Magdoff’s analysis is the foundation upon which the work of an entire tradition of Monthly Review authors rests.

This volume contains a series of essays aimed at illuminating the theory, history, and roots of imperialism, which extend the analysis developed in Magdoff’s The Age of Imperialism.

In 1800, Europeans governed about one-third of the world's land surface; by the start of World War I in 1914, Europeans had imposed some form of political or economic ascendancy on over 80 percent of the globe. The basic structure of global and European politics in the twentieth century was fashioned in the previous century out of the clash of competing imperial interests and the effects, both beneficial and harmful, of the imperial powers on the societies they dominated. This encyclopedia offers current, detailed information on the major world powers and their global empires, as well as on the people, events, ideas, and movements, both European and non-European, that shaped the Age of Imperialism.

The indentured labour trade was begun to replace freed slaves on sugar plantations in British colonies in the 1830s, but expanded to many other locations around the world. This is the first survey of the global flow of indentured migrants from Africa that developed after the end of the slave trade and continued until shortly after the First World War. This volume describes the experiences of the two million Asians, Africans, and South Pacific Islanders who signed long-term labour contracts in return for free passage overseas, modest wages, and other benefits. The experience of these indentured migrants of different origins and destinations is compared in terms of their motives, conditions of travel, and subsequent creation of permanent overseas settlements.