The Scramble For Africa- An Overview

The Scramble For Africa- An Overview

The scramble for Africa also known as “The Race for Africa” was a huge run of European power to acquire territories in Africa due to political, and social interests. It’s also defined as the haste to obtain territories in Africa by Europeans. Unfortunately, by early 1890, African countries were colonized apart from Liberia and Ethiopia. But before that why was African territories not colonized before 1880s ? Many factors such as political, economic and social contributed to this. In the next section, we will be exposing some of those reasons.

Why was Africa not colonized before 1880?

Many reasons contributed to prevent the scramble for Africa before 1880. And we classified them under political, social and economic factors.

Political factors.

  • Some Europeans leader such as Otto Von Bismark of Germany had no interest on colonization and due to that opposes it. This was solely because he wanted Germany to grow in Europe first.
  • Also the existence of strong respected and powerful  empires (like ASANTE, GHANA, DAHOMEY) who could not allow foreign bodies to colonize them.
  • Europe faces internal problems and as a result, it prevented them from showing interest to colonization.

Economic factors.

  • Before 1880, nations in Europe had richer and attractive areas more than Africa. Australia, Canada, India and China provided better markets and sources of raw materials.
  • Many part of Africa especially the interior was unexploited and it’s resources unknown.
  • Explorers and missionaries found it difficult to move in the interior part of Africa. In fact movement from Europe to Africa was not possible due to poor means of transport.

Social Factors.

  • The lack of basic necessities such as good drinking water, hospital, good food discourage Europeans from annexing Africa.
  • Europeans lack medications against tropical diseases.
  • In 1857,Movement into Africa was discourage due to high death rate caused by malaria and hash tropical climate. During this time Africa was called “The white man’s Grave”.
  • Africa had a long period of slave trade and it was also considered as a dark continent. So European believe that Africa has nothing interesting apart from trade.
  • Africans were primitive and wild.
  • Despite all those factors that discouraged European from annexing Africa, some other reasons causes them to rush for colonization.

Causes of the Scramble for Africa

Due to many reasons, Europeans started their race for Africa because of political, social, military or economic reasons.

Political Reasons.

  • Prestige. It was very prestigious among Europeans to have territories abroad. So possession of colonies oversea was a sign of greatness.Therefore the greatness of a country was determined by the number of colonies it had.
  • Balance Power. The principle that one nation should not be powerful than another in Europe and the desire to maintain this principle encourages colonization.
  • The collapse of strong Empire in Africa. After 1880, most powerful empires such as Ghana, Mali fell apart and this gave a chance to Europeans to take control.
  • British involvement in Egypt. In 1882, British encouraged France to sit for colonies. This was to compensate France for the lost of Egypt.

Economic Reasons.

  • Raw Material. With the grow of industries, there was the need of raw materials at home. Due to scarcity, it made Europeans to rush to Africa where it was available and cheap.
  • Invest surplus capital. The surplus capital gotten from industrial revolution needed areas where re-investment was possible. This motivated the scramble since Africa was seen as a profitable area.
  • European training firms. The existing training firm in Africa contributed greatly for the scramble by involving their home, government, to set up colonies and protect their trade and investment.
  • Cheap Labor. Europeans needed cheap labor to work in their plantations and this could be found in Africa. Portugal participated in the scramble because of cheap labor.
  • End Exploitation of Middle-man Monopoly. European trader saw that if they occupied African territories, they were to buy directly from the interior at cheaper prices. Rather than passing through middle-men, which were costly, to end that they have to participate in the scramble.

Social Reasons.

  • Surplus population. There was a great problem in Europe after the Industrial revolution. Therefore Europeans needed to acquire more land to resettle the unemployed population.
  • Spread population. Europeans believed that their religion and civilization was better than others. With this in mind, they rush to Africa to evangelize and spread their civilization.
  • End Obnoxious Practice. Europeans saw that African still carryout some practices such as slave trade, human sacrifice, killing of twins, Idol worshiping. This made European Philanthropist scramble for territories in Africa in order to put an end to those practices.

Other reasons includes

  • Conscription of Africa. In order to increase their military power they had to scramble so as to recruit.
  • Congo Basin. It was rich in minerals and agricultural resources such as copper, diamond, gold and rubber.
  • Decline of the Turkish empire.
  • The effect of 1880 economic depression.
  • Scientific Discoveries. European scientist government wanted to carryout experiences and make discoveries.
  • The Berlin West African Conference of 1884 —1885.
  • Discovery of large Gold deposit. The hope of discovering large amount of gold contributed to the scramble.
  • Fertile land. Europeans discovered that African soils was very fertile and they could establish their plantations with crops they could use in industries. Example of some of those crops were cocoa, coffee, rubber, palm oil.
  • Unemployment. The industrial revolution created unemployment and this made Europeans to search for job opportunities else were.

As a result of this, almost all of Africa was colonized and Europeans became more powerful but as there are never causes without consequences. Unfortunately these consequences affects Europeans as well as Africans and they had positive as well as negative effects

Consequences of the Scramble

  1. European power occupied strategic areas during the scramble.
  2. Europeans competed among themselves to sign treaties of protection with African rulers.
  3. Where peaceful method failed, they used guns and other weapons to frighten Africans rulers.
  4. Explorers, traders and missionaries assisted their home government agent in signing treaties of annexation.
  5. There were clashes between Europeans in some areas like the Congo and Nigeria basin.
  6. Conferences such as the Berlin-West African and Brussels Conference held to worth out modalities for European occupation of Africa.

See also Indirect rule in Nigeria

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Download our application
kawlo
sponsors Ads