What do you mean by colonialism?
Colonialism is defined as “control by one power over a dependent area or people.” It occurs when one nation subjugates another, conquering its population and exploiting it, often while forcing its own language and cultural values upon its people.
The word colony comes from the Latin word colonus, which means farmer - indicating the transfer of people to land. Colonialism is the act of power and domination of one nation, by acquiring or maintaining full or partial political control over another sovereign nation.
Colonialism refers to the policy of acquiring and maintaining colonies especially for exploitation of resources in the colonial land for the mother nation. It also means that it is a relationship between an indigenous majority and a minority foreign invaders.
The purposes of colonialism included economic exploitation of the colony's natural resources, creation of new markets for the colonizer, and extension of the colonizer's way of life beyond its national borders.
Rising global inequalities
And yet, colonialism is still not a thing of the past. It continues to oppress developing nations and minority communities globally — from Western Africa to Libya, Palestine to Ukraine, to places like Kashmir that are facing subjugation under military occupation.
The long control exercised by the British Empire over much of North America, parts of Africa, and India is an example of colonial domination. Colonialism has often led indigenous people, such as tribal groups, to become a minority in an area they once were the majority (dominant) group.
The three main countries in the first wave of European colonialism were Portugal, Spain, and the early Ottoman Empire.
United Kingdom (Britain)
The British Empire was the largest of its kind in history, and once covered about one quarter of all the land on Earth.
Causes of colonisation
The reasons for African colonisation were mainly economic, political and religious. During this time of colonisation, an economic depression was occurring in Europe, and powerful countries such as Germany, France, and Great Britain, were losing money.
Colonialism is where one country physically exerts complete control over another country and Imperialism is formal or informal economic and political domination of one country over the other. In a nutshell, colonialism can be thought of as the practice of domination and imperialism as an idea behind the practice.
What was the beginning of colonialism?
The age of modern colonialism began about 1500, following the European discoveries of a sea route around Africa's southern coast (1488) and of America (1492).
- political and legal domination over an alien society.
- relations of economics and political dependence.
- exploitation between imperial powers and the colony.
- racial and cultural inequality.
Some of the negative impacts that are associated with colonization include; degradation of natural resources, capitalist, urbanization, introduction of foreign diseases to livestock and humans. Change of the social systems of living.
There are different types of colonialism, namely settler, exploitation, plantation, surrogate, and internal colonialism—all of which are exploitative and oppressive.
Majorly there are two types of colonialism: Settler colonialism and Exploitation colonialism. The Settler colonialism involves immigration at large scale as an outcome of religious, economic or political issues. Exploitation colonialism involves the trade and commerce like the export of goods or even the slave trade.
Today the effects of colonialism had manifested in environmental degradation which had led to climate change. Economic underdevelopment and racial discrimination were expressed in racial profiling.
Those countries still have colonies are Australia, Denmark, Netherland, New Zealand, Norway, France, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Ans. The last remaining colony in the world is the island of Puerto Rico.
Neocolonialism takes the form of economic imperialism, globalization, cultural imperialism and conditional aid to influence or control a developing country instead of the previous colonial methods of direct military control or indirect political control (hegemony).
Modern studies of colonialism have often distinguished between various overlapping categories of colonialism, broadly classified into four types: settler colonialism, exploitation colonialism, surrogate colonialism, and internal colonialism.
Two world wars and a crippling economic depression within thirty years left European society exhausted and its military forces depleted. Western Europe recovered economically but could no longer maintain the colonial structures through which it had exerted global power.
Who ended colonialism?
First, the two postwar superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, preferred to exert their might by indirect means of penetration—ideological, economic, and military—often supplanting previous colonial rulers; both the United States and the Soviet Union took up positions opposed to colonialism.
Colonial America (1492-1763) European nations came to the Americas to increase their wealth and broaden their influence over world affairs. The Spanish were among the first Europeans to explore the New World and the first to settle in what is now the United States.
Answer and Explanation: European colonial powers benefited most from imperialism. These included: Spain, Portugal, France, Britain, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands.
In the past, the United States also occupied parts of Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Panama, and American citizens founded a colony in Africa called Liberia (today an independent nation). America's history with colonial possessions is tricky, and these territories weren't generally understood as colonies.
Britain, France, Spain, and the Netherlands established colonies in North America. Each country had different motivations for colonization and expectations about the potential benefits.
Ultimately, of all the countries in the world, only one consistently appears on every list of countries that have never been colonized: Japan. Several other countries appear on various lists. However, they all have events in their history that arguably make them colonies according to one definition or another.
However, imposing colonial control was often especially bloody for several reasons. First, the colonial power usually had deadlier weapons than the locals. Second, locals often outnumbered colonizers. Colonizers used their weapons to make up for the difference in numbers.
