5.2: Connecting Europe's Past to the Present

Learning Objectives

1. Describe European settlement patterns during different historical eras.
2. Explain how European boundaries have changed from over time.
3. Identify how European's economic regions are influenced by natural resources.

 

European Settlement

Europe’s physical landforms, climate, and underlying resources have shaped the distribution of people across the region. When early humans began settling this region, they likely migrated through the Caucasus Mountains of Southwest Asia and across the Bosporus Strait from what is now Turkey into Greece. The Greeks provided much of the cultural and political foundations for modern European society. Greek ideals of democracy, humanism, and rationalism reemerged in Europe during the Age of Enlightenment. The Roman Empire followed the Greek Empire, pushing further into Europe and leaving its own marks on European society (Figure 5.2.1). Modern European architecture, governance, and even language can be traced back to the Roman Empire’s influence.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{1}\): Map of the Roman Empire, 117 CE (public domain; Andrei nacu via Wikimedia Commons).

 

The Roman’s vast European and Southwest Asian empire united the region under Christianity and created new networks of roads and trading ports. With the fall of the Roman Empire, however, tribal and ethnic allegiances reemerged and a number of invasions and migrations occurred. England, for example, was settled by the Germanic Anglo-Saxons, from which the name “England” or “Angeln” is derived, then by the Normans from present-day France.

Europe today is comprised of 40 countries, but historically, this was a region dominated by kingdoms and empires – even fairly recently. A map of Europe from just 200 years ago looks strikingly different from today’s political boundaries (Figure 5.2.2). At that time, Greece and Turkey were still controlled by the Ottoman Empire and Italy was a conglomerate of various city-states and independent kingdoms. Many of the countries and political boundaries of Europe we know today were not formed until after World War II.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{2}\): Map of Europe, 1812 CE (CC BY-SA 3.0; Alexander Altenhof via Wikimedia Commons).

 

Europe’s population has shifted and changed over time as well. Whereas Europe was once largely feudal and agrarian, today around 75 percent of its people live in cities. Europe’s largest city is London, with a population of around 8.5 million within its city limits. Although the United Kingdom was the dominant force in Europe during industrialization, Germany now dominates the region in terms of population, gross domestic product, and size.

 

The Industrial Revolution

The differences in levels of development across Europe today have largely been shaped by the Industrial Revolution. The refers to the changes in manufacturing that occurred in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. These changes had profound effects on society, economics, and agriculture, not just in Europe, but globally. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, most goods in Europe were produced in the home. These so-called “cottage” industries consisted of individual workers making unique goods in their homes, usually on a part-time basis. These products, such as clothing, candles, or small housewares, could be sold by a farming family to supplement their income.

The Industrial Revolution began in the United Kingdom, and while it’s difficult to pinpoint the exact point at which the revolution began, a key invention was James Watt’s steam engine, which entered production in 1775. This steam-driven engine was adopted by industries to allow for factory production. Machines could now be used instead of human or animal labor. Interestingly, a side effect of the steam engine was that it enabled better iron production, since iron required an even and steady stream of heat. This improved iron was then used to build more efficient steam engines, which in turn produced increasingly better iron. These improvements and new technologies gradually spread across Europe, eventually diffusing to the United States and Japan.

During this time, there were also significant changes in agricultural production. The Agrarian Revolution began in the mid-1750s and was based upon a number of agricultural innovations. This was the Age of Enlightenment, and the scientific reasoning championed during this era was applied to the growing of crops. Farmers began using mechanized equipment, rather than relying solely on human or animal labor. Fertilizers improved soil conditions, and crop rotation and complementary planting further increased crop yields. During this time period, there was a shift to commercial agriculture, where excess crops are sold for a profit, rather than subsistence agriculture, where farmers primarily grow food for their own family’s consumption.

Around the same time improvements in rail transportation changed both the way goods were distributed across Europe and the movement of people across the region. The use of steam engines and improved iron also transformed the shipping industry, with steamships beginning to set sail across the Atlantic Ocean.

The Agrarian Revolution coupled with the Industrial Revolution profoundly changed European geography. With the improvements of the Agrarian Revolution, farmers could produce more with less work. This provided an agricultural surplus, enabling a sustained population increase. Port cities and capital cities became centers of trade and expanded. Critically, the Agrarian Revolution freed workers from having to farm, since fewer farmers were needed to produce the same amount of crops, enabling people to find work in the factories. These factories were primarily located in cities, and thus it was the combination of these two revolutions that dramatically increased urbanization in Europe. At the start of the 19th century, around 17 percent of England’s population lived in cities; by the end of the 19th century, that figure had risen to 54 percent.

Overall, the Industrial Revolution considerably improved European power by boosting their economies, improving their military technology, and increasing their transportation efficiency. Even before the Industrial Revolution, Europe exerted a considerable amount of control over the rest of the world. European colonialism began in the 1400s, led by Portugal and Spain. In the 1500s, England, France, and the Dutch began their own colonial campaigns. By the start of WorldWar I, the British Empire, boosted by the improvements of the Industrial Revolution, had the largest empire in history, covering 20 percent of the world’s population at the time (Figure 5.2.3).

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{3}\): Map of European colonization (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0; derivative work of Cogito ergo sumo by Caitlin Finlayson via Pressbooks).

 

Coinciding with the Industrial and Agrarian Revolutions were a number of political revolutions in Europe. The most influential political change came as the result of the French Revolution, which occurred between 1789 and 1799 CE. This revolution ended France’s monarchy, establishing a republic, and provided the foundation for numerous political revolutions that followed. It also weakened the power of the Roman Catholic Church in France, inspiring the modern-day separation between church and state that is typical of many Western countries, including the United States.

