World's history (part 15): 21st century[edit] Depiction of theInternet, a source of informationandcommunication Main article:21st century The 21st century has been marked byeconomic globalization, with consequent risk to interlinked economies, and by the expansion of communications with mobile phonesand the Internet. Worldwidedemandandcompetitionforresourceshas risen due to growing populations and industrialization, mainly in India, China and Brazil. This demand is causing increased levels of environmental degradation and a growing threat of global warming.[197]That in turn has spurred the development of alternate or renewablesources ofenergy(notablysolar energyand wind energy), proposals for cleanerfossil fueltechnologies, and consideration of expanded use of nuclear energy(somewhat dampened bynuclear plant accidents).[198][199][200]

World's history (part 14): Contemporary history[edit] Main article:Contemporary history 1900–1945[edit] Main article:20th century Further information:Interwar period,Roaring Twenties, andGreat Depression World War Istatictrench warfare, western Europe History's only use ofnuclear weaponsin war— Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 1945 The 20th century[148][149][150]opened withEuropeat an apex of wealth and power, and with much of the world under its direct colonialcontrol or its indirect domination.[151]Much of the rest of the world was influenced by heavily Europeanized nations: the United Statesand Japan.[152]As the century unfolded, however, the global system dominated by rival powers was subjected to severe strains, and ultimately yielded to a more fluid structure of independent nations organized on Western models. This transformation wascatalysedbywarsof unparalleled scope and devastation.World War I [153]destroyed many of Europe's empires and monarchies, and weakenedBritainand France.[154]In its aftermath, powerful ideologies arose. TheRussian Revolution[155][156][157]of 1917 created the first communiststate, while the 1920s and 1930s sawmilitaristicfascist dictatorships gain control inItaly,Germany,Spainand elsewhere.[158] Ongoing national rivalries, exacerbated by the economic turmoil of theGreat Depression, helped precipitate World War II.[159][160]ThemilitaristicdictatorshipsofEuropeandJapan pursued an ultimately doomed course ofimperialistexpansionism. Their defeat opened the way for the advance of communismintoCentral Europe,Yugoslavia,Bulgaria,Romania,Albania, China,North VietnamandNorth Korea. 1945–2000[edit] Main article:20th century AfterWorld War IIended in 1945, theUnited Nationswas founded in the hope of allaying conflicts among nations and preventing future wars. [161][162]The war had, however, left two nations, the United States[163]and theSoviet Union, with principal power to guide international affairs. [164]Each was suspicious of the other and feared a global spread of the other's political-economic model. This led to the Cold War, a forty-five year stand-off between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies. With the development of nuclear weapons[165]and the subsequent arms race, all of humanity were put at risk ofnuclear warbetween the two superpowers. [166]Such warbeing viewed as impractical,proxy warswere instead waged, at the expense of non-nuclear-armed Third Worldcountries. TheCold Warlasted to the 1990s, when the Soviet Union's communist system began to collapse, unable to compete economically with the United States and western Europe; the Soviets' Central European"satellites"reasserted their national sovereignty, and in 1991 the Soviet Unionitselfdisintegrated.[167][168][169]The United States for the time being was left as the"sole remaining superpower". [170][171][172] In the early postwar decades, theAfricanandAsiancolonies of the Belgian, British, Dutch, French and other west European empires won their formal independence. [173][174]These nations faced challenges in the form ofneocolonialism, poverty, illiteracy andendemictropical diseases .[175][176] ManyWesternandCentral Europeannations gradually formed a political and economic community, theEuropean Union, which expanded eastward to include former Soviet satellites. [177][178][179][180] LastMoonlanding —Apollo 17(1972) The 20th century saw explosive progress inscienceandtechnology, and increasedlife expectancy andstandard of livingfor much of humanity. As the developed world shifted from a coal-based to apetroleum-based economy, new transport technologies, along with the dawn of the Information Age,[181]led to increasedglobalization.[182][183][184]Space explorationreached throughout the solar system. The structure ofDNA, the template oflife, was discovered, [185][186][187]and thehuman genomewas sequenced, a major milestone in the understanding of human biologyand the treatment ofdisease.