The Impact Of European Colonialism On The African Continent Today

The European colonization of Africa, also known as the Scramble for Africa, Partition of Africa, or Conquest of Africa, occurred between the 1870s and 1900s, and was the invasion, occupation, colonization, and annexation of African territory by European powers during a period of New Imperialism. European control of the continent increased from 10 percent (1870) to 90 percent (1914), with only three territories, Saguia el-Hamra, which was later integrated into Spanish Sahara, Ethiopia and Liberia remaining independent of Europe’s control. There were many reasons for the European colonization of Africa, including economic and political motives, with the Berlin Conference serving as a catalyst. Africans resisted the European invasions of their lands, with the two main methods of opposition were guerilla warfare and direct military engagement. European influence on Africa still remains today, though these influences are generally negative and hurt Africa’s overall development.

Across the continent nations were faced with the challenges of strengthening and growing their national unity and security to allow for continued growth. Many areas across Africa have witnessed failed states that lead to economic and political turmoil steaming from decades of failed European policy. In addition to the failed policy, European rulers left Africa with a complex problem of handling human rights. Under European colonial control African people were subjects to their European controlled courts which left them as inferior to those who were occupying their land. In many cases the indigenous people of Africa were forced into slavery to serve the colonial powers in the areas of industry and agriculture. The indigenous people of Africa were also forced to carry identification badges and were subject to continues brutality by authorities. Many areas throughout Africa are still stricken with deep wounds and divides from racism related to European rule. Even to this day the effects of European colonial rule have hindered the continents view of having a long history of developing new techniques and

Between 1870 and 1914, European countries ceased about ninety percent of Africa. Native Africans faced political, military, and imperialism pressure from various European countries. After the end of the profitable slave trade in Africa, due to abolishing of slavery, Europeans explored for new guaranteed markets, and heavily profitable investments. In addition, European countries were under industrialization, the demand for raw materials heavily increased. Europeans as well faced power struggles with one another and competition for political influence in Africa. European power struggle ultimately lead to the “Scramble for Africa.” Europeans undertook the process of imperialism in Africa in the late 19th century by exercising political, economic, and military power on their African colonies. Some African leaders and societies welcomed Europeans in hopes to protect and develop their native land. Some African leaders and societies responded to European occupation by gathering resistance groups in attempt to fight off foreign imperialists.

The scramble for Africa during the late 1870’s had caused many European nations to invest and get there hands on piece of Africa and also did this with minimal conflicts among each other. As a result, much of Africa was colonized and countries such as Britain and France had much territory and influence in Africa. Therefore, colonization led to lots of exploitations and for African countries to lose there right to govern their own country. However, the rise of independence began near the late 1950’s and the 1960’s and can be exemplified through the ending of World War II, educated African elites and nationalism. These three main factors can be displayed through events and forces that happened within the continent as well as outside of it.

Colonialism occurs when one nation takes control over a group of people or certain territories. During the Berlin Conference in 1885, the European countries divided Sub-Saharan Africa into regions that they would control. These countries included Belgian, Italy, Spain, Germany, Great Britain, and France. Most of Africa was divided and controlled by the European powers. The only independent countries at this time were Ethiopia and Liberia. These new boundaries caused many problems for the African people, as they were separated from their families, placed with hostile groups, and taken away from their groups in society. In conclusion, the colonization of Africa had many negative effects on the African people.

Europeans didn’t have a very positive influence on Africa, because they destroyed the African culture. Most things they loved were gone. Feelings like freedom were taken from them. Other things like their ways of life were completely destroyed. Europeans’ actions left Africa poor and weak. About three fourths of AIDS-related deaths come from Africa out of the whole world (Brown). There are also many child soldiers who now have no families because they were taken away to help kill (Brown). Now Africa is on a long journey to get back on their feet. Europeans could not have had a long-term good affect on Africa because almost everything they did was detrimental to society in

A question that could be asked to millions of people and a variety of answers could be given because certain points are significant to different people. There is no doubt that colonialism brought some benefits to the African people. For example widened trade links, technology, weapons and education but then again there are the limitations. Slavery, a destroyed way of life and exploitation of resources. The spreading of education to Africa was a huge thing for the people living there but they weren’t allowed to study law. This clearly shows that the European military were breaking laws and didn’t want the Africans to find out because they would have done something about it but just having some form of education was a start. The Africans also started to learn more about their land and culture, got hold of new weapons, tools, medicines and farming which enabled them to look after themselves and live for longer. This is significant because for a country that is being ‘taken over, they were given a lot of aid that would help them progress as a country. The only problem is that they couldn’t progress how or as far as they wanted because they were always under the eye of the European military and things had to be done that way. The sense of control would have been horrible for the African people, as they couldn’t go by their religion or ethics else they would have been

The aftermath of colonial rule on Sub-saharan Africans has been debilitating. It is present in the statistics, cultural changes, politics, and the historical unrest in the post-colonial state. European colonists concentrated on the export of Africa’s resources, production of cash crops, and profit gained by displacement of ethnic groups, with no focus on African development. In fact, the complete disregard for African nations lead to modern day dependency on foreign economy, hindering Africa even in its emerging independence. W.O. Maloba explains, “Economically, colonialism had linked Africa tightly to the world capitalist system dominated by Europe and later the USA. African countries, it needs to be repeated, produced raw materials and imported selected manufactured goods – each largely determined by Colonial Capitalism” (Decolonization 8). Post-colonization did not lead to complete independence for many countries, including Kenya, but a new form from within: Neocolonialism, which carries the power of colonialism under “Kenyan” rule. On independence and exploitation, Maloba continues, “the inherited economical institutions in many countries do not have the capacity to lead to sustained growth development. They were established to exploit and not develop these countries” (Decolonization 13). Colonialism, though short-lived, entrenched Africa into underdevelopment.

