“Mercantilism” was the prevailing economic theory during the first few centuries of European expansion and colonialism. It emphasized maintaining a favorable balance of trade and the accumulation of precious metals. In practice this meant stripping the colonies of their raw resources, bringing them back to Europe, and either storing them or using them in manufacturing. Mercantilism was eventually replaced by free-market capitalism as the dominant economic theory in Europe and much of the world.

During the last few decades of the nineteenth century, and the early twentieth century, the European imperial powers carved the continent of Africa among themselves. This was done uncooperatively though the so-called “Scramble for Africa” and cooperatively with the Berlin Conference in 1884-1885. Of these countries, all are correctly labeled except Mozambique and Great Britain. Mozambique was under the control of Portugal.

The Treaty of Tordesillas was signed between the empires of Spain and Portugal in 1494. It effectively divided the continent of South America between a Spanish-controlled empire and a Portuguese-controlled empire. This distinction remains important to this day, even since independence, because it represents a cultural and linguistic distinction. Those that fell on the Portuguese side of this arbitrary line now live in Brazil and continue to speak Portuguese; those that fell on the Spanish side live in the rest of South America and continue to speak Spanish.

Colonialism refers to the process by which one nation exercises near complete control over another country which they have settled and taken over. Often, the governing country uses the colony for its resources, taking what is useful without regard to the original inhabitants. This often leads to mistreatment of the original inhabitants, degradation of the local environment, and introduction of previously unknown diseases.

The correct answer is the opposite of what is typically expected in colonialism. The colony is usually the recipient of colonists from the colonizing country, not the other way around. Typically, there is a mass migration of people from the colonizing country into the colony. This helps to solidify control of the colony.

Indochina, often called French Indochina, was a colonial possession of the French Empire until the decolonization period that followed World War II. It was conquered by the Japanese during the war but returned to France following the conclusion of the war. In the 1950s, part of a wider global movement away from imperialism and political colonization, the countries that made up Indochina gained their independence.

The Berlin Conference was convened in 1884 with the intention of dividing up the continent of Africa among the various European imperial powers (Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, and Italy). It is one of the most significant events during the age of imperialism (circa 1870-1914).

In 1994, the system of Apartheid in South Africa, a legislatively created form of institutional racism that barred black South Africans from governmental and societal participation, was ended due to universal suffrage in a national election. This process, whereby all South Africans could vote, is a classic example of democratization, the movement of a nation's government to full democratic participation.

The Warsaw Pact, officially the Warsaw Treaty Organization of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance, was an alliance founded in 1955 between Eastern European countries to serve as a military and political unit of contiguous communist nations. While the eight signatories—the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Albania, Poland, and East Germany—were all communist-led nations, not all communist European nations joined. Notably Yugoslavia, which was led by the iconoclastic Marshal Josip Broz Tito, resisted joining an alliance that was so closely controlled by Soviet authorities. These nations still have close ties economically, despite the fall of communism and the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact.

The term “Iron Curtain” was coined by Winston Churchill in the aftermath of the Second World War. It refers to the “curtain” being pulled over Eastern Europe by the Soviet Union which removed those countries from the global capitalist market and isolated Eastern Europe from Western Europe.

The term “Domino Theory” is the idea that if communism is allowed to exist in one country, it will inevitably spread to the neighboring countries until they all fall “like dominoes.” The fear of the spread of communism and attempts to contain it were part of American foreign policy throughout the Cold War era. The term has since been used more liberally to describe the spread of political revolution from one country to the next, such as recently with ISIS in the Middle East.