Impact of Western European colonialism and colonisation

Colonialism is the policy or practice of acquiring full or partial political control over another country, occupying it with settlers, and exploiting it economically. Modern post-colonial states vary widely in terms of political and economic stability. Research suggests, the current conditions of post-colonial societies have roots in colonial actions and policies.^[1][2] For example, colonial policies, such as the type of rule implemented,^[3] the nature of investments,^[4][5] and identity of the colonizers,^[6] are cited with impacting the post-colonial states. Examination of the state-building process, economic development, and cultural norms and mores shows the direct and indirect consequences of colonialism on the post-colonial states.

Varieties of colonialism

Historians generally distinguish two main varieties established by European colonials: settler colonialism, where towns and cities were established with primarily European residents and the amenities of a “Neo-Europe” and exploitation colonialism, purely extractive and exploitative colonies whose primary function was to exploit resources.^[2] These frequently overlapped or existed on a spectrum.^[7]

Settler colonialism

Settler colonialism is a form of colonisation where foreign citizens move into a region and create permanent or temporary settlements called colonies. The creation of settler colonies often resulted in the forced migration of indigenous peoples to less desirable territories through forced migration. This process is exemplified in the colonies established in the United States, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, Argentina, and Australia.^[8]

The resettlement of indigenous peoples frequently occurs along demographic lines, but the central stimulus for resettlement is access to desirable territory. Regions free of tropical disease with easy access to trade routes were favorable.^[9] When Europeans settled in these desirable territories, natives were forced out and regional power was transferred to the colonials. Subsequently, this type of colonial behavior led to the elimination of native populations, not necessarily through genocide—the systematic killing of an ethnic group, but through the disruption of local customary practices and the transformation of socioeconomic systems. Ugandan academic Mahmood Mamdani cites “the destruction of communal autonomy, and the defeat and dispersal of tribal populations” as one primary factor in colonial oppression.^[7] Europeans justified settler colonialism with the false belief that the settlers were more capable of utilizing resources and land than the indigenous populations due to the introduction of modern agricultural practices. As agricultural expansion continued through the territories, native populations were further displaced to clear fertile farmland.^[9]

Daron Acemoglu, James A. Robinson, and Simon Johnson theorize that Europeans were more likely to form settler colonies in areas where they would not face high mortality rates due to disease and other exogenous factors.^[2] Many settler colonies sought to establish European-like institutions and practices that granted personal freedoms and allowed settlers to become wealthy by engaging in trade.^[10] Thus, jury trials, freedom from arbitrary arrest, and electoral representation were implemented to allow settlers rights similar to those enjoyed in Europe.^[2]

Exploitation colonialism

Since these colonies were created with the intent to extract resources, colonial powers has no incentive to invest in institutions or infrastructure that did not support their immediate goals of exploitation and thus, they established authoritarian regimes in these colonies, which had no limits on state power.^[2]

Exploitation colonialism is a form of colonisation where foreign citizens conquer a country in order to control and capitalize on its its natural resources and indigenous population. Acemoglu, Johnson, and Robinson argue, “institutions [established by colonials] did not introduce much protection for private property, nor did they provide checks and balances against government expropriation. In fact, the main purpose of the extractive state was to transfer as much of the resources of the colony to the colonizer, with the minimum amount of investment possible.”^[2] Since these colonies were created with the intent to extract resources, colonial powers has no incentives to invest in institutions or infrastructure that did not support their immediate goals. Thus, Europeans established authoritarian regimes in these colonies, which had no limits on state power.^[2]

The policies and practices carried out by King Leopold II of Belgium in the Congo Basin are an extreme example of exploitation colonialism.^[2] E. D. Morel, a British journalist, author, pacifist, and politician, detailed the atrocities in multiple articles and books. Morel believed the Belgian system that eliminated traditional, commercial markets in favor of pure exploitation was the root cause of the injustice in the Congo.^[11] Under the “veil of philanthropic motive,” King Leopold received the consent of multiple international governments (including the United States, Great Britain, and France) to assume trusteeship of the vast region in order to support the elimination of the slave trade. Leopold positioned himself as proprietor of an area totaling nearly 1 million square miles, which was home to nearly 20 million Africans.^[12]

