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This is hard to talk about, here's my take. To say that British colonialism was better in Nigeria than in Kenya, or than Belgian colonialism doesn't _really_ s
by bantunes 6y ago
This is hard to talk about, here's my take.
To say that British colonialism was better in Nigeria than in Kenya, or than Belgian colonialism doesn't _really_ seem to support the thesis that "there were good things about British colonialism", does it?
The fact is people showed up with guns one day and said "you work for me now" and "all these separate tribe lands are now one administrative unit so I can manage it better". No matter how nice they were by building roads (to ports), or schools (so the workers can understand basic math and thus follow orders, and how great their lives are under colonial rule) doesn't change the highly likely correct statement that an independent Nigeria free from influence stirring internal conflicts would have been much better off.
"Being colonized was better than living through our internal struggles" is kinda moot. Europe had plenty of war, disease and more war and still came out through it. A colonizer imposing stability by the sword/rifle wouldn't have been better in the long term.
- peteretep 6y ago> The fact is people showed up with guns one day and said "you work for me now" Seems a reach to suggest this was a novel scenario introduced by recent European colonialism, rather than a human phenomenon going back millennia
- bantunes 6y agoI didn't mean to imply it was an European innovation.
- wz1000 6y agoEuropean colonialism was certainly novel in its sheer scale, and its effects are felt to this day in pretty much every non European country barring a small handful.
- asa4akj 6y agoNope, because only the brits surpassed the previous biggest empire, the mongols. And mongols did come with some advancements in tech as well, but also plenty of destruction.
- wz1000 6y agoThe Mongolian Empire was very different in operation from the British or other colonial empires. It was not set up with the aim of wealth extraction and economic dominance of subjugated territories back to the parent country. You could not call it "colonial" by any widely accepted definition of the word.
- asa4akj 6y agoBecause it collapse still in the part of expanse. Other empires like roman was just like the british. In fact the definition of empire is the dominion of "second class" territories in virtue of the "first class".
- Nasrudith 6y agoI thought Mongolians were more on wealth extraction and less on economic dominance - essentially demanding tribute and after setting up an administrative class after a wholesale purge of the previous military elite the only demand being to keep the tribute flowing. Less economic dominance because they were nomadic raiders not traders or industrialists. Their complete cultural apathy is largely what makes them "not colonalism" technically. In the same way that samuari aren't technically feudalism because they aren't landowners but servants of a lord. Although they work by analogy pretty well.
- DC-3 6y agoEuropeans were the first to gain the ability to project power on a global scale and thus became the colonisers. There is a borderline racist trend in some parts of academia to frame colonialism as being a consequence of the inherent value system of white Europeans - but while it is true that racist and chauvinistic attitudes were used to defend colonialism, I think it is fairly certain that had Africans been the first to develop the ability to administrate a state across oceans then we could be living in a world now where England, Italy, and Denmark are struggling to reclaim their respective identities and sovereignty after only recently gaining freedom from their Yoruba and Kongo oppressors.
- asa4akj 6y agoAfricans had European colonies before Europeans had African colonies. Carthage predates Rome, and Carthage had colonies all over Hiberia, which Rome later conquered.
- DC-3 6y agoWell the Carthaginians were semitic people from modern-day Lebanon IIRC, so it's a bit of a stretch to call them African.
- JPLeRouzic 6y agoCarthage was in what is now called "Tunisia". It was founded by people from Tyre which is indeed in Lebanon. After gaining independence in the seventh century BC, Carthage gradually expanded its economic and political hegemony across northwest Africa, Iberia, and the major islands of the western Mediterranean. In 146 BC, after the third and final Punic War, the Romans destroyed Carthage and established a new city in its place. All remaining Carthaginian dependencies, as well as other Phoenician city-states, came under Roman rule by the first century AD. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Carthage https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Carthage
- DarthGhandi 6y ago> doesn't change the fact that an independent Nigeria free from influence stirring internal conflicts would have been much better off Maybe we have different definitions of the word fact but I'd suggest what you are saying is actually a hypothetical and not a fact at all. Ethiopia was never colonised and look how they turned out compared to the rest of Africa. It's very tempting to try simplify these highly complex realities, the relative comparison you've made doesn't hold water though.
- bantunes 6y agoI did explicitly say "free from influence stirring internal conflicts", and in that regard Ethiopia has some history with Italy and communist regimes. I stand by my statement: they'd be better off left to their own fate. But maybe you're right, it's not factual.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- enkid 6y agoI don't think you can make some of the claims you are making without more evidence. State formation is often a violent process and often involves someone showing up with weapons demanding you pay them taxes. Does it matter if it is a European or a neighbor? You often have what we would call colonialism in this process, just a more local version of it. Think about the Huns sweeping into central Europe, conquering those people's and adding them to their coalition. Or the Aztec demanding tribute from their neighboring cities. Or China conquering central Asian states and Korea. Or the Zulu building a confederation through conquest of Southern Africa. All of these were coercive relationships, built on a state or proto state dominating the "less advanced" people around them. I'm not saying that this makes colonialism good, but the idea that there was some sort of peaceful prior existence for the people before colonization or without colonization there wouldn't be just as difficult violent struggles is not obvious from history.
- bantunes 6y agoAnd yet we don't call what the Huns, Aztec, Chinese or Zulu did "colonialism" - why do you think that is, and does it change your point?
- makomk 6y agoWe don't call what the Huns, Aztec, Chinese or Zulu did "colonialism" because it doesn't help the narrative. Notice how, in particular, there are plenty of people willing to call what happened to Ireland colonialism even though it involved solely neighbours and even though every single faction arrived there via England originally.
- disgruntledphd2 6y agoIreland is probably better framed as (mostly) entrenched religious discrimination and subjugation on that basis (for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_Laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penal_Laws)
- randompwd 6y ago
- acqq 6y agoThere are many angles to this story, but some should not remain ignored: the story of centuries long slave trade -- note, the slave trade was fully established much before the Western nations used "the fruits" of it: https://www.historytoday.com/archive/fall-kano https://www.historytoday.com/archive/fall-kano and the changes in Britain helped changing that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Trade_Act_1807 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_Trade_Act_1807 From a book by Gene W Heck "Charlemagne, Muhammad, and the Arab Roots of Capitalism": "For the medieval Muslim world was, to a large extent, a civilization powered by involuntary servitude. Its manual labor force and, even at times, significant parts of its military, consisted predominantly of slaves. Nonetheless, there were, by doctrinal definition, no slaves indigenous within the Dar al-Islam ~ as after the initial Arab conquests, its empire became comprised of Muslims and tax-paying non-Muslims (dhimmis), classes of citizens who could not legally be reduced to slavery. ‘Therefore, an vibrant external slave traffic was vital to provide the energy required for the successful functioning of Islamic industry.”" (Gene W Heck PhD: residing in Middle East, a senior business development economist operating in Saudi Arabia and throughout the Middle East and adjunct professor of government and history with the University of Maryland.) https://medinapublishing.com/book-author/gene-w-heck-phd/ https://medinapublishing.com/book-author/gene-w-heck-phd/ Also note the size of one specific market: https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/teaching-resource/historical-context-facts-about-slave-trade-and-slavery https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-resources/teaching-res... "Over the period of the Atlantic Slave Trade, from approximately 1526 to 1867, some 12.5 million slaves had been shipped from Africa, and 10.7 million had arrived in the Americas." Many people who try to "explain" what happened before bend over backwards to avoid considering some of such facts which were some of the main drivers of what was happening in the world for centuries (and I include there the author of the original article -- the "censored" history is simply not something worth analyzing).