Chapter 8 Flashcards
what were the
- After WWII (1939-1945), most of Africa was still under colonial rule (many Africans actually joined European armies during the war. You can see this in the prize-winning French movie Indigène).
- The three decades that followed the war, were marked by decolonization, the struggle to end European colonialism on the African continent.
- Many African leaders hoped that the Atlantic Charter, blueprint for a postwar world developed by the Americans and the British, would lead to freedom for Africa.
foot note ???
First, their countries seek no aggrandizement, territorial or other;
Second, they desire to see no territorial changes that do not accord with the freely expressed wishes of the peoples concerned;
Third, they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live; and they wish to see sovereign rights and self government restored to those who have been forcibly deprived of them;
Fourth, they will endeavor, with due respect for their existing obligations, to further the enjoyment by all States, great or small, victor or vanquished, of access, on equal terms, to the trade and to the raw materials of the world which are needed for their economic prosperity;
Fifth, they desire to bring about the fullest collaboration between all nations in the economic field with the object of securing, for all, improved labor standards, economic
advancement and social security;
Sixth, after the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to see established a peace which will afford to all nations the means of dwelling in safety within their own boundaries, and which will afford assurance that all the men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want;
Seventh, such a peace should enable all men to traverse the high seas and oceans without hindrance;
Eighth, they believe that all of the nations of the world, for realistic as well as spiritual reasons must come to the abandonment of the use of force. Since no future peace can be maintained if land, sea or air armaments continue to be employed by nations which threaten, or may threaten, aggression outside of their frontiers, they believe, pending the establishment of a wider and permanent system of general security, that the disarmament of such nations is essential. They will likewise aid and encourage all other practicable measures which will lighten for peace-loving peoples the crushing burden of armaments.
Signed by: Franklin D. Roosevelt & Winston S. Churchill
were metropoles ready to give up their colonies
- The imperial powers of Europe quickly forgot the good intentions expressed by Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt in Atlantic Charter.
- World War II was even followed by a “second invasion” because European governments tried to reassert their control over their African colonies.
- Link to a map of African colonies after World War II: https://cmvtcivils.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/decolonization.jpg
- The Europeans wanted to go back to exploiting Africa, but they quickly met stiff resistance from African leaders (the French also met opposition from nationalist such as Ho Chi Minh in Indochina at the same time).
were colonies ready to overpower their colonies
-Moreover, the governments of Western Europe such as France, the United Kingdom and Belgium did not have the financial resources to pay for the modernization of their colonies (they barely had enough to pay to organize their own welfare state and that was partly financed by assistance from the United States).
first country 1950s recognise indeondence in africa
-During the late 1950’s, the United Kingdom was the first European imperial power to recognize the independence of African colonies such as Sudan and Ghana (the Mau Mau rebellion that took place in Kenya in 1952 made them realize that Africans were increasingly hostile to British imperialism).
which colonies left which african countries in the 1960s
-1960 was a wonderful year for the Africans who were opposed to colonialism. France and Belgium followed the British and they gradually withdrew from Africa. Seventeen new independent countries were formed during that year.
-The independence of so many new countries led to a great wave of optimism amongst new African political leaders who dreamed a bright future for their continents:
“We are simply Africans. We do not want to subject ourselves to any foreign influence, we want nothing to do with any imported doctrines, whether from the west, from Russia (USSR), or from America… We do not want to escape one dictatorship only to fall beneath another.” Patrice Lumumba, Congo’s Prime Minister, 1960.
“now we must be prepared to bury the past an all its unpleasant memories and look to the future… It is clear that we must find an African solution to our problems, and this can only be found in African unity. Divided we are weak; united, Africa could become one of the greatest forces for good in the world.” Kwame Nkrumah, Prime Minister of Ghana, 1961.
was the end of colonialism the end of troubles in Africa
- Unfortunately, the departure of the imperial powers did not end the economic dependency of Africa.
2) Neocolonialism
2) Neocolonialism
- Corporations from developed countries remained active in Africa after 1960.
- They often had to pay African politicians and military officers to be able to invest and to protect their investments since they could no longer count on colonial authorities to defend their commercial interests in Africa.
- This is known as neocolonialism: “International relationship characterized by one nation’s dominance (usually economic) over another but which lacks the formal, political, or legal hallmarks of outright colonialism” (King, 2006, E8).
- European and American corporations still controlled the lion’s share of Africa’s resources after 1960. Chinese corporations recently joined them in the exploitation of African resources such as oil, gold, diamonds, uranium, cocoa, chrome, copper, cobalt and coltan (Coltan is an essential mineral for the production of cell phones, video games and laptops).
