The Berlin Conference played an
instrumental role in the shaping of modern Africa and explains a great deal about
why the continent struggles, economically, politically and socially. The Berlin Conference decided the borders of
the country in Africa. These borders
where made with very little regard for the African people.
African nations and that is nations in
the sense of a cultural group not in the sense of a political entity, where
greatly and negatively affected by the decisions made at the Berlin
Conference. The political boundaries
that were drawn were based on European imperial land claims rather than the
reality of African life. Traditional
trade routes were cut off, nations were separated, and nations that despised
each other were forced to share a pen.
These borders work fine for the
purposes of Europeans and their settlers.
For them these borders represented the areas where they could act and
this gave them a clearly defined area of operations. For people that just want new territory with
which to work, this method of “nation building” works fine. However the peoples of Africa had their own
unmarked territories and their own ways of doing things. By placing these borders, things like nations
being divided and nomadic patterns being disturbed became genuine concerns. Especially since African people's were
scarcely consulted, this was because the Berlin Conference was not about
them. Rather it was about European colonial
claims.
Bibliography
Michalopoulos, Stelio, and Elias
Papaioannou. "The Long-Run E ff ects of the Scramble for Africa."
Last modified January 2011. Accessed May 18, 2015.
https://urcourses.uregina.ca/pluginfile.php/631887/mod_resource/content/1/scramble_africa_stelios_elias.pdf.
1 comment:
If they would have consulted any Africans during this conference do you think they would have listened to thier opinions? I think they would not have as it was all about having territory to control. Unfortunately the little guy is seldom paid attention to.
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