The Major Reasons For Colonial Expansion In Africa

The main reason for European imperialism in Africa was for political reasons. According to Document A, the purpose of the colonization of African countries was for political competition between European countries (Doc. A). The partition of Africa in 1884 through 1885 showed that France and Britain were the biggest winners in seizing Africa. The British took most of north and south Africa, when the French took most of western Africa. According to Document B, John Ruskin said,” This is what England must either do or

Resources,they carry a country financially.A big driving force for imperialism at the time was resources,and Africa just so happened to have an abundance of them.Ranging from diamonds to slave labour ,Africa was a gold mine in the eyes of the Europeans.Proof of this is the

One of the main reasons Europeans sought to explore the world was to spread Christianity. As far as they knew, the New World had never heard of Christianity, and the Spanish Cardinal Trinlini said that this made them “heathens [who] live a barbarous life”. His motivation for exploring these new lands was to save the natives from their ignorance

European imperialism during 1450-1750, began as a plan to gain more riches for the European nations. The Europeans did this for three main reasons, which were for God, Gold, and Glory. The Europeans domination over Latin America, Africa and Asia were made out to be good for the native people of these lands. However, the Europeans were not there to help these geographic areas. They were there to spread their influence and gain riches for themselves and the European nations. The successes and failures of the Europeans and non Europeans would decide their relationship status for as long as they could co-exist.

Spain, Portugal, and France sought to convert natives to the Roman Catholic Church, while England and the Netherlands believed that Catholicism was corrupt, and attempted to build support for the Protestant movement in the New World.

     There were many reasons for the European countries to be competing against each other to gain colonies in Africa. One of the main reasons may be that Europeans believed that the

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.

Religion was not a major reason for European exploration because many of the European traders and travelers wanted to get rich by finding gold or some other valuable object, people wanted to travel to another place because of their country’s poverty, disease, or and economic backwardness, and also that the Europeans started traveling more ever since their technology and navigation was more developed.

The Missionaries also served to civilise Africa, “They founded schools where sanitations and agriculture as well as the three R’s [reading, writing arithmetic] were taught”(document N). Thus benefiting Europe's excuse to extract the materials needed from Africa saying that they were just Civilising the natives.

European nations in the 15th century began exploring new lands with three motives: religion, wealth, and glory. It was made possible by advances in naval fleet building and navigation, first pioneered by the Portuguese. Europeans began to be involved in extensive exploration, coming in contact with Africa, Americas and their prime target Asia. The main targets of the pioneering Portugese and Spanish was to find and alternate trade route for the Indies trade and also promote Christianity to the new lands. As the century unfolded, the search for newer territories to colonize and shortern routes to the exotic land of spices and silk became the initial driving force for the intensive early exploration by the Europeans .

The Renaissance and the Age of Exploration brought on new ideas, technology, and tools that allowed the Europeans to travel across sea. The Europeans traveled to Africa in search of grains, spices, ivory, gold and slaves. Upon further exploration they found China. In China they found what they were searching for, they found silk cloth, spices and goods. The Europeans wanted to gain power by expanding their empire and search for gold. New technology, firepower, greed, and curiosity drove the Europeans to explore western

From the start, there were many beneficial reasons for a European nation to imperialize, and by far, one of the most appealing reasons to imperialize other nations was access to raw materials. By the late 1800s, many European nations were seeing rapid growth in industry and manufacturing, but did not have the resources within their continental borders

The European powers that were in much need for resources during the 1500s through 1800s were Great Britain, France and Germany. During 1500 and 1800 Africa seemed like an impossible feat to conquer because of malaria but this wouldn’t stop the persistence of the leaders of France and Great Britain. The idea of exploring and conquering new land meant more to these leaders because of the motivation to keep their national security strong and keep their economy stronger. These countries would use their remaining resources to look for more disposable ones so that their empires could grow considerably. Great Britain would be dug in the

Finally, the most important reason to British imperialism was their desire to advance economically. Their economy was primarily based on trade, and because colonies could be added as a form of imperial control, it only furthered and expanded trade. Because such countries as Germany and France began to rise to power, Britain was confronted with competition, so they felt that they had to take the African land first. The British feared that as the other countries began to become stronger and more stable, they would steal their markets, so that is how the scramble for Africa starts. As for the Suez Canal, it became extremely important for money making

Businessmen needed new markets where their goods would not be taxed (Lugard 379-81). These new markets would also create more of a demand for products which would in turn create more jobs for the Europeans back home (Chamberlain 180). The Africans also provided a cheap labor source for companies built in Africa. The natives were said to be submissive and to pick up on things quickly, which made them prime candidates for the tough manual labor they were required to perform. The combination of new markets and new labor did wonders for commercial competition (Lugard 380-2).  Perhaps the Europeans realized that economic advantages alone would not be enough to convince everyone that imperialism was valuable to society. Therefore, they thought of many other justifications in an attempt to convince people.