Importance Of National Self-Determination In Africa

As a result of the government-mandated segregation, resistance in both the United States and South Africa escalated. In other words, the history of the African civil rights movement taught: “Nationalism has been tested in the people’s struggles . . . and found to be the only antidote against foreign rule and modern imperialism” (Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom 2008, 156). By comparing and contrasting the Jim Crow Laws and apartheid, we are able convey that nationalism ultimately lead to activism and reform.

During the European Scramble for Africa, in the early 20th century, Africans had a peaceful reaction with anti-imperialistic sentiments (docs. 2, 3, 4, and 7), peaceful actions through the approach of diplomacy (docs.1, 2, and 3) and also a rebellious anti-imperialistic reaction (docs. 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9) towards the Scramble for Africa.

“African Perspectives on Colonialism” is a book written by A. Adu Boahen. This book classifies the African responses to European colonialism in the 19th century. Boahen begins with the status of Africa in the last quarter of the 19th century and follows through the first years of African independence. This book deals with a twenty year time period between 1880 and 1900. Boahen talks about when Africa was seized and occupied by the Imperial Powers of Europe. Eurocentric points of view dominated the study of this era but Boahen gives us the African perspective. There are always two sides of the story and Boehen tells us the side less talked about informing us of what he knows.

Established in 1961, the Special Committee of Decolonization is a body of the United Nations, an international bureaucratic agency, working towards the just treatment and interaction of Non-Self-Governing individuals. This body still operates in the present day. The Special Committee of Decolonization defines Non-Self-Governing Territories “whose people have not yet attained a full measure of self-government”. (United Nations 2017) In essence, a nation where foreign, commonly colonial powers dictate the lives of people who have and maintain rich, diverse, historical, and cultural existence in the world for millennia. And while The Special Committee of Decolonization, works towards the decolonization of these nations, they fail to end the scourge of informal imperialism.

The process of decolonization proved to have its own struggles within those who were seeking their independence from imperialist powers. Evidently, these nationalist movements were different in many regions, but they generally shared the sentiment that “Westernization” had taken something away from them. This proved to be the case in Africa and Asia, where the colonization movement from imperialist powers was of strong presence, and that had trouble weakening during and after the Cold War. Part of this struggle was due to the forms of government that were imposed, and because many of these colonies had been in this position for such long time that they were not able to predict upcoming conflicts after their independence. However, in many cases, the problems were more complicated and often implied a combination of reaction to westernization and internal conflicts. Undoubtedly,

The inconsistencies in the implementation even partly contributed to the outbreak of the Second World War (xxx, xxx). The European powers mobilized their African subjects with propaganda vilifying the racial-supremacist ideology of the Fascist powers. This set-in motion a process in which “Fascist nationalism produced the opposed reality of anti-Fascism; and anti-Fascism became antiracism; and antiracism led in due course to an end of colonization” (Davidson, 1992). The result was the erasure of European colonial rule from large swathes of the African continent within a relatively short period of time (xxx, xxx). Consequently, this led to the development of a decolonized version of the self-determination concept. The decolonization version of self-determination was based on the following three principles: i) all dependent peoples are entitled to freedom; ii) the peoples so entitled are defined in terms of the existing colonial territories, each of which contains a nation; and iii) once such a people has come to independence, no residual right of self-determination remains with any group within it or cutting across its frontiers (Emerson 1964). This version of self-determination had numerous implications. The concerned entities often did not find it necessary to demonstrate effective legitimate authority to gain and

The study of British colonialism is a rather new field with much to discuss and a lot more to debate. The recent recognition of new nation-states that were once under the control of Britain was a growing phenomenon and one that continues to play a large role in today’s global politics. Since the rather recent period of these new nations, new study’s have been done into the history of a) the peoples that inhabited the land before Britain, b) the way Britain occupied and control and land, and now c) post-Britain. This is a growing topic in the historical field because seventy-five years ago there was no thought that Britain would relieve control of India or Nigeria. That is why post-British colonialism is important to today, because it is a

Erez Manela’s The Wilsonian Moment Self-Determination and the International Origins of Anticolonial Nationalism is a monograph that attempts to reconstruct the story of colonial world at the end of Wilsonian moment. The book’s title, The Wilsonian Moment is alluding to the crucial period that lasted from autumn of 1918 to spring of 1919, when the Allied victory were confident that President Woodrow Wilson’s ideas for a new world will become successful until the terms of the Treaty of Versailles became public and the failure of the Wilson’s promise became evident. Erez Manela says, “The focus of this book is on the specific significance of Wilsonian moment in the colonial world, defined broadly as the dependent or semi dependent territories that encompassed at the time almost all of Asia and Africa”(8). Manela demonstrates how Woodrow Wilson’s post-war rhetoric on self-determination, a concept that firmly believes all nations should be able to determine for their futures and governance impacted several anti colonial movements by using Egypt, India, China, and Korea as case studies. In these case studies, Manela explicitly exhibits how colonized countries received and interpreted Wilson’s rhetoric, and applied it to their local struggle for independence. These four countries actively fought for their independence, but their arguments were dismissed at the Paris Peace Conference for different reasons. Manela tells us,” The “revolt against the West,” emerged “not from the

