Africa, 1840
Africa, 1880
Africa, 1914
Africa, Various
Highlight: Berlin Conference
For a long time outsiders viewed Africa with curiosity, awe, and greed. Foreign invasions were prevented for a long time due to Africa's geography, but because of its size, surface features, climate, resources, and strategic importance, it became a prime candidate forconquest by ambitious European empires. Although Africa is physically remote from the power centers of Europe, North America, and Asia, it is surrounded by water and can therefore be reached easily from the other continents. This meant that the Europeans needed to establish rules for dealing with one another if they were to avoid constant bloodshed and competition for African resources. The Berlin Conference established those ground rules.
 |
principal architect of the Berlin Conference. |
The exploration of Africa by Europeans started with thePortuguese sailing along Africa's coast in 1450. The success the Portuguese had on these voyages encouraged other European naval powers to explore Africa. By the mid-nineteenth century, Europeans had established colonies all along the African coast and competed for control. The push for overseas territories was made even more intense by the Industrial Revolution and the need for cheap labor, raw material, and new markets. The competition between the Europeans often lead to violent conflict.
This violent conflict was terribly wasteful, so Portugal suggested the idea of an international conference that could settle the territorial disputes that arose from European activities in the Congo region. The Berlin Conference was held in Berlin between November 15, 1884 and November 26, 1885, under the leadership of German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck. Although controlling the slave trade and promoting humanitarian idealism were promoted as the focus of the conference, the conference only passed empty resolutions about the ending of slave trade and providing for the welfare of Africa. In truth, the result of the Conference was a method of dividing the continent of Africa between the European powers.Article 34 of the Berlin Act states that any European nation that took possession of an African coast, or named themselves as “protectorate” of one, had to inform the signatory powers of the Berlin Act of this action. If this was not done then their claim would not be recognized. This article introduced the “spheres of influence” doctrine, the control of a coast also meant that they would control the hinterland to an almost unlimited distance. Article 35 determined that in order to occupy a coastal possession, the nation also had to prove that they controlled sufficient authority there to protect existing rights such as freedom of trade and transit. This was called the doctrine of “effective occupation” and it made the conquest of Africa a less bloody process.
The Berlin Act was an important change in international affairs. It created the rules for “effective occupation” of conquered lands, ensuring that the division of Africa would take place without war among the European powers. Through the Berlin Act, the European powers justified dividing a continent among themselves without considering the desires of the indigenous peoples. While this appears extremely arrogant to us now, it seemed to them to be the obvious extension of their imperialism. The Berlin Conference is one of the most clear examples of the assumptions and preconceptions of this era, and its effects on Africa can still be seen today. The arbitrary boundaries the Europeans imposed often divided an ethnic group and also brought enemies under the same government causing strife that still exists today.
Source:The Web Chronology Project
Highlight: Belgian Congo
Often African nations are described as unstable. There is a great deal of truth in this statement as almost all post-colonial African nations have experienced political violence and severe economic mismanagement during the mid and late twentieth century.
Of all African nations, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has had an especially tumultuous post-colonial experience. Formerly a Belgian colony, the DRC still faces violence in the eastern portion of the country as well as political, economic, and social instability throughout.
There are many historical reasons for the DRC’s instability but Belgian colonial education policies are a key cause of this instability.
In 1884-1885, the Berlin West Africa Conference effectively divided up the African continent amongst the Great Powers of Europe. Attended by the colonial powers of Great Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany, and Belgium, among others, the Conference created artificial state boundaries as well as a colonial system that was in effect for the next sixty years.
Among these territories, the Congo was a unique case. Granted to King Leopold II of Belgium, the Congo was a “personal” concession for the King, rather than a colony. The King, not the Belgian government, effectively owned and controlled the Congo. Leopold administered the Congo in a notoriously brutal manner, using it to augment his own personal wealth. The Congo’s wealth, which included its numerous rubber trees, was brutally extracted using what was basically slave labor. This rubber was then exported to fuel the industrial growth of both nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Europe and America.
Of all African nations, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has had an especially tumultuous post-colonial experience. Formerly a Belgian colony, the DRC still faces violence in the eastern portion of the country as well as political, economic, and social instability throughout.