- Moreover, Africa’s consumers still depend on manufactured goods produced overseas and African farmers are rarely able to compete with the subsidized farmers of Europe and North America.
cause of many of the Political and Social Problems in the neo colonist period in Africa
-The boundaries that were arbitrarily imposed by the imperial powers created African countries that are not homogenous from ethnic or religious standpoints: Political boundaries were not drawn according to ethnicity, which made it difficult to establish cohesive nations (Hallock, 2013, p. 184) The imperialist-imposed artificial boundaries cut through tribes and forced together unworkable combinations of tribes. (Roskin, 2013, p.420)
-For example, Congo had 75 different dialects when it became independent from Belgium!
-This is causing many other conflicts in Africa between factions that were forced to coexist within the same country: Nine of the ten deadliest conflicts of the 1990s occurred in Africa…The underlying source of these conflicts was age-old tribal and religious differences (Hallock, 2013, p. 280).
example of conflict created by arvitrary land divisions
- This list of conflicts includes the Rwanda genocide that caused approximately 800,000 deaths in 1994.
- Most the victims were Tutsis. The Hutus also massacre some of their peers who were considered too close the Tutsis (the UN soldiers led by Romeo Dallaire were denied permission to try stopping to the killings).
how did the departure of colonial powers affect the political structures of the continent
- Another problem that stems from imperialism is that the Europeans did not understand that their notion of a democratic nation state was not ideal for their former African colonies.
- Wole Sonyinka (1997), a famous Nigerian writer, argues that state governments cannot function properly when they are imposed by foreigners. They have to be the creation of people who freely agree to form a polity. This process never took place in Africa.
- Therefore, the optimism of the early 1960’s expressed by African leaders such as Lumumba and Nkrumah quickly faded due to the aforementioned political difficulties.
- The enthusiasm of independence was quickly replaced by problems such as military coups , civil wars, droughts, corruption, lawlessness, overpopulation, desertification, the indebtedness of most African governments and famines.
international rwactions to the climate created on the African continent
-The famine in Ethiopia also inspired the hit song Do They Know it’s Chirsmas? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WesKXdaWBq0) in 1984 and Live Aid Concert during the summer of 1985 to raise funds to end this famine. This epic televised concert to did not solve the endemic problems of drought and famine in sub-Saharan Africa but it did offer unforgettable performances by famous artists of the 60s, 70s and 80s such as U2, Madonna, David Bowie, Phil Collins, Elton John, Sting, Eric Clapton, Stevie Wonder, Bryan Adams, Boy George, The Who and Wham! They performed in front of almost 2 billion viewers. The movie Bohemian Rhapsody offers a very good rendition of the spectacular performance of the band Queen at Wembley Stadium: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d7IJY1XnKM. This is the real performance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPKlrRwJB8A
was africa live laugh loving in these conditions
- African countries still tend to do very poorly in socio-economic indicators.
- The State World Atlas of the (Smith, 2012) shows that 9 of the 10 countries where people have a life expectancy at birth that is still under 50 years are in Africa (p. 25). It also shows that the 5 remaining countries where adult illiteracy is above 70 percent are in Africa (p.31).
- Post-colonial Africa also struggles with pandemics of deadly illnesses such as Ebola, malaria, cholera, noma (a gangrenous infection of the mouth) and AIDS (but Africa is coping relatively well with the Covid-19 pandemic).
- Approximately 25 million Africans were HIV-infected on the eve of the 21st century (Hallock, 2013).
do these consequnces still have an effect on Africa today
-According to Howard and Louis (2002), European Imperialism is also responsible for the presence of many corrupt and brutal dictatorial regimes.
-The Europeans gave Africans the impression that “development could spring only from the state itself and that they shared its top-down authoritarianism and contempt for grass-roots African modernizers” (Ranger, 2002, p.273).
The organization Transparency International consistently ranks African governments amongst the most corrupt in the world: https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi#
-“Today, the continent of Africa, although blessed with enormous potential, is one of the most volatile and conflict-ridden areas of the world” (Duiker & Monami, 2007, p. 207).
south africa history in brief
- South Africa’s history was unique by African standards.
- Historian Stephanie A. Hallock (2013) calls it modern Africa`s only true success story (I would personally add Botswana to her short list).
- South Africa became a British Dominion in 1910. Therefore, it was an autonomous community within the British Empire (like Canada, Newfoundland, Australia and New Zealand).
- South Africans enjoyed less control from the British government than other Africans of the British Empire who lived in British colonies such as Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana and Sudan.
- South Africa achieved nearly total autonomy from Great Britain by the mid-1930s.
- This was not good news for non-whites in South Africa.
