The political emancipation of the bourgeoisie

The political emancipation of the bourgeoisie

        « Political questions are far too serious to be left to the politicians. » Said Hannah Arentdth in her book Men in dark times from 1968. Hannah Arendt Bluecher born on the 14th October 1906 and died on the 4th December 1975 was a German philosopher and political theorist. Arendt was a jewish women in a war thorn nazi germany and unsurprisingly got caught by the gestapo and was briefly emprisonned. Opon her release, she quickly flead to Czechoslovakia and Switzerland before settling in Paris. She philosophized about a wide range of topics such as cultures, violence, the banality of evil, and totalitarianism. To this day, she is regarded as one of the most influencial philosopher of the twenties centuary.

Today we will be asking ourselves : What was the impact and reasoning behind  colonization during the imerialist era and who gained from this expansion ?

The answer this, we will be dividing this commentary in 3 parts. Firstly, we will present the 2 rueling powers, secondly, focusing on the expantion of the Nation-State and lastly the Impact of the Nation-State on the colonies.

1. Two rueling powers during the imerialist era

1. The bourgeoisie
2. The nation-State

1. Expansion

1. The exansion mindset.
2. The real benefit for expansion.

1. Impact of the Nation-State on the colonies

1. Imorality of conquest
2. The effects of colonization on the colonies

1. Two rueling powers during the imperialist era

1. The bourgeoisie

During the 19th century, society was highly hierarchized. One of the most influential and powerful memeber of this time was the bourgeoisie, which consisted of bankers, industrialists of landowners. We are told in the first paragraph that the bourgeoisie is, and i quote : « the first class in history to achieve economic pre-eminence without aspiring to political rule. » The bourgeoisie’s main goal was not political power like many other classes. Rather, the bourgeoisie was mearly looking to earn their own money and have growing powerful families. We are told, line 4, i quote : « bourgeoisie had already established itself as the rueling class, it had left all political decisions to the state. » We can see here that the Nation-State as well as the bourgeoisie developed alongside each other.  

1. The Nation-State

The dictionnary defines a Nation-State as « a sovereign state of which most of the citizens or subjects are united also by factors which define a nation, such as language or common descent. » So in other terms it reffers to the countries during the 18th and 19th centuary.

1. Expansion

1. The exansion mindset.

To honnor the words of Philip the 2nd « Orbis non suffictit » or Cecil Rhodes « Expansion is everything » which he goes on to add « I would annex the planets if I could » This hyperbole illustrates the mindset of the Nation-State during the 19th centuary which was that the more colonies you had, the more powerful your empire was. This than lead to a « race to expasion » of sorts. To illustrate this we can take for example the sramble for africa where European powers despreatly tried to get as much of the african territory under control.

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