There are many historical reasons for the DRC’s instability but Belgian colonial education policies are a key cause of this instability.
In 1884-1885, the Berlin West Africa Conference effectively divided up the African continent amongst the Great Powers of Europe. Attended by the colonial powers of Great Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany, and Belgium, among others, the Conference created artificial state boundaries as well as a colonial system that was in effect for the next sixty years.
Among these territories, the Congo was a unique case. Granted to King Leopold II of Belgium, the Congo was a “personal” concession for the King, rather than a colony. The King, not the Belgian government, effectively owned and controlled the Congo. Leopold administered the Congo in a notoriously brutal manner, using it to augment his own personal wealth. The Congo’s wealth, which included its numerous rubber trees, was brutally extracted using what was basically slave labor. This rubber was then exported to fuel the industrial growth of both nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Europe and America.
King Leopold II of Belgium, as a Garter Knight.
Despite his growing reliance on the wealth of the Congo, Leopold never visited this territory himself. By 1908, the territory was so poorly managed that an international furor condemning Leopold had erupted. That same year, in an attempt to stem this furor, the Congo was ceded to Belgium and placed under the control of the Belgian government, not its king. Belgium then administered the Congo as a colony until independence in 1960.
Unlike other early twentieth-century colonial powers in Africa, Belgium did not directly oversee the education of the Congo’s indigenous population. Rather, it turned the responsibility for education over to missionaries.
In 1908, the Congo had 587 missionaries, mostly Catholic, who educated only 46,075 students, a very small fraction of the many residents. This small number of students stemmed from many factors. The number of missionaries was insufficient to educate a large population. But the missionary’s educational agenda, which often undermined indigenous African culture and promoted colonial domination, also deterred many Africans from pursuing European educations.
Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the primary role of the Church, both in religion and education, was to promote colonialism. Many Congolese villagers at first avoided the mission schools because they had a religious agenda that threatened to undermine their cultural values and beliefs.
Unlike other early twentieth-century colonial powers in Africa, Belgium did not directly oversee the education of the Congo’s indigenous population. Rather, it turned the responsibility for education over to missionaries.
In 1908, the Congo had 587 missionaries, mostly Catholic, who educated only 46,075 students, a very small fraction of the many residents. This small number of students stemmed from many factors. The number of missionaries was insufficient to educate a large population. But the missionary’s educational agenda, which often undermined indigenous African culture and promoted colonial domination, also deterred many Africans from pursuing European educations.
Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the primary role of the Church, both in religion and education, was to promote colonialism. Many Congolese villagers at first avoided the mission schools because they had a religious agenda that threatened to undermine their cultural values and beliefs.
Map of Church Mission areas in the Belgian Congo, Hippolyte d'Ursel.
Along with concerns about the type of education the Congolese should receive, the Church also believed that higher education should be reserved only for those entering the priesthood. As a result, most students who did attend school in the Congo received only a basic primary education. This practice was reinforced by the Belgian colonial administration, which discouraged higher education for Africans. It was only in 1954 that the first Congolese citizen was admitted to a university for purposes other than religious education.
Belgian colonial education policy stood in stark contrast to the colonial educational policies of Britain and France. While government policies that discouraged the educational and vocational promotion of African peoples were a characteristic of every early twentieth-century colonial system, both Britain and France sent numerous missionaries to their colonies. These missionaries often founded schools and created educational programs for the communities that they worked in. But the British and French governments, unlike Belgium, also took strong control over the education of their colonial subjects.
With the Congo, Belgium not only took a less active role in education, it also used Catholic missionaries as a form of civil servants who were paid by the government. Ironically, Belgium’s hands-off policy toward education, which was characteristic of Belgian colonial policies overall, reflected the government’s reluctance in being a colonial power; the government had only agreed to take over the Congo to save its king from the public humiliation and outcry of the international community which had been horrified by Leopold’s brutal policies.
Belgian colonial education policy stood in stark contrast to the colonial educational policies of Britain and France. While government policies that discouraged the educational and vocational promotion of African peoples were a characteristic of every early twentieth-century colonial system, both Britain and France sent numerous missionaries to their colonies. These missionaries often founded schools and created educational programs for the communities that they worked in. But the British and French governments, unlike Belgium, also took strong control over the education of their colonial subjects.
