Expansion and Nation-Building in the Americas

In the Americas, elites moved to build strong nation-states based on inclusive government and territorial expansion. Expansion, however, did not involve colonialization so much as conquest and incorporation of frontier territory into the nation-state itself.

The United States

Despite distinct lines of fracture, Americans successfully carved out a strong nation-state. Territorial expansion provided a means of unifying the country as well as bringing prosperity to the white farmer. "Manifest Destiny" ideals also required, however, the suppression of Amerindians and conflict with Britain and Mexico. Despite the unity of territory, divisions over who constituted the "people" ultimately generated the Civil War, which itself ushered in the supremacy of the national government.

Economic growth exploded after the Civil War with new technology greatly accelerating agricultural and industrial output. Growth also led to social stratification that compounded tensions as overproduction in the 1890s led to unemployment and calls to restructure the American economic system. Loss of frontier and class unrest stimulated overseas expansion, which climaxed in the U.S. war with Spain and annexation of the Philippines. Although the United States had become a world power on ideals of equality, there was no common agreement on what form that equality should take.

Canada

Obtaining independence from England peacefully, Canadians quickly had to grapple with differences among themselves. Canada’s French-speaking population wanted to preserve its cultural integrity without being absorbed into the English world. Anxious to preserve unity, the Canadian state used territorial expansion as a means of offering opportunity to Canadians. (Canada also thus kept its western territories from falling into the hands of the Americans.) The government encouraged the construction of westward railways and established treaties with the Native Americans. These changes strengthened the state, but the concept of nation among Canadians remained weak into the twentieth century.

Spanish America and Brazil

In Spanish America and Brazil, expansion into the frontier went not to small farmers but to landed elites with huge plantation estates. Wealth and political influence thus remained limited to a few. Fear of rebellion led elites to jealously guard their economic dominance and political power by curbing the rights of the poor and nonpropertied. The nation-state thus excluded large segments of society from both the nation and the state. Brazilian elites suffered when slavery was banned but adapted and kept their plantations intact. Suffrage kept voting rights from the vast population of freed slaves while territorial expansion and railways created economic opportunities to keep the system afloat, at least until the rubber industry went bust.

Although nation-states generally sought to build economic prosperity and unity among citizens, some struggled to reach their ideals. All states in the Americas used territorial expansion to assure prosperity, but this also introduced new peoples who were not included in the nation.

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