Today, the map of Europe reflects the changes brought about by the Industrial and Agrarian Revolutions as well as the political changes that took place throughout the time period. Europe’s core area, where economic output is highest, is largely centered around the manufacturing areas that arose during the Industrial Revolution (Figure 5.2.4). These manufacturing areas in turn were originally located near the raw materials, such as coal, that could sustain industrial growth.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{4}\): Map of Europe's regions (public domain; Koyos via Wikimedia Commons).

 

The shift in labor that occurred during the Industrial Revolution, as people left rural farms to find work in factories, led to the specialization of labor that is found in Europe today. Areas within Europe tended to specialize in the production of particular goods. Northern Italy for example, has maintained a specialty in the production of textiles. Germany continues to specialize in automotive manufacturing. The Benz Patent-Motorwagen, the world’s first gasoline powered automobile, was first built in Germany in 1886 and would later develop into the Mercedes-Benz corporation. As regions focused on the manufacture of particular goods, they benefited from, the savings in cost per unit that results from increasing production. If you wanted to build a chair, for example, you’d have to buy the wood, glue, and screws as well as the tools needed to construct it, such as a drill, sander, and saw. That single chair would be quite costly to produce. If you wanted to make ten chairs, however, those same tools could be used for every chair, driving the cost of each chair down. Many areas in Europe have shifted from more traditional to high-tech manufacturing and industrial output in the region remains high.

 

Modern Europe

The political map of Europe continues to change, with shifting alliances, competing goals, and new pushes for independence. In general, Western Europe has moved toward cooperation. The European Union developed out of the Benelux Economic Union signed in 1944 between Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. France, Italy, and West Germany signed an economic agreement with the Benelux states in 1957, and from there, the economic cooperation continued to expand. The European Union (EU) itself was created in 1993 and today, the organization has 27 member countries (Figure 5.2.5). Not all members of the EU use the euro, its official currency; the 19 member states who do are known as the eurozone. The United Kingdom is the only state to have left the EU. Its withdrawal is known as “Brexit” (meaning “British exit”) and was finalized in January 2020.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{5}\): 2023 Map of the European Union (reproduction authorized; European Union).

 

Today, it is relatively easy to travel across Europe, in part because of economic and monetary cooperation, but also because internal border checks have largely been abolished. The Schengen Agreement, signed in the 1990s allows member states to essentially function as a single territory in terms of entry. These states share a common visa system and residents and vehicles can travel freely throughout states participating in the agreement.

Although the European Union has provided member states with a number of advantages, the system has had some structural concerns. Greece, for example, admitted to the EU in 1981, adopted the euro in 2001. It has had continued issues with debt, however, and has required massive bailouts from other member states. The United Kingdom held a referendum in June 2016 and decided to leave the EU, the first time a country has made the decision to leave the organization. When analyzing the EU and its advantages and disadvantages, you might consider why a country would join a supranational organization. To join an organization like the EU, a country gives up some of its sovereignty, its independence in making economic, political, or legal decisions. Ideally, a country would gain more than it loses. Countries united economically can more easily facilitate trade, for example, or could share a common military rather than each supporting their own. Those who favored the United Kingdom withdrawing from the EU, however, argued that membership in the EU did not offer enough advantages and preferred the United Kingdom to control its own trade deals and immigration restrictions.

Devolution, which occurs when regions within a state seek greater autonomy, has continued in Europe, representing a tension between nationalistic ideals and ethnic ties. In the United Kingdom, a 2014 Scottish independence referendum was narrowly defeated but led to greater autonomy for Scotland. In general, policies offering increased autonomy have kept the map of Western Europe fairly intact. Ethnic groups seeking sovereignty often want political autonomy but economic integration, and thus devolution generally allows them more decision-making power.

In the Balkan region, however, strong ethnic identities has contributed to continued political instability and the formation of new states. In fact, the devolutionary forces found in this region led to the creation of the term Balkanization, referring to the tendency of territories to break up into smaller, often hostile units. The Balkans came under the control of the Ottoman Empire, and once the empire collapsed following World War I, several territories in this region were joined together as the country of Yugoslavia (Figure 5.2.6). Following World War II, Yugoslavia was led by Josip Broz Tito who attempted to unify the region by suppressing ethnic allegiances in favor of national unity. After his death, however, those ethnic tensions reemerged. In the 1990s, Yugoslavia was led by the dictator Slobodan Miloševic, a Serbian who supported a genocidal campaign against the region’s Croats, Bosnians, and Albanians. In Bosnia alone, over 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys were killed. Most recently, Kosovo, comprised mostly of Albanian Muslims, declared independence from Serbia in 2008, though its status as a sovereign state is still contested by some, including Serbia, Bosnia, and Greece.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{6}\): Former Yugoslavia Map (public domain; United Nations via Wikimedia Commons).

 

The map of Europe continues to evolve. In February 2019, for instance, the country formerly known as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia officially changed its name to the Republic of North Macedonia, or just North Macedonia, resolving a long dispute with Greece.

While some countries in the region have decidedly benefited from globalization, others remain fairly limited in terms of global trade and global economic integration. Figure 5.2.7 is a map of gross domestic product (purchasing power parity) per capita reveals a marked difference between the states of Western Europe and the eastern region. Germany’s GDP per capita as of 2021, for example, was $58,291 (in US dollars), according to the World Bank. In Moldova, a former Soviet republic bordering Romania, that figure was $15,391.

 

Figure \(\PageIndex{7}\): GDP (in PPP) per capita, 2021 from the World Bank. Note: In Europe and many other places, a period is not a decimal point. The period in a number is the same as a comma in the United States. So, 70.000 on the map is 70,000 (public domain; Wikimedia Commons).

 

 

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Attributions:

"Connecting Europe's Past to the Present" is adapted from World Regional Geography by Caitlin Finlayson (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).