With the Congo, Belgium not only took a less active role in education, it also used Catholic missionaries as a form of civil servants who were paid by the government. Ironically, Belgium’s hands-off policy toward education, which was characteristic of Belgian colonial policies overall, reflected the government’s reluctance in being a colonial power; the government had only agreed to take over the Congo to save its king from the public humiliation and outcry of the international community which had been horrified by Leopold’s brutal policies.
Chained Congolese slaves on a Belgian Rubber Plantation.
By the eve of Congolese independence in June 1960, the aspiring nation had only sixteen African university graduates out of a population of more than thirteen million. There were no Congolese engineers or physicians.
Perhaps most crucially, the lack of centralized education left the new nation in a stunted state of growth. Across the African continent, educated Africans had often played a key role in the independence movements and these leaders had then stepped in to govern the new nations which emerged in the 1960s. In many of these new African states, a uniform educational system had helped to promote national unity and identity---both of which were desperately needed as the colonial map had created artificially constructed nations that had numerous different and even competing ethnic groups.
In the Congo, educated Africans who could serve to unify the nation were basically non-existent. This was unfortunate because the Congo, as the third largest country in Africa, was home to many distinct ethnic groups and possessed incredible wealth in its natural resources. While post-colonial African nations needed to establish and create a national identity in the wake of colonialism and although all of these nations required an educated citizenry, the absence of these in the ethnically diverse Congo contributed greatly to its instability in the decades that followed.
No one single factor can be said to have caused the Congo’s road to independence to be a rocky one but the lack of educational opportunities for the Congolese when they were the colonial subjects of Belgium was clearly a central factor in the new country’s instability.
Perhaps most crucially, the lack of centralized education left the new nation in a stunted state of growth. Across the African continent, educated Africans had often played a key role in the independence movements and these leaders had then stepped in to govern the new nations which emerged in the 1960s. In many of these new African states, a uniform educational system had helped to promote national unity and identity---both of which were desperately needed as the colonial map had created artificially constructed nations that had numerous different and even competing ethnic groups.
In the Congo, educated Africans who could serve to unify the nation were basically non-existent. This was unfortunate because the Congo, as the third largest country in Africa, was home to many distinct ethnic groups and possessed incredible wealth in its natural resources. While post-colonial African nations needed to establish and create a national identity in the wake of colonialism and although all of these nations required an educated citizenry, the absence of these in the ethnically diverse Congo contributed greatly to its instability in the decades that followed.
No one single factor can be said to have caused the Congo’s road to independence to be a rocky one but the lack of educational opportunities for the Congolese when they were the colonial subjects of Belgium was clearly a central factor in the new country’s instability.
Originally Posted on The Ultimate History Project
Highlight: Moroccan Crises
In 1904 France had concluded a secret treaty with Spain partitioning Morocco and had also agreed not to oppose Britain’s moves in Egypt in exchange for a free hand in Morocco. Germany, however, insisted upon an open-door policy in the area; and, in a dramatic show of imperial power, the emperor William II visited Tangier and, from his yacht on March 31, 1905, declared for Morocco’s independence and integrity. The resultant international panic, the First Moroccan Crisis, was resolved in January–April 1906 at the Algeciras Conference, where German and other national economic rights were upheld and where the French and Spanish were entrusted with the policing of Morocco.
On Feb. 8, 1908, a further Franco-German agreement reaffirmed Morocco’s independence while recognizing France’s “special political interests” and Germany’s economic interests in North Africa.
The Second Moroccan Crisis (1911) was precipitated when the German gunboat Panther was sent toAgadir on July 1, 1911, ostensibly to protect German interests during a local native uprising in Morocco but in reality to cow the French. This “Agadir Incident” sparked a flurry of war talk during the summer and fall (the British even made preparations for eventual war), but international negotiations continued, and the crisis subsided with the conclusion of the convention of Nov. 4, 1911, in which France was given rights to a protectorship over Morocco and, in return, Germany was given strips of territory from the French Congo. Spain at first objected; but, through the intervention of Great Britain, a Franco-Spanish treaty was concluded on Nov. 27, 1912, slightly revising the previous Franco-Spanish boundaries in Morocco. The negotiations of 1911–12 between the powers also led up to the eventual internationalization of the Tangier zone, consisting of Tangier and its environs, in 1923.