[188][189][190][191][192]Global literacyrates continued to rise, and the percentage of the world'slaborpool needed to produce humankind'sfoodsupply continued to drop. The technologies of sound recordings, motion pictures, and radio and television broadcasting produced a means for rapid dissemination of information and entertainment. Then, in the last decade of the twentieth century, a rapid increase took place in the use of computers, including personal ones. A global communication network emerged in theInternet. The century saw several man-made global threats emerge or become more serious or widely recognized, including nuclear proliferation,global climate change,[193][194]deforestation,overpopulation, near-Earth asteroids and comets,[195]and the dwindling of globalnatural resources(particularlyfossil fuels).[196]

World's history (part 13): Portugal claimed Brazil. Spain claimed the rest ofSouth America,Mesoamerica, and southernNorth America. Britain colonized the east coast of North America, and France colonized the central region of North America. Russia made incursions onto the northwest coast of North America, with a first colony in present-day Alaskain 1784,[134]and the outpost ofFort Rossin present-dayCaliforniain 1812.[135]In 1762, in the midst of the Seven Years War, France secretly ceded most of its North American claims to Spain in theTreaty of Fontainebleau. Thirteen of the British colonies declared independence as the United States of Americain 1776, ratified by theTreaty of Parisin 1783, ending the American Revolutionary War.Napoleon Bonapartewon France’s claims back from Spain in theNapoleonic Warsin 1800, but sold them to the United States in 1803 as the Louisiana Purchase. InRussia,Ivan IV(“the Terrible”) was crowned (1547) the firstTsarof Russia, and by annexing the Turkic Khanates in the east, transformed Russia into a regional power. The countries of western Europe, while expanding prodigiously through technological advancement and colonial conquest, competed with each other economically and militarily in a state of almost constant war. Often the wars had a religious dimension, either Catholic versus Protestant, or (primarily in eastern Europe) Christian versus Muslim. Wars of particular note include the Thirty Years War, theWar of the Spanish Succession, theSeven Years War, and theFrench Revolutionary Wars . Napoleon came to power in France in 1799, an event foreshadowing the Napoleonic Wars of the early 19th century. Modern period[edit] Main article:Modern history Further information:18th century and 19th century TheScientific Revolutionchanged humanity's understanding of the world and led to theIndustrial Revolution, a major transformation of the world's economies. [113][136]TheScientific Revolutionin the 17th century had made little immediate impact on industrialtechnology; only in the second half of the 18th century did scientific advances begin to be applied significantly to practical invention. The Industrial Revolution began in Great Britainand used new modes of production — thefactory,mass production, andmechanisation — to manufacture a wide array of goods faster and using less labour than previously. The Age of Enlightenment also led to the beginnings of modern democracyin the late-18th century AmericanandFrench Revolutions.Democracyandrepublicanismwould grow to have a profound effect on world events and on quality of life. After Europeans had achieved influence and control over the Americas, theimperialactivities of the West turned to the lands of the East and Asia. [137][138]In the 19th century the European states had social and technological advantage over Eastern lands.[139]Britain gained control of the Indian subcontinent,Egyptand theMalay Peninsula;[140]theFrench took Indochina; while the Dutch cemented their control over the Dutch East Indies. The British also colonizedAustralia,New ZealandandSouth Africawith large numbers of British colonists emigrating to these colonies. [140]Russia colonised large pre-agricultural areas of Siberia.[141][142]In the late 19th century, the European powers divided the remaining areas of Africa. Within Europe, economic and military challenges created a system ofnation states, and ethno-linguistic groupings began to identify themselves as distinctive nationswith aspirations for cultural and political autonomy. This nationalismwould become important to peoples across the world in the 20th century. During the Industrial Revolution, the world economy became reliant oncoalas a fuel, as new methods oftransport, such asrailwaysand steamships, effectively shrank the world.[136]Meanwhile, industrialpollutionandenvironmentaldamage, present since the discovery of fire and the beginning of civilization, accelerated drastically. The advantages that Europe had developed by the mid-18th century were two: anentrepreneurialculture,[139][143]and the wealth generated by the Atlantictrade[139](including theAfrican slave trade). By the late 16th century,silverfrom the Americas accounted for the Spanish empire's wealth. [144]The profits of theslave tradeand ofWest Indianplantations amounted to 5% of theBritish economyat the time of the Industrial Revolution.[145]While some historians conclude that, in 1750,labour productivityin the most developed regions of China was still on a par with that of Europe's Atlantic economy (see the NBER Publications by Carol H. Shiue and Wolfgang Keller [146]), other historians like Angus Maddisonhold that the per-capita productivity ofwestern Europehad by the lateMiddle Agessurpassed that of all other regions. [147]