Africa faced many serious negative consequences because of imperialism. The resolution of the All African People’s Conference held in Ghana in 1958 said, “...Whereas fundamental human rights… freedom to live a full and abundant life… are denied to Africans through the activities of the Imperialists,” (Document 3). This resolution said that human rights, which are rights entitled to all humans regardless of any difference, were taken away. Because of this, the Africans were made to feel inferior which is not healthy for people and can cause serious consequences like the Africans assimilating to the European culture instead of preserving their rich, diverse culture. Sekou Toure, an African nationalist, had similar ideas, he said, “Our continent possesses tremendous reserves of raw material… with its potential sources of power, give it excellent conditions for industrialization,” (Document 2). So as well as the Africans being stripped of their basic rights

Decolonization is the undoing of colonialism, where a nation establishes and maintains its domination over dependent territories. In the words of Fanon, in the reading The Wretched of the Earth, “National liberation, national reawakening, restoration of the na­tion to the people or Commonwealth, whatever the name used, whatever the latest expression, decolonization is always a violent event.” (Fanon, 1). Frantz Fanon was one of many authors who supported decolonization struggles occurring after World War II. He breaks down decolonization into two senses: one being the physical act of freeing a territory from external control of a colonizer, and the other being the psychological act of freeing the consciousness of the native from the alienation caused by colonization. Fanon particularly advocated that violence was justified by overthrowing colonial oppression. In his reading, The Wretched of the Earth, Fanon wrote on why and how colonialism must be stopped. Fanon argued that the colonial infrastructure must be destroyed. “Decolonization, which sets out to change the order of the world, is clearly an agenda for total disorder. But it cannot be accomplished by the wave of a magic wand, a natural cataclysm, or a gentleman’s agreement. Decolonization, we know, is an historical process: In other words, it can only be understood, it can only find its significance and become self coherent insofar as we can discern the history-making movement which gives it form and substance,”

Britain, as a global superpower, was able to relatively easily contain the Mau Mau uprising once it got wind of the violence inflicted upon its people. The incident in Kenya helps prove the notion that violence will almost always be met with violence. For policymakers, an assessment of the two instances of resistance allows an insight into the effects of colonial rule on colonized countries, both during colonization and after

She presents distinctive arguments on how Vichy’s pretense of republican colonialism and its propaganda fall by the way side. Both change and traditional propaganda presented in the second part were still visible; however, Ginio offers solid evidence of Vichy's rejection of racial equality or the incorporation of sociopolitical incorporation. She argues that the administration exposed their doctrine of absolute colonial hierarchy where earlier regime's colonial administration officials at least partially veiled their absolute authority. She asserts that previous regime had lent energy to propaganda focused on assimilation ideals and of raising technological and cultural levels of Africans…perhaps even obtaining sociopolitical equality. Ultimately, however, she laments that, "the Vichy colonial administration did not see itself as in any way obligated to the discourse of republican assimilation" (p 110). Ginio further argues that the Vichy Regime rejected any kind of assimilation between colonialists and Africans completely and began to emphasize racial differences and colonial hierarchy. The Regime, “therefore had no problem implementing a policy of segregation based on race rather than on other more blurred categorizations” (p

In the Discourse on Colonialism, Cesaire illustrates a compelling relationship between colonized states and the proletariat class. He conveys that the proletariat socio-economic class allows for the possible unification of society against the powers of colonialism. Interestingly, the comparison reflects as these elements extend from constructed illusions to unequivocal creeds. By isolating and juxtaposing the two groups, Cesaire is able to elaborate on how he believes that race and class unite to dominate 'inferior subjects' in nations throughout the globe. Throughout the essay, Cesaire provides reasoning for the socially constructed experiences of those dictated by colonial imperialism, particularly Africans, and proletarian conflicts in

How should an empire assert their claim to territory and how should they govern it? This question is important because there are a number of methods an empire could employ presiding over a colony. For example the French empire employed a system call direct rule. The French rulers wanted to assimilate or incorporate the peoples of West Africa . The British however preferred a system called indirect rule and it was applied to many of their West African colonies including Nigeria and Ghana. It has proven to be detrimental to problems in Africa and can be linked to the political past of the British colonial government. The goal of this paper is to expose the reasons for indirect rule in British colonies and the negative impact of post colonial development in West Africa.

In 1918, under the United Nations’ (UN) mandate, Britain occupied Tanganyika and Zanzibar, at the same time adding subsidies to the education system previously under German control. In contrast, the people in Tanganyika did not appreciate the colonial education; they instead, viewed it as an interruption of their agricultural routines, as it favored the colonial regime’s benefit, instead of the indigenous people (Ingham, 2013). In the meantime, education fashioned aristocracies and servers, where indigenous became servants to the colonial rulers (lords) In addition, the colonial rulers replaced the tradition of Tanganyikan with foreign values (Nyerere, 1967) through education they provided.