First Moroccan Crisis
On this day in 1905, Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany arrives in Tangiers to declare his support for the sultan of Morocco, provoking the anger of France and Britain in what will become known as the First Moroccan Crisis, a foreshadowing of the greater conflict between Europe's great nations still to come, the First World War.
The kaiser did not have any substantive interest in Morocco; neither did the German government. The central purpose of his appearance was to disrupt the Anglo-French Entente, formed in April 1904. The Entente Cordiale, as it was known, was originally intended not as an alliance against Germany but as a settlement of long-standing imperialist rivalries between Britain and France in North Africa. By its terms, Britain could pursue its interests in Egypt, while France was free to expand westward from Algeria into Morocco, the last territory that remained independent in the region. France subsequently signed an agreement with Spain dividing Morocco into spheres of influence, with France receiving the greater part.
Angered by its exclusion from the decisions made about North Africa, Germany believed that the Anglo-French Entente went a long way towards the creation of a new diplomatic balance in Europe itself. An international convention had guaranteed the independence of Morocco in 1880; Germany now saw that the friendship between two of Europe's most powerful nations threatened to override this, and thus also posed a challenge to Germany's own influence in Europe and the world.
With much pomp and circumstance, Wilhelm—whose ship had faced gale-force winds on its passage to North Africa—arrived in Tangiers on March 31, 1905. In what would be known as the open door speech, he announced that he looked upon the sultan of Morocco as the ruler of a free and independent empire subject to no foreign control and that he himself would always negotiate with the sultan. He also stated that he expected Germany to have advantages in trade and commerce with Morocco equal to that of other countries. Wilhelm's sensational appearance marked an aggressive departure from the German foreign policy under the legendary Otto von Bismarck, who as chancellor had united the German empire in 1871 and had advocated conciliatory gestures towards France and other European rivals as a key part of German foreign policy.
Although Germany had intended aggressive action in Morocco to place a wedge between France and Britain, it in fact had the opposite effect, strengthening the bond between the two countries due to their mutual suspicion of Germany. What began as mere friendship turned, after the First Moroccan Crisis, into a type of informal military alliance, including conversations between the British and French governments and military staffs and later, a mutual defense agreement with a third country, Russia.
In the wake of the kaiser's appearance, an international conference convened in Algeciras, Spain, in January 1906 to conclude an agreement about Morocco. The resulting convention awarded France a controlling interest in Moroccan affairs, but guaranteed equality of trade and economic freedom for every nation and limited any colonial action by any nation without consultation with the other signatories. A Second Moroccan Crisis flared in April 1911, when the French pushed troops into the country, claiming to be defending the sultan against riots that had erupted in Fez but actually violating the terms of the Algeciras convention. In response, Germany sent its own warship, the Panther, which arrived in the port of Agadir on May 21, intensifying the enmity between the two nations and, by extension, their allies.
Slightly more than two years before the outbreak of World War I, then, the two Moroccan crises left no doubt that the traditional power balance in Europe had shifted into large blocs of power, with Germany relatively isolated on one side—enjoying only lukewarm support from Austria-Hungary and Italy—and Britain, France, and Russia on the other.
Second Moroccan Crisis
Six years after the First Moroccan Crisis, during which Kaiser Wilhelm's sensational appearance in Morocco provoked international outrage and led to a strengthening of the bonds between Britain and France against Germany, French troops occupy the Moroccan city of Fez on May 21, 1911, sparking German wrath and a second Moroccan Crisis.
In March 1911, French authorities claimed, rebel tribes staged an uprising in Morocco, endangering one of the country's capital cities, Fez. The sultan appealed to France for help restoring order, which led the French to send their troops to Fez on May 21. Germany, however, wary of French power in Africa, believed the French had fomented the tribal revolt to create an excuse to occupy Morocco. The German foreign secretary, Alfred von Kiderlen-Wachter, neglected to consult key personnel, including the chiefs of the armed forces, before sending a naval cruiser, the Panther, to anchor in the harbor of Agadir on Morocco's Atlantic coast, asserting Germany's claims of French aggression on July 1 in an attempt to encourage resistance against the French among the native population.