World's history (part 12): Regional developments[edit] Persiacame under the rule of theSafavid Empirein 1501, succeeded by theAfsharid Empirein 1736, and theQajar Empirein 1796. Areas to the north and east were held by UzbeksandPashtuns. TheOttoman Empire, after takingConstantinoplein 1453, quickly gained control of the Middle East, theBalkans, and most ofNorth Africa. Elsewhere inAfrica, this period saw a decline in many civilizations and an advancement in others. TheSwahili Coastdeclined after coming under Portuguese (and later Omani) control. In west Africa, theSonghai Empirefell to the Moroccans in 1591 when they invaded with guns. The South African Kingdom of Zimbabwegave way to smaller kingdoms such asMutapa,Butua, andRozwi.Ethiopiasuffered from the 1531 invasion from neighboring Muslim Adal Sultanate, and in 1769 entered theZemene Mesafint(Age of Princes) during which the Emperor became a figurehead and the country was ruled by warlords, though the royal line later would recover under Emperor Tewodros II. The Ajuuraan Empire, in theHorn of Africa, began to decline in the 17th century, succeeded by theGeledi Sultanate. Other civilizations in Africa advanced during this period. The Oyo Empireexperienced its golden age, as did theBenin Empire. TheAshanti Empirerose to power in what is modern day Ghanain 1670. TheKingdom of Kongoalso thrived during this period.European exploration of Africareached its zenith at this time. In the Far East, theChineseMing Dynastygave way (1644) to theQing, the last Chinese imperial dynasty, which would rule until 1912. Japanexperienced itsAzuchi-Momoyama period(1568 – 1603), followed by theEdo period(1603-1868). TheKoreanJoseon Dynasty (1392-1910) ruled throughout this period, successfully repelling 16th- and 17th-century invasions from Japan and China. Japan and China were significantly affected during this period by expanded maritime trade with Europe, particularly the Portuguese in Japan. During the Edo period, Japan would pursue isolationist policies, to eliminate foreign influences. On theIndian subcontinent, theDelhi Sultanateand theDeccan Sultanateswould give way, beginning in the 16th century, to theMughal Empire . Starting in the northwest, the Mughal Empire would by the late 17th century come to rule the entire subcontinent,[133]except for the southernmost Indian provinces, which would remain independent. Against the Muslim Mughal Empire, the Hindu Maratha Empirewas founded on the west coast in 1674, gradually gaining territory – a majority of present-day India—from the Mughals over several decades, particularly in the Deccan Wars(1681-1701). The Maratha Empire would fall to the British in 1818, under the control of theBritish East India Company , with all former Maratha and Mughal authority devolving to theBritish Rajin 1858. In 1511, the Portuguese overthrew theSultanate of Malaccain present-dayMalaysiaandIndonesianSumatra. The Portuguese held this important trading territory (and the valuable associated navigational strait) until overthrown by the Dutch in 1641. The Johor Sultanate, centered on the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, became the dominant trading power in the region. European colonizationwould affect the whole of Southeast Asia – the British in BurmaandMalaysia, the French inIndochina, the Dutch in theNetherlands East Indies, and the Spanish in the Philippines. OnlyThailandwould successfully resist colonization. The Pacific islands ofOceaniawould also be affected by European contact, starting with the circumnavigational voyage ofFerdinand Magellan , who landed on theMarianasand other islands in 1521. Also notable were the voyages (1642–44) ofAbel Tasmanto present-day Australia,New Zealandand nearby islands, and the voyages (1768-1779) of CaptainJames Cook, who made the first recorded European contact with Hawaii. Britain would found its first colony on Australia in 1788. In theAmericas, thewestern European powersvigorously colonized the newly discovered continents, largely displacing theindigenous populations , and destroying the advanced civilizations of theAztecsand theInca. Spain, Portugal, Britain, and France all made extensive territorial claims, and undertook large-scale settlement, including the importation of large numbers of African slaves.