During the colonization of Africa, which was at it's peak in the 18th and 19th century, the European powers of the time indulged in activities that changed and still continues to have multiple effects on the continent

The powers of colonialism are moderately responsible for Africa's problems today. In the nineteenth century, European authorities drew political boundaries that cut across native cultural and territorial divisions, aggravating social tensions. Great areas of land were occupied over by colonial governments or European companies and persons. Involuntary moved off their ancestral land, tens of over 10,000 Africans became workhands and migrant labors. When the colonial era finished in the 1950s and 1960s, Sub-Saharan countries only had a few trained personnel and minor groundwork. Manipulative policies extracted Africa's minerals and other ordinary wealth for the advantage of outsiders. National economies were pushed toward developing goods - including such cash crops as coffee, palm oil, and cocoa - for European shops. Colonial leaders, as well as those who replaced them, devoted little attention to improving the grain and root crops upon which most Africans have depended. As well, Europeans lived at the expenditure of the Africans, who were given little or no pay for the work they had to put up with.

Modern African states have several problems ranging from corruption, to armed conflict, to stunted structural development. The effects of colonialism have been offered as a starting point for much of the analysis on African states, but the question of why African states are particularly dysfunctional needs to be examined, given the extent to which they have lagged behind other former European colonies in many aspects. In the first section, I will consider the problems with African states from the level of the state. That is, the nature of the states' inceptions and the underlying flaws may explain some of the issues that have been associated with African states today. Next I examine the development of, or lack of, civil

Colonialism put a significant burden on colonies and once these territories were decolonized, they were no longer self-sufficient. Even after these territories regained their autonomy, they were still left to struggle after being exploited for decades. To begin, the French and British colonized Africa and left these territories to pay for operations the French and British implemented, such as military, private services to “whites”, and further education. These territories had very little to begin with because of slavery, so massive debts were accumulated. For instance, Senegal, as mentioned earlier, was colonized by France in the nineteenth century. It, along with other colonies along the west African coast, were exploited for their resources and were left to pay for the damages after not only World Wars I and II, but also from in-country fighting as well. Siji Jabbar, author of “How France loots its former colonies” says, “France organized its colonies in a system of “compulsory solidarity” which consisted of obliging the states to put 65% of their foreign currency reserves into the French Treasury, plus 20% for liabilities. This means these countries only ever have access to 15% of their own money! (Jabbar, 2013). Ultimately, colonization did just permit the occurrence of physical slavery, but colonies were looted and forced to sign binding contracts that leave them penniless indefinitely, but are also hard to get out of. Second, some of these territories had some natural resources that were considered valuable. Unsurprisingly, the colonists exploited these natural resources, such as the gold mines in the Congo. When colonialization ended, these developing nations were left with no natural resources and struggled to find ways to be independent, since the sectors they relied on to make money were abused and destroyed under European and American control. An interesting example of colonial exploitation occurred along the coast of West Africa in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century. Rene Ruiz, author of “The colonial underdevelopment of Africa by Europe and the United States” mentions, “The wealth of these countries instead went to enrich Western nations, leaving nothing for the African

Through the19th century to the start of the 20th century, Africa was at the mercy of Europe imperialism. Politics and economics led powerful European nations to colonize the continent of Africa. What was later coined as “The Scramble for Africa”, led powerful nations to aggressively take over the continent and exploit its materials, people, and land. The European powers that took control of most of Africa included Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. The continent was divided and given to these European countries in 1884 through the Berlin Conference. The brutal rule by imperial command created a continent that still to this day deals with the lasting presence of the European takeover. Although not all effects of imperialism were bad or malicious, many were leaving an image of the era as psychologically damaging to Africans as well as to the land in general. Whether the effects of colonization left the continent in better or worse shape than it would have been without European imperialism, the colonization of Africa is a part of history that will remain infamous so long as it is remembered

It presented European powers an open market for trade that bought more from colonial power than it sold overall (Shillington, 2005). From this stage, African territory was divided randomly between the European countries. France and England had a significant influence in reshaping the colonies. Britain as well as Germany utilized the idea of ‘Imperial Monachy’, while the French struggled to incorporate Africans into republican traditions (Grinker, 2010). During this process, some of the local values and institutions were replaced by more modern/western ones. Furthermore, colonisation obstructed the internal process of state formation and development in Africa, leaving legacies of corruption and political instability (Tangie, 2006). Africa experienced extreme cultural clashes which were resultant from the influence of political, economic, social and religious factors on the indigenous societies of Africa. Along with the occupation, the Europeans brought with them traditions

Imperialism and colonization caused several effects around the world. Some of these effects have left behind a legacy that goes on to this day. The continent of Africa was one of the most attractive areas to colonize for Europe. In a time period between 1870’s and 1900’s Europe colonized Africa due to the industrial revolution they distributed African lands in order to gain raw material. The lands within Africa were distributed using the order of imperialism, each country required permission in order to obtain the land. These lands were extremely useful because of the massive quantity of natural resources such as gold, iron, cobalt etc. There were several distinguished countries during the imperialism; a country that definitely holds legacy within several districts and regions of Africa is Great Britain. A country largely affected by Great Britain and colonialism is my country Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe was under British jurisdiction from 1888 to 1979. The colonization of Zimbabwe began when the British Statesmen Cecil Rhodes arrived in Zimbabwe with his British South African Company. He did not squander anytime, he swiftly began taking authority of Zimbabwe. In the coming years Great Britain would have the majority of jurisdiction of Zimbabwe.