Though, as in the First Moroccan Crisis, Germany had counted on France's isolation and eventual submission, this did not prove to be the case, as Britain once again backed France, its partner in the Entente Cordiale of 1904. David Lloyd George, Britain's chancellor of the exchequer, made this clear in a public address in London at a banquet at the Mansion House on July 21. After Russia too gave its support to France, though somewhat ambiguously, and Austria-Hungary failed to lend Germany even its diplomatic support, the Germans were forced to back down. In the ensuing negotiations, concluding November 4, Germany reluctantly agreed to recognize the French protectorate over Morocco in return for territorial concessions—which they deemed inadequate—in other regions of Africa.
Meanwhile, military talks began between the British and French, and it was decided that their two navies would divide responsibilities, with the French taking control of the Mediterranean and the British the North Sea and the English Channel. As the two countries moved from friendship to alliance—counting Russia as well on their side—in the wake of the Second Moroccan Crisis, a powerful Germany found itself increasingly isolated, with only tenuous support from its fellow Triple Alliance members, Austria-Hungary and Italy. As Helmuth von Moltke, chief of the German general staff, wrote to the German chancellor, Theobald Bethmann von Hollweg in a memorandum dated December 2, 1912: All sides are preparing for European War, which all sides expect sooner or later.
Originally Posted On History.com
Highlight: Herero Rebellion
The Herero and Nama Revolts of German South West Africa (now Namibia) between 1904 and 1908 were a popular response to the German colonization and occupation of the region which began in 1894. The Herero people are actually composed of several Bantu speaking peoples of central highlands and are also referred to as the Ovaherero. Scholars dispute whether the revolts, also known as the Herero-German War and the Nama-German war, were the result of a premeditated uprising initiated by the Herero. Faced with continued encroachment upon their land, agriculture and way of life despite several treaties signed by German colonizers and Herero chiefs, several Herero chiefs organized in revolt on January 1, 1904. Over 100 German settlers and soldiers were killed in the uprising, and ultimately took control of Hereroland, located in the north-central region of the colony.
The repression of the revolts by combined forces of the German colonial administration and German army provided a brutal foreshadowing of subsequent German colonization efforts in Africa as well as the implementation of racist ideologies and pseudo-scientific research which would resurface in Germany itself under the policies of the Third Reich. The Herero were joined by the Nama, a less populous group which resided in the central and south regions of the colony, in October 1904. Over the course of the three years it took to quell the rebellion, 60,000 Herero people were killed in the fighting with the German troops, roughly 80% of the Herero population. The Nama people lost approximately 35-50% of their population in fighting with the German army. In the aftermath of the wars, Herero men, women, and children were subjected to various forms of murder, torture and rape. Lynching was often used to murder Herero men. The defeated survivors from both groups (15,000 Herero, 2,200 Nama) were placed in concentration camps. In the camps they were forced to undertake physical labor under harsh conditions. Many Herero women were raped and forced to perform sexual services for German soldiers, which led to a high incidence of syphillus, gonnorhea and other sexually transmitted diseases in the camps.
Moreover, camp prisoners were transformed into human subjects for various laboratory experiments designed to confirm the racial inferiority of black peoples. These experiments were overseen by Dr.Eugen Fischer who became the senior geneticist of the Nazi regime. Ironically, German scientists were not the first to use the Herero people as the empirical basis for pseudo-scientific racial theory. Francis Galton, cousin of Charles Darwin and renowned theorist of eugenics, developed his first eugenicist formulations after undertaking an expedition with English-speaking tourists through Southwestern Africa in 1850. In several important respects, German policies of repression of the revolt were prototypical of the policies imposed upon racial "inferiors" during World War II. Fischer used the findings from these experiments as the basis for arguing the genetic dangers to the German race via miscegenation (race-mixing, or mis-mating) between German men and African women. In 1905, the government of South West Africa forbade marriage between Africans and Europeans and declared prior marriages between the two races dissolved.