After establishing dominance in the Congo Basin, Leopold extracted large quantities of ivory, rubber, and other natural resources. It has been estimated that Leopold made 1.1 billion in today’s dollars ^[13] by employing a variety of exploitative tactics. Soldiers demanded unrealistic quantities of rubber be collected by African villagers, and when these goals were not met, the soldiers held women hostage, beat or killed the men, and burned crops.^[14] These and other forced labor practices caused the birth rate to decline as famine and disease spread. All of this was done at very little monetary cost to Belgium. M. Crawford Young, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison observed,“ [the Belgian companies] brought little capital–a mere 8000 pounds...[to the Congo basin]–and instituted a reign of terror sufficient to provoke an embarrassing public-protest campaign in Britain and the United States at a time when the threshold of toleration for colonial brutality was high.”^[15]

The system of government implemented in the Congo by Belgium was authoritarian and oppressive. Multiple scholars view the roots of authoritarianism under Mobutu as results of colonial practices.^[16][17]

Impact of varying systems of political rule

Systems of colonial rule can be broken into the binary classifications of direct and indirect rule. Direct rule involves the establishment of a centralized European authority, run by colonial officials, within a territory. In a system of direct rule, the native population is excluded from all but the lowest level of the colonial government.^[18] Mamdani defines direct rule as centralized despotism: a system where natives were not considered citizens.^[7] By contrast, indirect rule integrates pre-established local elites and native institutions into the administration of the colonial government.^[18] Indirect rule maintain good pre-colonial institutions and foster development within the local culture.^[3] Mamdani classifies indirect rule as “decentralized despotism,” where day-to-day operations were handled by local chiefs, but the true authority rested with the colonial powers.^[7]

Indirect rule

In certain cases, as in India, the colonial power directed all decisions related to foreign policy and defense, while the indigenous population controlled most aspects of internal administration.^[19] This led to autonomous indigenous communities that were under the rule of local tribal chiefs. These chiefs were either drawn from the existing social hierarchy or were newly-minted by the colonial authority. The government acted as an advisor and only interfered in extreme circumstances.^[3] Often, with the support of the colonial authority, natives gained more power under indirect colonial rule than they had in the pre-colonial period.^[3]

Comparing outcomes

Both direct and indirect rule have persistent, long term effects on the success of former colonies. Lakshmi Iyer, of Harvard Business School, conducted research to determine the impact type of rule has on a region, looking at India, where both systems were present. Iyer’s findings suggests that regions ruled indirectly were generally better-governed and more capable of establishing effective institutions than areas under direct British rule. In the modern postcolonial period, areas formerly ruled directly by the British perform worse economically and have significantly less access to various public goods, such as health care, public infrastructure, and education.^[19]

Colonial actions and their impacts

Border reorganization

Health impacts of colonialism

European colonialism spread contagious diseases between Europeans and subjugated peoples.

Countering disease

The Dutch Public Health Service provides medical care for the native people of the Dutch East Indies, May 1946

The Spanish Crown organised a mission (the Balmis expedition) to transport the smallpox vaccine and establish mass vaccination programs in colonies in 1803.^[20] By 1832, the federal government of the United States established a smallpox vaccination program for Native Americans.^[21] Under the direction of Mountstuart Elphinstone a program was launched to increase smallpox vaccination in India.^[22]

From the beginning of the 20th century onwards, the elimination or control of disease in tropical countries became a necessity for all colonial powers.^[23] The sleeping sickness epidemic in Africa was arrested due to mobile teams systematically screening millions of people at risk.^[24] The biggest population increases in human history occurred during the 20th century due to the decreasing mortality rate in many countries due to medical advances.^[25]

Colonial policies contributing to indigenous deaths from disease

St. Paul's Indian Industrial School, Middlechurch, Manitoba, Canada, 1901. This school was part of the Canadian Indian residential school system.

John S. Milloy and Roland Chrisjohn published evidence that information about how new diseases were spread was concealed by colonialists to conceal infectious origins. Evidence has been presented at Canada's current Indian Residential Schools Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Trent University historian John S. Milloy demonstrated that medical professionals were aware that government policy was resulting in a higher death rate among indigenous people.^[26]

Documents from the RG 10 series on Canadian residential school system, written by Canada's federal Department of Indian Affairs (Vols. R 7733) (reproduced in Hidden from History: The Canadian Holocaust (2005) by Indigenous rights activist Kevin Annett), show many examples of a deliberate policy of non-intervention in preventing the spread of diseases such as tuberculosis and smallpox that were devastating native populations; at worst, there is evidence that the Canadian government was adopting policies that had the inevitable result of encouraging the rapid spread of deadly diseases among the native population.

