Europe did not enjoy a technological and economic advantage over Asia until the end of the 18th century, but the development of modern science gave European countries an edge and became a means of justifying imperialism. However, despite its contribution to scientific and technological advancement, imperialism cannot be justified because it was carried out in an unethical and harmful way to the public good.
Between 1500 and 1850, Europe did not enjoy a technological, political, military, or economic advantage over Asian powers. By 1775, Asia was powerful enough to control 80% of the world’s economy, but between 1750 and 1850, the world’s center of power shifted from Asia to Europe. The cause of this shift was modern science. Modern science enabled European countries to utilize technology effectively. Not only that, but European countries also used science and technology to justify their colonization. In his book Sapiens, Yuval Harari argues that science gave ideological legitimacy to the imperialist project. But can modern scientific and technological advances justify imperialism?
It is undeniable that science and technology have been advanced through imperialism. Military purposes were paramount, which led to extreme advances in military technology, and colonial exploration led to many scientific discoveries. However, imperialism has also caused many people to suffer, and both the colonized and the ruling nations have a troubled history. With such ambivalence, can imperialism be justified in the name of scientific and technological advancement as intended by European nations?
Before we discuss the legitimacy of imperialism, let’s take a look at the scientific and technological advancements during the period of imperialism. First, let’s look at technological advances in terms of military technology. According to Daniel R. Hedrick’s book, Science, Technology, and Imperialism, the classic military technology that spawned imperialism was the steamship. Steamships were invented in the United States in the early 1800s, and after 1811, steamships gradually increased in Europe. These ships were able to reach the interior of Asia and Africa, making it easier for European countries to invade distant countries and emphasize European superiority. Second, let’s look at the advancement of science. According to Yuval Harari’s Homo sapiens, in 1831, the British Royal Navy sent the survey ship Beagle to map the coast of South America, the Falkland Islands, and the Galapagos Islands. The expedition included geographer Charles Darwin, who collected empirical data during the voyage. This led to his theory of evolution, which changed the course of human history. In addition to important scientific discoveries such as evolution, there were also scientific discoveries made through the study of the religions, languages, and plants of the conquered nations. In this way, science and technology were both developed through imperialism and shaped by imperialism. This shows that science and technology developed rapidly and diversely through imperialism.
As we have seen, imperialism has played a role in the development of science and technology, but I do not believe that the development of science and technology justifies imperialism. I will present two main arguments for this claim. The first is that imperialism contributed to the development of science and technology, but it was not the decisive factor. It is possible that science and technology would not have been as advanced without imperialism, but only at a slower rate. There were many scientific discoveries outside of the imperial period, such as Newton’s laws of universal gravitation and motion and Avogadro’s law. Since scientific discoveries are mainly driven by human curiosity, science and technology would have progressed slowly even without imperialism, so we can see that imperialism was not an indispensable factor in the development of science and technology.
The second argument is that imperialism is not justified by the fact that it contributed to the development of science and technology. There are two reasons for this. The first is that while imperialism did advance science and technology, it did so in an unethical way. In the 21st century, no country invades another country to study its geography, language, etc. Nor does any country allow research that violates human rights. If imperialism was an ethical way to advance science and technology, scientific research would be conducted in a similar way today. However, if you try to do science the imperialist way, it would not be accepted in the modern world. This shows that imperialism is an unethical way to advance science and technology.
The second reason is that while imperialism advanced science and technology, it also used it for nefarious purposes. This was mainly to justify racism, which was unethical. In Homo sapiens, Yuval Harari explains that biologists, anthropologists, and even linguists provided scientific evidence that Europeans were superior to all other races and had a right to rule over the countries they controlled. For example, European scholars portrayed the Aryans as a race that emerged to lay the foundations of culture throughout the world, arguing that Europeans were superior to the people of the countries they controlled. These racist theories persisted for a long time, which shows that imperialism justified racism by using science for the wrong reasons.
In conclusion, while imperialism may have contributed to scientific and technological advancement, it was not the determining factor in scientific and technological advancement, nor was it an ethical and public good approach to scientific and technological advancement. It also leads to the conclusion that imperialism cannot be justified in the name of scientific and technological advancement.
