The historical periods change, and the new eras require innovative approaches to organizing the political, economic, social, and cultural life of the people. In the United States, the Progressive Era is associated with the period of 1890-1920 when the traditional old order was changed with the new order under the influence of active transformations in the political and social spheres.
The activists of Progressivism in the USA were the representatives of different social categories that is why the changes started by the Progressive politicians were actively supported in the society.
The importance of the Progressive Era reforms is in providing a lot of possibilities for changing different aspects of the political, economic, and social life for the benefit of the US citizens with references to stating the democratic principles, development of the women’s movement and labor unions, and modernizing the social and economic spheres.
Today, the Progressive Era is discussed as the period when the leaders of the USA chose the way of reforms to improve all the aspects of the social life and state’s development in order to respond to the requirements of the industrial age.
To follow the way of progress meant to set the democratic principles as efficient basics of the US development. That is why it was necessary to make the work of the government effective without concentrating on corruption and make the state’s economy strong without references to the corporate business.
The next important stage was the changes in the social sphere. The active followers of Progressivism were the women who stood up for the actual equality of women and men in relation to the suffrage. Moreover, the importance of the Progressive Era reforms can be evaluated with references to developing the feministic ideas among the American women.
The possibility to accentuate the social value of women becomes real, and the female activists of Progressivism use this chance to state their rights and emphasize the social equality with the focus on developing definite charitable programs.
The representatives of the US working class also used the possibilities provided by the Progressive Era to change their current state and gain some benefits. The accents were made on forming labor unions as the organizations to protect the workers’ rights.
In spite of the fact, there were a lot of limitations for the labor movement development, the positive tendencies in changing the workers’ situation for better were observed. Furthermore, the movement for the racial equality developed along with the women and labor’s movements.
There were no immediate critical changes in the social situation, but the Progressive Era reforms changed the general course of the country’s development, accentuating the democratic ideas and social rights.
Such leaders as Theodore Roosevelt made a lot for transforming the previous order based on traditions and for setting new goals for the country’s development depending on fair business and trade, modernized economy, education, and medicine.
Thus, the key notions associated with the Progressive Era are the modernization, rejection of the old traditions, efficiency, and responsibility. Labor movement, women’s orientation to feminism, and movements for the racial equality became the symbols of the age.
The period of Progressivism is significant for the US history because the associated changes and new developed approaches used by politicians created the necessary conditions for the country’s further progress.