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Open Rebellion Vs. Military Resistance

Decent Essays

Several rulers skillfully pitted the great imperial powers against each other, though this was less prevalent after the Treaty of Berlin. The reason for this sudden change was that now the powers of Europe had the borders of where they could conquer clearly defined. There was nothing to prevent the African countries from being manipulated against one another, however. While military resistance gradually dwindled, there were quieter forms of resistance. Dropping productivity, misleading officials, and theft were all strategies that the subjugated peoples used in order to make, “the process of ruling much more difficult” (SSG 347). These strategies, which did not require a Western education, were likely much more effective than open rebellion would have been because a rebellion could have been crushed. In addition, to the laboring classes, “one government was… much like another” (SSG 346). While they could have mounted an effective resistance, they did not see the point of an abstract change of government. What did generate discontent was the taxes that the conquerors imposed. More formal methods of addressing the metropole would have to develop. Because the colonies were so large, the metropole’s military forces were not able to be everywhere at once, and the native people were able to, “negotiate with, subvert, petition, and even infiltrate the colonial system” (SSG 406). Negotiation was a tool …show more content…

The metropole foiled the careers of native people, even educated ones, in the bureaucracy. In the metropole, the newspapers and textbook writers slanted their writing against the native people. However, educated people were able to work against the metropole. The most important means of limiting the native people from rising up was through education in both the colony and the

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