Unit 3: Industrialization and Imperialism

Students will understand how industrialization reshaped economic systems, political power, and global relationships during the nineteenth century. They will recognize that technological innovation, resource demands, and political competition fueled industrial expansion and imperialism. Students will analyze how industrial societies created new forms of inequality while also producing economic growth and social change. They will also examine how imperial expansion transformed societies in both colonizing and colonized regions.

Students will analyze primary sources, economic data, maps, and political writings to evaluate the causes and consequences of industrialization and imperialism. They will compare industrial development across regions and examine how technological change reshaped labor systems and global trade. Students will participate in discussions evaluating the motivations behind imperial expansion and the impacts on colonized societies. They will write analytical responses explaining patterns of economic and political change across regions.

Students will complete an imperialism case study analysis. Students will investigate one imperial relationship and evaluate its economic, political, and social impacts. They will present an argument explaining how industrialization contributed to imperial expansion and how imperialism reshaped global power structures.