The new imperialism was the mid-19th and 20th century cultural equivalent of the modern mafia, with its roots intertwined in the economic, cultural, and humanistic aspects of life. The nations' sole objective involved the exploitation of their controlled state. Manage from the takeover of Asian and African nations to Europeans through political deviance, damaging sieges, and strategic military attacks. The comparison to the modern equivalent persists as the above is protected by the fable that these nations needed help and in doing so the Europeans were the good guys. The ideas of the new imperialism are strongly influenced by those of the Enlightenment. Occurring during the 18th and 19th centuries, the Enlightenment was an intellectual movement with the aim of social progress (Genoa, 1/11). Armed with scientific thought and reason, Enlightenment thinkers set out to explore the fields of science, economics, and human nature. Brilliant minds such as Voltaire, Kant, and others throughout Western Europe collaborated on further knowledge. The Enlightenment laid the foundations on which the new imperialism was born, incorporating the ideas of an incessant need to explore not only the scientific world but also the physical one. The goals and ideas of the Enlightenment significantly influenced the new imperialism, because the Enlightenment created the need for new means and a purpose for accumulating them. The foundations of the new imperialism rested on the ideas and products of the Enlightenment. Advances in technology, medicine and cartography led to the success of the new imperialism (Genoa, 2/15). For example, trips to Europe would have been of no use if it had not been for the Enlightenment discovery... middle of paper... They denounce the topic of slavery as illegal; their only goal is freedom, to inevitably return to the trade (Sparks, 132). Thus, displaying a key feature of the greed of the new imperialism, the prevalence of materialism over all else. The ideas and goals of the Enlightenment significantly influenced the new imperialism. The Enlightenment laid the foundation for a new imperialism, created new needs to be satisfied through the means of foreign countries, and was hidden by the Enlightenment concept of universalism. And although the abolition of the slave trade was influenced by the ideas and goals of the Enlightenment, this did not happen to the extent of the new imperialism. Without the influence of the Enlightenment there is no doubt that the new imperialism would have had no reason to be born, but the same cannot be said for the abolition of the slave trade..