of the 20th centuries. He divides the world into five "main economic areas," as follows: (1) Central Europe (the whole of Europe with the exception of Russia and Britain); (2) Britain; (3) Russia; (4) Eastern Asia; (5) America; and he includes the colonies in the "areas" of the State to which they belong, "setting on one side a small number of countries not yet situated in these areas, such as Persia, Afghanistan, Arabia, Morocco and Abyssinia."

Here is a summary of these economic data:

	Area	Pop.	Transport		Trade	Industry
CHIEF ECONOMIC AREAS	${\displaystyle \scriptstyle {\overbrace {\quad \quad \quad } }}$	${\displaystyle \scriptstyle {\overbrace {\quad \quad \quad } }}$	${\displaystyle \scriptstyle {\overbrace {\quad \quad \quad \quad \quad } }}$		${\displaystyle \scriptstyle {\overbrace {\quad \quad \quad } }}$	${\displaystyle \scriptstyle {\overbrace {\quad \quad \quad \quad \quad \quad \quad } }}$
	in mill'ns of sq. km.	in mill'ns	Rlys. in thous. of km.	Merch. fleet in in mills. of tons	Impt. & expt. in mlds. of Mks.	Outp't of Coal in mls. of tns.	Outp't of Iron in mls of tns.	No. of Cotton spindles (mls.)
Cent. Europe	27.6	388	204	⁠8	41	251	15	26
	[23.6]	[146]
British	28.9	398	140	11	25	249	⁠9	51
	[284]	[355]
Russian	22.6	131	⁠63	⁠1	⁠3	⁠16	⁠3	⁠7
Eastern Asia	12⁠	389	⁠8	⁠1	⁠2	⁠8	⁠00.2	⁠2
America	30⁠	148	379	⁠6	14	245	14	19

We notice three areas of highly developed capitalism—that is, with a high development of means of transport, of trade and of industry. They are the Central European, the British areas, and the American. Amongst them are three States which dominate the world: Germany, Britain, the United States. Imperialist rivalry and the struggle between them have become very keen because Germany only has a restricted area and few colonies; (the creation of "Central Europe" being not yet achieved, and it is being fashioned in a life-and-death struggle).

For the moment the distinctive feature of Europe is political division. In the British and American areas, on the other hand, political concentration