The Scramble for Africa European Motives Industrialization and

The Scramble for Africa

European Motives § Industrialization and competition between European powers stirred the quest for raw materials and land. Africa was a source of raw materials and a potential market for industrial products.

Early contact § Europeans had established contact with sub-Sarahan Africans starting in the 1450’s. Powerful African armies kept the Europeans out of most areas of Africa for 400 years. As late as 1880, Europeans controlled only about 10% of the continent’s land, mainly on the coast.

The Belgian Congo § Between 1879 -1882, Belgium’s King Leopold II gained control over vast areas of the Congo. Although he claimed his motivation was to abolish slavery and spread Christianity, his companies brutally exploited the African workers by forcing them to collect sap from rubber trees.

§ At least ten million Congolese died due to the abuses inflicted during Leopold’s rule. An international outcry brought attention to these abuses.

Forces Driving Imperialism § Belief in European superiority. § Racism: The belief that one race is superior (and that other races are inferior) to others. §. § Social Darwinism: Adaptation on Darwin’s theory of natural selection. The stronger “more advanced” nations (European) would dominate the weaker ones (non-European).

Technology § The Maxim gun, the world’s first automatic machine gun, allowed European armies to defeat larger African armies (who were stuck using older weaponry)

More technology § Railroads, steamships, and telegraph cables allowed close communications between the colony and the controlling nation.

Resistance to the Europeans § Around 1816, a Zulu Chief, Shaka, used highly disciplined warriors and good military organization to create a large centralized state. His successors, however, had difficulty keeping the kingdom together against the superior arms of the British invaders.

§ In 1828, the Zulu Kingdom was 11, 000 sq. miles in area (larger than New Jersey) and had 250, 000 inhabitants.

§ Using spears and shields against British guns, they nearly defeated the great European army until falling in the Battle of Ulundi in 1879. The Zulu nation fell to British control in 1887.

The Division of Africa: The Berlin Conference § Fourteen European nations met in Berlin in 1884 -85 to lay down the rules for the division of Africa. They agreed that any European country could claim land in Africa by notifying other nations of its claims and showing it could control the area.

§ No African ruler was invited to attend these meetings. By 1914, only Liberia and Ethiopia remained free from European control.