Traditionalist versus Reformist among Colonial Powers

893 Words2 Pages

Traditionalist and Reformers continually clashed during the 1800’s through the mid 1940’s. Traditionalist wanted to keep all western influence out, while the reformist concluded that without reform their societies would continually be dominated by the west. The Reformist was generally more successful in eventually establishing independence with some exceptions. The era of western imperialism in Asia was gradual as the western powers being the Dutch at first and then the British created unfair treaties with the Chinese, Japanese, and other Asian countries. One of the most oppressive controls the British had over the Chinese had to do with the Opium trade. The Chinese emperor was aggravated with the continual British importation of opium into china which was ravaging the Chinese country. Many Chinese were becoming addicted to Opium. The tension between the British and Chinese came to a clash in the Opium War 1839-1842. After the war the treaty of Nanjing was imposed on the Chinese to pay for Britain’s war expenses and provided Britain with Hong Kong. Out of these events nationalism began to grow in China and many Chinese came to see the emperor as ineffective. After settling many internal problems the Chinese reformers began the “Self strengthening” movement. This movement’s goal was to reform China using modern European techniques. Many of the reformist and traditionalist came into conflict with each other. One such conflict which is still known as one of the bloodiest wars was the taiping rebellion. The leader of the rebellion was Hong Xiuquan a Chinese religious leader. The reformers slowly gained their goals as the Chinese monarchy was overthrown after the disasters Sino-Japanese war and the Boxer rebellion. The Japanese... ... middle of paper ... ...orms to transform his country into a modern secular country. Many Islamic leaders and traditionalist opposed Mustafa, but due to his high reputation of defending Turkey he was popular with most of Turkey. Mustafa established laws based on the European laws and dissolved the Islamic courts and schools. Due to his great reforms and transformation of Turkey he was awarded the surname of Ataturk “father of the Turks” by the National Assembly. The traditionalist and reformers often came into conflict on both nations of Africa and Asia. As one can see the countries in question would not have been able to gain independence had it not been for modern reformist methods. Although the reformist are often the most known and were most successful in their respective countries traditionalist also helped to keep their countries values. Works Cited History of World Scocieties

Open Document