Some positives historians have pointed out are medicine, education, improved infrastructure, Christianity, and boundaries. The growth of the African population was aided by the Western medicine introduced by Europeans. Africans were introduced to formal education by Europeans.
The opportunity to make money was one of the primary motivators for the colonization of the New World. The Virginia Company of London established the Jamestown colony to make a profit for its investors. Europe's period of exploration and colonization was fueled largely by necessity.
Although use of the term is controversial, the enormous power of the United States is beyond dispute and most scholars agree that even if the U.S. is not actually an empire, its foreign policy could at various points in its history be characterized as imperial.
What is colonialism vs capitalism?
The term Capitalism refers to the economic system established just to make a maximum profit through trade and industry whereas the term colonialism refers to the establishing political control over the area or state in order to rule and exploit it economically.
In reality, it remains a powerful force in today's world. From Kashmir to Palestine, Western Sahara to Crimea and South Ossetia, many parts of the world remain under direct military occupation. Countries such as Britain and the USA also retain control over colonial territories.
Following the first voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1492, Spain and Portugal established colonies in the New World, beginning the European colonization of the Americas. France and England, the two other major powers of 15th-century Western Europe, employed explorers soon after the return of Columbus's first voyage.
Depending on how you define it, the only countries that were never colonies are Liberia, Ethiopia, Japan, Thailand, Bhutan, Iran, Nepal, Tonga, China, and possibly North Korea, South Korea and Mongolia. Some historians nitpick over this list.
- Health System Improvement. ...
- Infrastructure Development. ...
- Education and literacy. ...
- Constant Conflicts and War. ...
- Culture and Identity Dissolving. ...
- Economic Dependence. ...
- New Illnesses.
These five stages (exploration, expropriation, appropriation, exploitation, and justification) were necessary in order for colonialism to become both an effective tool for domination and a successful tool of domination; as such, they provide powerful glimpses into Achebe's fictional representation of the cataclysm ...
Colonialism is generally classified by one of five overlapping types according to the practice's particular goals and consequences on the subjugated territory and its indigenous peoples. These are settler colonialism; exploitation colonialism; plantation colonialism; surrogate colonialism; and internal colonialism.
Poverty exists due to decisions taken by people, countries and companies with power. These decisions started with colonialism, which has shaped the way we live now.
“Slavery and colonialism allocated rights and privileges on a racial basis, and they also entrenched economic, social and political inequalities along racial lines. Formal abolition of slavery and colonialism was by no means sufficient to undo these racial inequalities that were consolidated over centuries.”
Colonization as a spiritual act is a curse. The spiritual act of colonization dehumanizes both the colonizer and the colonized and operates from principles of unjust domination through control and authority over another.
When did colonialism end?
Between 1945 and 1960, three dozen new states in Asia and Africa achieved autonomy or outright independence from their European colonial rulers.
Battle of Adowa (Ethiopia) As you have already learned, Ethiopia along with Liberia, were the only African countries that were not colonized by Europeans.
In 1913, 412 million people lived under the control of the British Empire, 23 percent of the world's population at that time. It remains the largest empire in human history and at the peak of its power in 1920, it covered an astonishing 13.71 million square miles - that's close to a quarter of the world's land area.
Practice of occupying and exploiting other countries. colonisationUK. colonizationUS. expansionism. imperialism.
Today the effects of colonialism had manifested in environmental degradation which had led to climate change. Economic underdevelopment and racial discrimination were expressed in racial profiling.
Colonialism is where one country physically exerts complete control over another country and Imperialism is formal or informal economic and political domination of one country over the other. In a nutshell, colonialism can be thought of as the practice of domination and imperialism as an idea behind the practice.
Depending on how you define it, the only countries that were never colonies are Liberia, Ethiopia, Japan, Thailand, Bhutan, Iran, Nepal, Tonga, China, and possibly North Korea, South Korea and Mongolia. Some historians nitpick over this list.
The opposite of colonisation is not decolonisation, it is repatriation. If universities gained wealth from Britain's colonial past, we should be asking how repatriation of what was lost should take place.
Someone who engages in colonization, i.e. the agent noun, is referred to as a colonizer, while the person who gets colonized, i.e. the object of the agent noun or absolutive, is referred to as a colonizee, colonisee or the colonised.
United Kingdom (Britain)
The British Empire was the largest of its kind in history, and once covered about one quarter of all the land on Earth. One of the last major colonies to be given up by Britain was Hong Kong which was given back to China on July 1st 1997.
What countries are still colonized?
Those countries still have colonies are Australia, Denmark, Netherland, New Zealand, Norway, France, the United States, and the United Kingdom. Ans. The last remaining colony in the world is the island of Puerto Rico.
Therefore, unequal exchange, external integration and internal disarticulation, drain of wealth, and a foreign political domination may be understood as the four main features of colonialism.
The age of modern colonialism began about 1500, following the European discoveries of a sea route around Africa's southern coast (1488) and of America (1492).