Rudolph Goering, the governor general of German South West Africa at the time, was the father of Herman Goering, Hitler's second-in-command under the Third Reich. General Lothar von Trotha, head of the colonial military army in East Africa, sucessfully argued that the Herero people had to be destroyed as a nation, and advocated the murder of women and children. After their surrender,all cattle and land were expropriated from the Herero. Scholars such as Helmut Bley and Jan-Smart Gewald suggest that the Herero society was effectively destroyed as a result of this brutal campaign by the Germans, although the Herero peoples would successfully reconstruct their lives and communities after 1908. British novelist Thomas Pynchon's novel depicts the murder of and experimentation on the Herero and Nama peoples in his novel Gravity's Rainbow.
Source: Global Mappings
Extended History
The areas of German South West Africa (now Namibia) were formally colonized by Germany between 1884–90. The semiarid territory was more than twice as large as Germany, yet it had only a fraction of the population—approximately 250,000 people. In contrast to Germany’s other African possessions, it offered little promise for large-scale mineral or agricultural extractions. Instead, South West Africa became Germany’s only real settler colony. By 1903 some 3,000 Germans had settled in the colony, primarily on the central high grounds. The launch of this new settler society, albeit still small, disrupted the socioeconomic balance of the territory and resulted in conflict. Apart from overarching anticolonial concerns, the primary points of friction were access to scarce resources such as land, water, and cattle. The largest conflict involved the Herero nation, a mainly pastoral people who over the preceding decades had adopted various traits of modernity, including use of horses and guns.
The fighting began on Jan. 12, 1904, in the small town of Okahandja, the seat of the Herero chieftaincy under paramount leader Samuel Maharero. It is still unclear who fired the first shots, but by noon that day Herero fighters had laid siege to the German fort. In the following weeks, fighting rippled out across the central high grounds. Seeking to gain control of the situation, Maharero issued specific rules of engagement that precluded violence against women and children. Nevertheless, 123 settlers and soldiers were killed in these attacks, including at least four women.
Maj. Theodor Leutwein, military commander and governor of the colony, was in charge of the German response. Since the Herero were well armed and, moreover, significantly outnumbered the German colonial garrison, he favoured a negotiated settlement of the conflict. He was, however, overruled by the General Staff in Berlin who demanded a military solution. On April 13 Leutwein’s troops were forced into an embarrassing retreat, and the governor was consequently relieved of his military command. In his place the German emperor, William II, appointed Lieut. Gen. Lothar von Trotha as the new commander in chief. He was a colonial veteran of the wars in German East Africaand of the Boxer Rebellion in China.
Von Trotha arrived on June 11, 1904. At that point there had not been any major combat for two months. The Herero had fled to the remote Waterberg plateau at the edge of the Kalahari (desert) to distance themselves from the German troops and supply lines, in an attempt to avoid additional battles and safely await a possible negotiation for peace or, if necessary, be well positioned to escape into British Bechuanaland (now Botswana). Von Trotha used this lull to gradually encircle the Herero. Moving his troops to the Waterberg plateau was a large undertaking, considering that the German maps of this area were incomplete and because water had to be hauled across the rugged terrain, along with the heavy artillery that would be vital for a successful attack. The general’s expressed strategy was to “annihilate these masses with a simultaneous blow.”
In the early morning of Aug. 11, 1904, von Trotha ordered his 1,500 troops to attack. Standing against an estimated 40,000 Herero, of whom only some 5,000 carried arms, the Germans relied on the element of surprise as well as their modern weaponry. The strategy worked. Continuous shelling by the artillery sent Herero combatants into a desperate offensive, awaited by the German machine guns. By late afternoon the Herero were defeated. However, a weak German flank to the southeast allowed the majority of the Herero nation to make a desperate escape into the Kalahari. In this exodus to British Bechuanaland, many thousands of men, women, and children eventually died of thirst.
In subsequent months von Trotha continued to pursue the Herero into the desert. Those who surrendered or were captured by the Germans were often executed summarily. By early October, however, von Trotha was forced to abandon the pursuit, due to exhaustion and lack of supplies.
Source: Encyclopedia Britannica
