What were the Atlantic Revolutions?

In the late 1700s and early 1800s, big changes were sweeping across the world. People in many countries around the Atlantic Ocean, including North America, France, Haiti, and parts of Latin America, began to question old systems of power. For hundreds of years, kings and queens had ruled most nations, and ordinary people had very little say in how they were governed. But new ideas from the Enlightenment taught that everyone had natural rights and that governments should protect the freedom and equality of their citizens. These powerful ideas inspired a series of uprisings known as the Atlantic Revolutions.

The first of these revolutions began in the American colonies, followed by the French Revolution, and then movements for independence in Haiti and across Latin America. Though each revolution was unique, they all shared a common goal: to gain freedom and create fairer societies. The Atlantic Revolutions reshaped the world, spreading the belief that people could govern themselves and stand up for justice. These movements didn’t just change the countries where they began, they inspired future generations everywhere to keep fighting for liberty and human rights.

Influences of the Atlantic Revolutions

The Enlightenment

In the 1700s, a new way of thinking called the Enlightenment began to spread across Europe. Enlightenment thinkers, like John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, believed that all people had natural rights, such as the right to life, liberty, and happiness, and that governments should protect those rights. These ideas inspired revolutions in America (1776) and France (1789), where people fought against kings and unfair rulers. Leaders in Latin America, like Simón Bolívar, Father Hidalgo, and Toussaint Louverture, read about these ideas and began to believe that their people, too, deserved freedom and equality.

The Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars also played a big part in the fight for independence. When Napoleon Bonaparte took control of France and invaded Spain and Portugal in the early 1800s, the Spanish and Portuguese kings were forced to flee. This left their colonies in the Americas without strong leadership. Many people in Latin America saw this as their chance to take control of their own countries. With Europe distracted by war, leaders like San Martín and Bolívar organized their armies and began to fight for independence. The chaos in Europe helped open the door for change in the Americas.

The Haitian Revolution

Nationalism

Finally, a new feeling called nationalism spread during this time. Nationalism is the belief that people who share the same culture, language, or history should rule themselves instead of being controlled by foreign powers. This idea gave strength and pride to independence movements across the Americas. People began to see themselves not as subjects of Spain or France, but as Mexicans, Venezuelans, Haitians, and Argentinians. They wanted to build their own nations and shape their own futures. Together, the Enlightenment, the Napoleonic Wars, and the rise of nationalism gave people across the Americas the courage and inspiration to fight for freedom, and to believe they could win it.

The Spanish Caste System

At this time, the Spanish put people living in the colonies into a caste system. A caste system is when people are divided into groups based on race, religion, wealth, or social status, usually resulting in unequal treatment or rights among the groups. The people at the bottom of the Spanish caste system received the worst treatment, while those at the top were given more freedoms and rights.

The Monroe Doctrine

In 1823, President Monroe gave a speech before Congress. Part of this speech became the Monroe Doctrine: a U.S. foreign policy about the Western Hemisphere. This framework would affect relations with newly independent Latin American nations for years to come.

The Monroe Doctrine is a U.S. foreign policy framework addressing America’s security and commercial interests in the Western Hemisphere. It emerged from three paragraphs in President James Monroe’s annual address before the U.S. Congress on December 2, 1823, and was made in response to the Atlantic Revolutions in Latin America.

The doctrine addresses how the United States would conduct foreign relations with newly independent nations in Central and South America, and how to keep Europeans from colonizing Latin America again.

In the doctrine, Monroe declares that anyone who tries to take away Latin American’s independence is no friend of the United States, and that it is in the United States’ interest to defend Latin America.