Government officials, including the heads of Indian Affairs, authorized these practices through a policy that legitimated lack of care and widespread deaths on the grounds that “a high death rate from tuberculosis and other diseases is to be expected … among Indian children” (DIA Superintendent D.C. Scott, 1918).

Government policy by officials such as Department of Indian Affairs Superintendent D.C. Scott (quote above) was not to treat natives infected with tuberculosis or smallpox, and native children infected with smallpox and tuberculosis were deliberately sent back to their homes and into native villages by residential school administrators. Within the residential schools, there was no segregation of sick students from healthy students, and students infected with deadly illnesses were frequently admitted to the schools, where infections spread among the healthy students and resulted in deaths; death rates were at least 24% and as high as 69%.^[27]

Tuberculosis was the leading cause of death in Europe and North America in the 19th century, accounting for about 40% of working-class deaths in cities,^[28] and by 1918 one in six deaths in France were still caused by tuberculosis. European governments, and medical professionals in Canada,^[29] were well aware that tuberculosis and smallpox were highly contagious, and that deaths could be prevented by taking measures to quarantine patients and inhibit the spread of the disease. They failed to do this, however, and imposed laws that in fact ensured that these deadly diseases spread quickly among the indigenous population. Despite the high death rate among students from contagious disease, in 1920 the Canadian government made attendance at residential schools mandatory for native children, threatening non-compliant parents with fines and imprisonment. John S. Milloy argued that these policies regarding disease were not conventional genocide, but rather policies of neglect aimed at assimilating natives.^[27]

Some historians argue that some European colonists, having discovered that indigenous populations were not immune to certain diseases, deliberately spread diseases to gain military advantages and subjugate local peoples. Historian Roland Chrisjohn, Director of Native Studies at St. Thomas University (New Brunswick), has argued in The Circle Game: Shadows and Substance in the Indian Residential School Experience in Canada (Theytus Books, 1997. ISBN 0-919441-85-8) that the Canadian government followed a deliberate policy amounting to genocide against native populations. British officers, including the top British commanding generals Amherst and Gage, ordered, sanctioned, paid for and conducted the use of smallpox against the Native Americans during the siege of Fort Pitt. As described by historians, "there is no doubt that British military authorities approved of attempts to spread smallpox among the enemy", and "it was deliberate British policy to infect the indians with smallpox".^[30][31] Disease did break out among the Indians, but the exact effectiveness of the British attempts at infecting Native Americans is unknown.^[32] Letters and journals show that British authorities discussed and agreed to the deliberate distribution of blankets infected with smallpox among Indian tribes in 1763,^[33] and an incident involving William Trent and Captain Ecuyer has been regarded as one of the first instances of the use of smallpox as a biological weapon in the history of warfare.^[34][35] Some contemporary Europeans voiced the perspective towards native deaths from contagious disease that it was divine providence; Governor Winthrop of colonial Massachusetts declared, "God hath therefore cleared our title to this place".^[36]

Historic debates surrounding colonialism

Francisco Suarez and other theologians at the School of Salamanca formulated objections to colonialism during the sixteenth century. They argued for the limitation of the imperial powers of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor by underscoring the natural rights of indigenous people. The School of Salamanca also created a casuistry justifying legitimate cases of conquests, and thus legitimizing the colonization project itself.

Bartolomé de Las Casas opposed the dominant pro-colonial viewpoint of the Dominican Order, which held that the Native Americans had no souls and could thus be freely enslaved. He spoke at the Valladolid debate against Juan Ginés de Sepúlveda. Denis Diderot criticized ethnocentrism and the colonisation of Tahiti in Supplément au voyage de Bougainville in 1772.

Academic debate about colonialism has made use of the Stranger King concept.

