History: Early Modern Period of 1500 to 1800 - Term Paper Example

The question however remains as to whether or not the economic connections that were eventually created made any impacts on the various continent or regions of the world. This paper is therefore committed to identifying the different ways by which Africa, Asia, Middle and Near East, Europe, and the Americas were economically connected in the period of 1500 to 1800 and draw conclusions on the kind of effects that the various regions experienced as a result of economic connection. Africa Most historians believe that Africa remains an undeveloped region of the world because of the various forms of depletion of its human and natural resources that it suffered at the hands of the Americans and Europe in the period of 1500 to 1800 (Flynn and Arturo, 2002).

This is generally to say that Africa was a negative beneficiary of the economic connection that existed from 1500 to 1800. Economic connection in Africa came in the form of an invasion rather than a market opportunity as most parts of the continent were conquered and ruled by various countries from Europe and America at various times in history from 1500 to 1800. . The same is true for human resources. What is worse, the human resource that left Africa in the form of slave trade went to acquire various forms of skilled labor but during the period of the nineteenth century when there were global outcry against slave trade and so freedom was given to willing Africans to return to their home countries, only a few voluntarily went back to furnish the continent with the skill they had gone to acquire (Flynn and Arturo, 2002).

Asia The economic connection that existed in the case of Asia in the periods of 1500 to 1800 is one that is midst with some favorable as well as unfavorable conditions. For instance it is generally noted that at the time, Asia was known as the spice capital of the world whereby the best of spices including pepper and other edible ornaments were mainly produced from that part of the world (Hall, 1992). However, the early parts of the sixteenth century saw major invasion of parts of Asia including China and Japan for the search of the existing fine and rare spices, which were of massive economic value at the time.

Gold, which was also abundant in the region were also invaded upon. Unlike what happened in some parts of the world like Africa and the Americas, the invasion was more of a trade invasion whereby the invaders, mainly Europeans opened themselves up for fair trade (Cross, 1983). Because of the economic capital of the Europeans, which was fair stronger than that of the Asians, there was an eventual imbalance of trade whereby in terms of purchases, European over powered the native Asians. This actually sent Asia as a continent to a very long period of economic silence and underdevelopment as their resources became eventually