an island. These geographical similarities arose purely from the coincidence that both were bordered by the ocean, which created the necessity for boats and by the time the opportunity for trade

In the time period from 1450-1750, Asia began to use multiple strategies to to build their empires. Many aspects of their culture including their government, religion, and education were refined and changed. During their time period, Europe began to move into Asia in order to gain influence. While the empires of Eastern Asia focused more on their governments and education, the Europeans came and attempt to spread their religious ideas, especially Catholic countries.

As individual European countries scrambled to gain more territory to add to their Empires, Japan feared the changes that visiting countries brought. When other countries visited Japan with imports to trade they also brought with them a new religion, Christianity. Japanese Emperors feared the chaos that a new religion would bring and decided to shut the rest of the world out. Only the Dutch were allowed to trade with the Japanese as a need remained to be informed of the rest of the world and medical advances.

Foreign trade is one of the most important aspects of Asian and European Empires. Without trade, these empires would not have flourished in the manner that they did. Many different factors played a role in developing trade in their cultures. As various empires ruled from 2000 BC to 1911 in Asia and Europe, trade has had a major influence in the development of those cultures as seen today. The nation that has the most success in trading becomes the strongest nation and will last the longest.

4. The Portuguese viewed the Atlantic Ocean islands as the perfect location for the cultivation of

The process of the Western Expansion into South East Asia occurred in two phases. These two phases can be characterized by their unique features, which differentiated them from one another. Historical records have shown that, the expansion was facilitated by the major Western Imperial powers, as known as: The United States of America, Holland, Britain, and France. In addition, historical doctrine have shown that, there were certain economic and social factors that facilitated the occurrence of the differences between their first and the second phase of the expansion into the South East Asia (Schoppa, pg.23, 2008). This discussion will focus on the differences between the first and the second phases of the expansion, as well as the factors that facilitated the occurrence of these differences.

The controversial scholarly journal of Robert S Wolff explores the history of the first trade encounters between the Portuguese in Africa and Asia, controversy lying in its separation from the Western narrative. Throughout the article, the author is trying to figure out the motives or other considerations playing a role behind the actions of Portuguese and other Europeans, such as choosing violent ways of making a profit in the lands of Africa and Asia, rather than using the existing trade networks, to emerge as the world ruler. In his view, Europeans had claimed themselves to be the “center of the world” way before they have risen to that title. European countries were looking for profitable trade in wealthy lands full of gold, consequently lack of resources and other valuable goods became a barrier to their success in the already existing channels.This is seen in da Gamma’s first encounter with the local ruler of Calicut, where his gifts were considered substandard to that of the poorest merchant, as seen by the local advisor.

China and Japan had similar but different experiences with the Western civilization. China and Japan reacted differently to the Western nations and it was China’s reactions to the West that would break the Chinese’s isolation leaving their traditions behind. The Industrial trade in Europe and the United States had created a gap between Asia and the West, This left china and Japan far behind technologically and they were not able to stand up against the western nations and although at different times China and Japan both ended up having to sign unequal treaties, and to open their ports for merchants.

Tokugawa Ieyasu was worried because he saw many of the Europeans starting colonies in many of the regions that they had explored. To make sure that he kept Japan safe and powerful, he decided to let all the foreign ships headed to Japan to land at one port. This port was at the island of Deshima in the Nagasaki Bay. So when Tokugawa Iemistu decided to implement the closed country policy for Japan he decided to apply his grandfather’s ideas even more. This is shown as he expelled all foreigners for Japan as he didn’t want the westerners to influence the Japanese. He also made sure that no foreigners were allowed to land their ships in Japan, this was except for the Dutch and the chinese who had assisted the Japanese in battle. Another reason for the introduction of the closed country policy was Tokugawa was apprehensive that the Christians particularly the Christians Daimyo would follow their spiritual leader rather than following and viewing the Shogun as their ultimate authority. Fearing that he would lose all control of Japan he decided to isolate japan and introduce a series of edicts called the closed country policy. Tokugawa had many reasons why he introduced the Closed country policy, they were that he wanted to be able to say in control of japan without anyone trying to over throw him and that he wanted everyone to follow his beliefs and to not be

The nineteenth century was a turbulent time of western imperialism and a major Asian power shift. European powers and the United States had a destabilizing effect on the region and the choices Japan and China made in response their imposing expansion was a major contributor to the trajectory of their respective futures. Social factors, such as the differences in national and religious unity, also played a role in the how the two nations emerged from the Age of Imperialism.

In 1453, trade between Europeans and Asians was suddenly stopped by the Ottomans which separated the two groups. European trade with Asians was very profitable, and to stop trade between them completely would be a devastating blow to the Europeans, like how in present day, if China suddenly put an end to their trade with the US, the US would be crippled. This end to trade by the Ottomans caused more and more Europeans to look for alternate trade routes to Asia, mainly by sea.

This relocation was not only due to the stop of relations with Portuguese before settled in Nagasaki but in particular due to a politic strategy of subtract power from regional daimyo. In fact, Hirado was under the control of a regional daimyo while Nagasaki was under the direct control of the bakufu and therefore more convenient to increase control and central power. In addition to this, it is also important to say that the Japanese were interested in trading with Westerners, too. Therefore, these restrictions were made with anything but a xenophobic intent just to eliminate any kind of Western presence from Japan, but more precisely to preserve the control from a European aspect, the religion, that represented a highly unsettling aspect in the making of it. In fact, by maintaining trading with the Dutch they were able to know whatever was happening in Europe and in particular to receive information and technologies unknown to Japan. An important example is the Rangaku (literally ‘Dutch learnings’, but more in general Western learnings) that permitted the Japanese to stay acquainted with Western technology and

Unlike many other European countries that sought out the territory in Southeast Asia merely for increasing their power through trade, the French first began interactions with the region as early as the 17th century. Alexandre De Rhodes began an expedition to the Southeast Asia region with the desire to expand the Jesuit missionaries throughout the region to further their belief. For many years until the 18th century, the Jesuits expanded and created many missionaries throughout the region. The 18th century had brought an astronomical expansion in the trading markets throughout Europe and Asia as all the European superpowers began colonizing all of Southeast Asia to further their trading “empires.” The French would also begin to

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