Your teacher may have just jumped straight straight into the The Great War (WWI). But there were definitely some shifting power dynamics going on prior to 1914--the start of the The War. Thanks to industrialization and overseas colonies, most of the Western Hemisphere - Great Britain, France, and the Netherlands, for example - is dominating the global political order. Old friends such as major land empires (Ottomans, Austria-Hungary, Russian Empire, and the Qing Dynasty later on) were replaced by new rising powers like Japan (post-Meiji Restoration) and the US (recently acquiring the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam). However, although World War I exacerbated problems around the world at the turn of the century (especially in Russia and the Ottoman Empire), but it’s worth a look at the four 'hot-spots' in the world prior to the Great War. So, for the sake of efficiency we will focus on Mexico, Russia, the Ottomans, and the Qing dynasty in China.
Objective:
A. Explain how internal and external factors contributed to change in various states after 1900.
Theme:
A. GOV (Governance)
Skills:
A. GOV
Explain how internal and external factors contributed to change in various states after 1900.
HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT
The West (Europe + U.S.A.) dominated the global political order at the beginning of the 20th century, while both land-based and maritime empires gave way to new states by the century’s end. The older, land-based Ottoman, Russian, and Qing empires collapsed due to a combination of internal and external factors. These changes in Russia eventually led to communist States around the world challenged the existing political and social order, including the Mexican Revolution that arose as a result of political crisis.