World's history (part 11): European expansion[edit] Further information:History of Europe, Age of Discovery, Colonialism, 16th century, and 17th century World map byOrtelius, 1570, incorporating new discoveries by Europeans Movable-typeprinting pressarose in mid-15th century. 50 years later, nine million books were in print. During this period, European powers came to dominate most of the world. One theory of why that happened holds that Europe's geographyplayed an important role in its success. The Middle East,IndiaandChinaare all ringed bymountainsandoceansbut, once past these outer barriers, are nearly flat. By contrast, the Pyrenees,Alps,Apennines,Carpathiansand other mountain ranges run through Europe, and the continent is also divided by several seas. This gave Europe some degree of protection from the peril of Central Asianinvaders. Before the era of firearms, these nomads were militarily superior to the agricultural states on the periphery of the Eurasiancontinent and, if they broke out into the plains of northern India or the valleys of China, were all but unstoppable. These invasions were often devastating. The Golden Age of Islam [114]was ended by theMongolsack of Baghdadin 1258. India and China were subject to periodic invasions, andRussiaspent a couple of centuries under theMongol-Tataryoke. Centralandwestern Europe, logistically more distant from theCentral Asianheartland, proved less vulnerable to these threats. Geography contributed to important geopoliticaldifferences. For most of their histories, China, India and the Middle East were each unified under a single dominant power that expanded until it reached the surrounding mountains and deserts. In 1600 the Ottoman Empire[115]controlled almost all the Middle East, theMing Dynastyruled China, [116][117]and theMughal Empireheld sway over India. By contrast, Europe was almost always divided into a number of warring states. Pan-European empires, with the notable exception of the Roman Empire, tended to collapse soon after they arose. Another doubtless important geographic factor in the rise of Europe was the Mediterranean Sea, which, for millennia, had functioned as a maritime superhighway fostering the exchange of goods, people, ideas and inventions. Nearly all the agricultural civilizations have been heavily constrained by theirenvironments. Productivity remained low, and climaticchanges easily instigatedboom-and-bustcyclesthat brought about civilizations'rise and fall. By about 1500, however, there was a qualitative change in world history. Technologicaladvance and thewealthgenerated bytradegradually brought about a widening of possibilities. [118][119][120][121][122][123][124][125][126][127][128]Many have also argued that Europe's institutions allowed it to expand, [129][130]thatproperty rightsandfree-market economics were stronger than elsewhere due to an ideal offreedompeculiar to Europe. In recent years, however, scholars such as Kenneth Pomeranzhave challenged this view, although this revisionist approach to world historyhas been met with criticism for systematically"downplaying"European achievements. [131]Europe's maritime expansion unsurprisingly — given the continent's geography — was largely the work of its Atlantic states: Portugal,Spain,England,France, and theNetherlands. Initially thePortuguese andSpanish Empireswere the predominant conquerors and sources of influence, and their union resulted in theIberian Union,[132]the first global empire, on which the"sun never set". Soon the more northernEnglish,FrenchandDutchbegan to dominate theAtlantic. In a series of wars fought in the 17th and 18th centuries, culminating with the Napoleonic Wars, Britain emerged as the new world power.