1. African and Caribbean Histories: Coventry Perspectives

2. Seminar Four The Berlin Conference and the Colonization of Africa Tuesday 10 TH November

4. Caricature of Cecil John Rhodes, after he announced plans for a telegraph line and railroad from Cape Town to Cairo. The Rhodes Colossus. Cartoon, Punch Magazine, December 10, 1892.

5. How was colonialism justified? Racial arguments Religious arguments Cultural arguments: inferior cultures would benefit from influence of superior ones: colonialism carried a ‘civilising mission’

8. Types of Colonial Rule 1. Direct Rule French, Belgians, Germans, & Portuguese Centralised administrations (usually in urban centres), that stressed policies of assimilation. 2. Indirect Rule British used indigenous rulers within the colonial administration, although they often maintained an inferior role.

9. Types of Colonial Rule 3. Settler Colony Southern Africa: South Africa, Southern & Northern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe & Zambia), Angola, Mozambique, & South West Africa (Namibia). Settlers from Holland, Britain, Germany, & Portugal colonised these areas. in Algeria, French colony in North Africa European settlers imposed direct rule on their colonies.

10. “to open to civilization the only part of our globe where Christianity has not yet penetrated and to pierce the darkness which envelops the whole population” (1876) Leopold II of Belgium

11. Henry Morton Stanley “There are 40 million naked people on the other side of the rapids, and the cotton-spinners of Manchester are waiting to clothe them... Birmingham's factories are glowing with the red metal that shall presently be made into ironwork in every fashion and shape for them... and the ministers of Christ are zealous to bring them, the poor benighted heathen, into the Christian fold.” (1877)

12. The Berlin Act (1885)

13. The Congo Free State1885 80 times the size of Belgium Organized Congo state to extract wealth from local populations Destroyed traditional economy Forced natives to work only for the state Raw Materials Ivory Rubber

14. Force Publique

15. Congo Reform Association(CRA) May 1903 The House of Commons passed a resolution urging that Congo natives be governed with humanity. Sent Consul Roger Casement to report on the conditions in the Congo 1904 The CRA was born in England following return of Casement from the Congo.

16. “I have returned from the Upper Congo today with convincing evidence of shocking misgovernment and wholesale oppression.” Robert Casement

17. 1908: Belgium government pays King Leopold II 150m francs (about 1.1 billion today) for the Congo Leopold becomes one of the richest men in Europe 1909: Leopold II dies Leopold’s rule resulted in the death of an estimated 10 million Congolese between1885 and 1908.