South America 1900-1920

Synopsis

By the late nineteenth century, workers in some South American countries had begun to organize. European ideologies such as anarchism, syndicalism, and socialism influenced the continent's labor movements. A growing number of trade unions appeared, particularly in countries such as Argentina, Chile, and Brazil. In most cases, union leaders attempted to unify their organizations into national confederations. However, in all cases, such countrywide organizations had a precarious existence and often split along ideological lines.

Timeline

• 1882: British forces invade, and take control of, Egypt.
• 1894: French army captain Alfred Dreyfus, a Jew, is convicted of treason. Dreyfus will later be cleared of all charges, but the Dreyfus case illustrates—and exacerbates—the increasingly virulent anti-Semitism that pervades France.
• 1899: Start of the Second Anglo-Boer War, often known simply as the Boer War.
• 1899: Polish-born German socialist Rosa Luxemburg...