Modern theories of colonialism

Dependency theory and neocolonialism

Andre Gunder Frank and other dependency theorists such argue that colonialism leads to the net transfer of wealth from the colonised to the coloniser and inhibits successful economic development. Frantz Fanon, Aimé Césaire, Léopold Sédar Senghor, and other writers of the Négritude movement underscore that colonialism also inflicts political, psychological and moral damage to the colonized.^[37]

Critics of the alleged abuses of economic and political advantages accruing to developed nations via globalised capitalism have referred to them as neocolonialism, seeing them as a continuation of the domination and exploitation of ex-colonial countries. Neocolonialism is in this sense a new form of imperialism, which had first been theorized by Lenin in Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism (1916). Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg thought that the necessary economic expansion of capitalism automatically led to territorial expansion, in order to find new resources and markets.

Some economic historians, including Marxist historian Bill Warren, disagree with dependency theorists:^[38]

There is no evidence of a process of underdevelopment…The evidence rather supports a contrary thesis: that process of development has been taking place…and that this has been a direct result of the west.

Other economists, such as Celso Furtado, have widely theorized on the specificities of third world economies, forming a concise theory of underdevelopment which understands it not simply as an early stage of a nation's economic history, but as a specific sort of modernized macroeconomic structure (a point of view which corroborates dependency theory, from a different perspective).

Benign colonialism

Dutch colonial administrator of the South Moluccas, picture taken 1940.

Benign colonialism is a term that refers to a supposed form of colonialism in which benefits outweighed risks for indigenous populations whose lands, resources, rights and freedoms were preempted by a colonising nation-state. The historical source for the concept of benign colonialism resides with John Stuart Mill who was chief examiner of the British East India Company dealing with British interests in India in the 1820s and 1830s. Mill's most well-known essays on benign colonialism are found in "Essays on some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy."^[39]

Mill's view contrasted with Burkean orientalists. Mill promoted the training of a corps of bureaucrats indigenous to India who could adopt the modern liberal perspective and values of 19th century Britain.^[40] Mill predicted this group's eventual governance of India would be based on British values and perspectives.

Advocates of the concept cite improved standards of health and education, employment opportunities, liberal markets, developed natural resources and introduced improved governance.^[41] The first wave of benign colonialism lasted from c. 1790-1960, according to Mill. The second wave included neocolonial policies exemplified in Hong Kong, where unfettered expansion of the market created a new form of benign colonialism.^[42] Political interference and military intervention in independent nation-states, such as Iraq,^[40][43] is also discussed under the rubric of benign colonialism in which a foreign power preempts national governance to protect a higher concept of freedom. The term is also used in the 21st century to refer to US, French and Chinese market activities in African countries with massive quantities of underdeveloped nonrenewable natural resources.

These views have support from some academics. Economic historian Niall Ferguson argued that empires can be a good thing provided that they are "liberal empires". He cites the British Empire as being the only example of a "liberal empire" and argues that it maintained the rule of law, benign government, free trade and, with the abolition of slavery, free labour.^[44] Historian Rudolf von Albertini agrees that, on balance, colonialism can be good. He argues that colonialism was a mechanism for modernisation in the colonies and imposed a peace by putting an end to tribal warfare.^[45]

Historians L.H Gann and Peter Duignan have also argued that Africa probably benefited from colonialism on balance. Although it had its faults, colonialism was probably "one of the most efficacious engines for cultural diffusion in world history".^[46] These views, however, are controversial and are rejected by some who, on balance, see colonialism as bad. The economic historian David Kenneth Fieldhouse has taken a kind of middle position, arguing that the effects of colonialism were actually limited and their main weakness wasn't in deliberate underdevelopment but in what it failed to do.^[47] Niall Ferguson agrees with his last point, arguing that colonialism's main weaknesses were sins of omission.^[44] Marxist historian Bill Warren has argued that whilst colonialism may be bad because it relies on force, he views it as being the genesis of Third World development.^[38]

Exemplary in the Dutch Empire of what was intended to be benign colonialism is the Dutch Ethical Policy applied in the Dutch East Indies (now: Indonesia) of the early 20th century.

Contemporary debate in France

The Taubira law officially recognized slavery and the Atlantic slave trade as crimes against humanity in 2001. May 10 was selected as the day dedicated to the recognition of the crime of slavery. Anticolonialist activists also want the African Liberation Day to be recognized by France.

