Why are Military Takeovers so Frequent in Postcolonial African Politics?

Between the years 1881 and 1914, African territory was being invaded by Europeans during the New Imperialism period. Before Europe’s invasion, Africa consisted of various tribes and had no central government due to this during the mid nineteenth century. Europe attempted to colonize Africa using harsh military force and resulted in the European Scramble for Africa. The European Scramble for Africa caused African leaders to have different reactions such as some wanting to have no conflicts, but peace, surrendering to the Europeans due to fear, and also attempting to fight back against the Europeans.

Africa became known as the “dark continent” through the Europeans eyes. Not only from the skin color of its inhabitants but also from the vast lands still undiscovered. Due to the Europeans’ view that Africa had a backward sense, they believed it was their responsibility to help. Conflict arose from the creation of a new society resulting in ethnic feuds and imperialism. European imperialistic powers subjugated Africa to strengthen their own economy. Africa’s rich supply of resources such as a large population had extremely detrimental to its economy. Slavery Sentence. The welfare of Africa’s people weakened rapidly from the poor management of the spread of diseases such as HIV/AIDS and Malaria. Africa is the least developed part of the world, given the impact of European imperialism, slavery, and an inability to deal with major diseases.

Europe and Africa have been linked together in evaluating the state formation process. Both regions have similarities, strengths, weaknesses, and room for improvement. To this day both regions are far from perfect. Some light can be shed on this subject, by evaluating Europe and Africa’s state formation process, evaluating what party benefits, and briefly explaining two economic consequences of European colonialism in Africa.

Africa has undergone a long history of being invaded, taken advantage of and colonized. European powers are primarily at fault for this, however they have experienced their own turmoil in this time period: war. This led Europe to create mercenary armies of African soldiers to fight for their countries, particularly in the World Wars. The rampant injustice of this system and many African lives lost was a spark for the African nation states under colonial rule. It led to the wildfire that was African independence movements, protests, and riots. It also led to the Year of Africa, where most countries were recognized as their own entities and no longer colonies. While there are many factors involved in this portion of history, the importance of

In the late 1800s, European influence started to snake its way into almost every part of the world (Spielvogel and McTighe 226). The African continent was no exception to this new wave of imperialism. For years prior, Europeans only ruled over small parts of the continent, working with African merchants and rulers to meet their interests. However, between the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Europeans would scramble to exert their influence over as much of Africa as possible. By 1914, there would only be 2 independent African nations left (Spielvogel and McTighe 231). As this imperialist invasion swept across Africa, centuries old institutions and nations would be crushed under the weight of European gun and cannon. Europeans then realized

In the late nineteenth century the European powers of the world began imperializing Africa. This annexation, occupation, and division of African territory has since led to much strife within the continent and has caused many struggles politically. This period known as the “Scramble for Africa” has led to the many problems that Africa faces today and has been the root of several wars in Africa to assume control. After World War II many European imperialists began to give African nations autonomy. This seemed like a step forward for African nations, but without any plan to transition into self governance many African nations have faced bloody civil wars and corruption. Along with political struggles, numerous African nations face rising debt and other economic problems. Many of these political and economic issues stem from the “Scramble for Africa”. Once the European countries left Africa had very little to support itself. To explain the issues left by imperialism the three African nations of Rwanda, South Africa, and Sierra Leone will be put under the scope.

The Scramble for Africa, was the occupation, division and colonization of the continent of Africa by European powers. This desire to take claim as much territory as possible stemmed from the need for resources and raw materials in order to keep up production after the industrial revolution, as well as the competitiveness of European countries that dates back for centuries. This rapid extraction of recourses would lead, as well as the previously stated completive nature of European countries would transform Africa into the continent we know today; filled with war, starvation, disease, and a lack of clean drinking water. All these modern day issues date back to the mass expansion by European nations nearly 150 years ago.

Currently, school shootings are a big problem in the United States. During a shooting, one person has a massive amount of power over a large number of people. Imperialism and slavery was a huge problem in the world’s history because people were talking over. Imperialism occurred because one society had a large number of power over many others. Evidently, if one person has more power than anyone else they can take over. The present and future connect and the future of society can be changed today. Imperialism occurs when a strong, powerful country invades and takes over a weak, less developed country. The main motivations behind European imperialism in Africa were political competition, cultural superiority, and economics.

Civil war constantly plagues Africa and can be the cause of tribalism, rival warlords fighting for control, and foreign influence to name a few. I will start off with civil war due to tribalism. The

A popular Burkinabé proverb is “An axe does not cut down a tree by itself.” This means that behind every event and collapse, there is always a cause.The military has large amounts of power, and effectively commanded Burkina Faso for 20 years. Of all the countries in Africa, Burkina has the highest amount of coups, with a staggering six or seven total. Class inequality and poverty go hand in hand, with about 50% of the population under the poverty line. In the case of Burkina Faso, almost fifty years of constant changing of power, heavy militarization, social inequality, and crippling poverty are the ones swinging the axe, and with each chop, the country is about to fall down.

Even if I had clear evidence to suggest that this is more than just hypothetical rambling, I am not certain that we really should change the discourse surrounding military intervention, because I do not know if it would lead to any greater insights about the politics of nations in which military coups take place. I merely wish to provide some food for thought, or some inspiration for greater research into the causes and effects of military intervention. Perhaps a closer examination of existing case studies may provide some justification for alternative discourse on military coups or perhaps future attempts will prove harder to clearly define as success or failure. Further studies are almost always being conducted by scholars of African politics and their research could very well be what I seek, an even more complicated example of military intervention, where success and failure are not so easy to

Ethnic conflict and civil war is a recurrent phenomena affecting many countries in Africa, and has been ignored, oversimplified and overlooked by majority of the Western world. Despite the decades of conflict, and loss of life, when the media does cover conflict in Africa, the damage has already been done. For an example, the awareness regarding the Rwandan Crisis was very delayed and action was taken too late, causing the deaths of thousands of lives.

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

For my final project, I chose to research (Africa) Nigeria. “Nigeria, Africa 's most populous country, is composed of more than 250 ethnic groups; the most populous and politically influential are: Hausa and the Fulani 29%, Yoruba 21%, Igbo (Ibo) 18%, Ijaw 10%, Kanuri 4%, Ibibio 3.5%, and Tiv 2.5%. British influence and control over what would become Nigeria and Africa 's most populous country grew through the 19th century. A series of constitutions after World War II granted Nigeria greater autonomy. After independence in 1960, politics were marked by coups and mostly military rule, until the death of a military head of state in 1998 allowed for a political transition” (CIA, 2012).

The issue of political violence is often described as being heterogenous to the the African continent and is often triggered by subnational political processes and characterized by the use of force by different types of groups that are politically motivated to secure resources and gain access to power (Raleigh 2014, p.92). The intent behind political violence is predominantly to impact a variety of political outcomes including policy that would eventually lead to a change in the present regime. Political violence however has no regard for the electoral process and may occur in the form of coup d’etat, rebellion and violent protest. Election violence, on the other hand differs in its timing an intent which is namely to influence electoral outcomes. Election violence is any random or organized act or threat to intimidate, physically harm, blackmail, or abuse a political stakeholders in seeking to determine, delay or to otherwise influence an electoral process (Fischer, 2002, p.). More specifically it " includes a range of behaviors that includes: the distribution of hate-speech leaflets, the forced displacement of specific groups of voters, political assassinations, and targeted violent attacks. It also encompasses protests and riots that occur as a direct result of elections (Burchard, 2009, p12). The commonality in such acts is the clear intent to impact electoral outcome by force.