European imperial dominance of much of the
globe, of Africa, of India and eastern Asia extend-
ing to China reached its zenith in the early twen-
tieth century, but already then was challenged.
There were limits to further expansion. Europe
was overextended, the US and Japan would
counter what they conceived as threats in their
own hemispheres and in the process run into con-
flict with each other. They also followed their
own imperial roads.
The emergence of the US as a superpower by
the mid-twentieth century is one of the most
striking changes of modern history. The state of
the American economy and America’s decision as
to where and in what manner to intervene in any
part of the globe have profoundly affected every
continent. The US came to wield an influence
such as no other single nation has exercised
before. What is striking is that this impact on the
world has been so recent, scarcely pre-dating the
turn of the century. How did it come about and
where are the roots of American world power?
The growth of the population, and of the
industrial and agricultural production of the US,
were phenomenal. Their sustained increase
through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,
overcoming two depressions in the mid-1870s
and the mid-1890s as well as the serious depres-
sion of the 1930s, is one of the ‘economic
wonders’ of modern history. There was a con-
temporary awareness of America’s good fortune,
and ‘growth’ was both expected and regarded asthe unique ‘American way’. When we compare
the population growth of the US with that of the
European great powers, we see clearly how rela-
tively sudden the transformation of the US into
the present-day colossus has been. In 1880 the
total population of the US was about the same as
Germany’s ten years later and only 5 million more
than Germany’s at the same time. Thus, in pop-
ulation the US only just ranked in the same
league as the largest of the European nations.
But, from then on, the US’s rapid outdistancing
of previously comparable countries was one fun-
damental reason for the emergence of the US as
a superpower.
A crucial factor in this growth of population
was another feature of the New World, the large-
scale emigration from Europe. Driven largely by
poverty and the hope of a better life a great mass
of humanity flooded into the US, more than 13
million between 1900 and 1914 alone. Most of
them were peasants from central and southern
Europe. The majority of these ‘new immigrants’
(to distinguish them from the ‘old’ immigrants
from Britain, Ireland, Germany and Scandinavia)(^1) Chapter 5
THE EMERGENCE OF THE US AS
A WORLD POWER
Population (millions)
1880 1900 1920 1930
US 50.2 89.4 118.1 138.4
Germany 45.2 56.4 59.2 64.3