Although slavery was recognized by this law, four years later, the vote of the February 23, 2005 law by the conservative Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), prompted teachers and textbooks to "acknowledge and recognize in particular the positive role of the French presence abroad, especially in North Africa." The law was met with public uproar and accusations of historic revisionism, both inside France and abroad.

Post-colonialism and post-colonial literature

See also

• Colonial mentality
• What the Romans Did for Us
• Scramble for Africa
• Decolonization
• Decolonisation of Africa
• State failure
• State-building
• Environmental determinism
• States and Power in Africa: Comparative Lessons in Authority and Control

References

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2. Acemoglu, Daron; Johnson, Simon; Robinson, James A. (1 June 2000). "The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation". National Bureau of Economic Research.
3. Crowder, Michael (1 July 1964). "Indirect Rule—French and British Style". Africa 34 (03): 197–205. doi:10.2307/1158021. ISSN 1750-0184.
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12. Morel 1923, p. 13
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14. Morel 1923, p. 31-39
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20. Dr. Francisco de Balmis and his Mission of Mercy, Society of Philippine Health History
21. Lewis Cass and the Politics of Disease: The Indian Vaccination Act of 1832
22. Smallpox History - Other histories of smallpox in South Asia
23. Conquest and Disease or Colonialism and Health?, Gresham College | Lectures and Events
24. WHO Media centre (2001). "Fact sheet N°259: African trypanosomiasis or sleeping sickness".
25. The Origins of African Population Growth, by John Iliffe, The Journal of African HistoryVol. 30, No. 1 (1989), pp. 165-169
26. A National Crime: the Canadian government and the residential school system, 1879-1986'. University of Manitoba Press. 1999. ISBN 978-0-88755-646-3.
27. Curry, Bill and Karen Howlett (April 24, 2007). "Natives died in droves as Ottawa ignored warnings". Globe and Mail. Retrieved February 25, 2012.
28. Tuberculosis in Europe and North America, 1800–1922. The Harvard University Library, Open Collections Program: Contagion.
29. Milloy, John S. (1999). A National Crime: the Canadian government and the residential school system, 1879-1986. University of Manitoba Press. ISBN 978-0-88755-646-3.
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31. Thornton, Russel (1987). American Indian Holocaust and Survival: A Population History : Since 1492. University of Oklahoma Press. pp. 78–79. ISBN 978-0-8061-2220-5.
32. Dixon, Never Come to Peace, 152–55; McConnell, A Country Between, 195–96; Dowd, War under Heaven, 190. For historians who believe the attempt at infection was successful, see Nester, Haughty Conquerors", 112; Jennings, Empire of Fortune, 447–48.
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34. Ann F. Ramenofsky, Vectors of Death: The Archaeology of European Contact (Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press, 1987):
35. Robert L. O'Connell, Of Arms and Men: A History of War, Weapons, and Aggression (NY and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989); Pg. 171
36. White, Matthew (2012). The Great Big Book of Horrible Things: The Definitive Chronicle of History's 100 Worst Atrocities. London: W.W. Norton and Co. p. 184. ISBN 978-0-393-08192-3.
37. Fanon, Frantz, The Wretched of the Earth, Maspero Publishing house, Pref. by Jean-Paul Sartre. Translated by Constance Farrington. London : Penguin Books, 2001
38. Warren, Bill (1980). Imperialism: Pioneer of Capitalism. Verso. p. 113.
39. Mill, John Stuart. 1844. "Essays on some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy."
40. Doyle, Michael W. 2006. "Sovereignty and Humanitarian Military Intervention." Columbia University.
41. Robert Woodberry- The Social Impact of Missionary Higher Education
42. Liu, Henry C. K. 2003. "China: a Case of Self-Delusion: Part 1: From colonialism to confusion." Asia Times. May 14.
43. Campo, Juan E. 2004. "Benign Colonialism? The Iraq War: Hidden Agendas and Babylonian Intrigue." Interventionism. 26:1. Spring.
44. Niall Ferguson, Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World and Colossus: The Rise and Fall of the American Empire
45. Albertini, Rudolph von, and Wirz, Albert. European Colonial Rule, 1880-1914: The Impact of the West on India, South East Asia and Africa
46. Lewis H. Gann and Peter Duignan, The Burden of Empire: A Reappraisal of Western Colonialism South of the Sahara
47. D. K. Fieldhouse, The West and the Third World