Age of Imperialism: Chapter 1: Why Empire?

Hey there! James Hay here, son of John Hay. My dad proposed the Open Door Policy to allow free trade in Chinese ports under European control. He's pretty involved with this whole 'American Imperialism' thing so I hear a lot about everything going on. Lately he's been taking a lot about all of the factors needed in order to be successful with imperialism. I think he said there were four different factors: economic, political, social, and military. Seems like too much stuff to worry about. No thanks! But anyway, some of the economic reasons are about the exports of farm and other products. These exports have been the basis of our American economic growth and what the colonies have survived off of. Exports such as tobacco, indigo, lumber, and through the 19th century, cotton, corn, wheat, and other goods. Now, thanks to new technology, we have improved our methods of transportation and communication, and now trade moved much more quickly. Our trade has grown so huge that people are growing to believe that America has grown to the point that they could also compete or even outsell other foreign manufacturers in the World Market. Now, some political reasons as to America's imperialism are simple that America desired to be a greater power. Many believed that a great nation like this need colonies and the U.S. decided it needed island colony in the Pacific to help out the navy. We needed the Panama canal built and controlled to also service the navy. The victory from the Spanish-American war gave the U.S. colonies like the Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico. The social factors my father has been talking about are similar to Social Darwinism, or survival of the fittest, where certain races and nations are superior to other. It is also the assumption that conflict between social groups in society leads to social progress as superior groups weed out the inferior ones. Americans believe that we were responsible for bringing things to the table like industry, democracy. and Christianity to less developed, 'savage' societies. Finally, the military reasons for the Imperialism were just simply that in order to become superior and to rule an empire, you need a strong, stable military.