HISTORY OF EUROEPAN COLONIZATION 19:
Other British Colonies in South Asia:
- Sri Lanka: 1948
- Myanmar: 1948 (democracy, then military regime)
- Malaysia remains British: becomes independent in 1957 (Malayan emergency, Independence wars)
- 1965: Singapore
Dutch East Indies: anti-Dutch sentiment, shared by Dutch communists
-
1945: Sukarno asserts independence
-
Dutch military action: KNIL 100k soldiers, 95k soldiers went to Dutch East Indies to destroy the freedom fighters; 150k casualties
-
did not even call it a war - a ‘dutch military action’.
-
2022: big research project to figure out the actions of the Dutch
-
1949: Dutch recognize independence, finally.
-
Sukarno, Suharto - first presidents
-
Dutch New Guina (west of Papua): Dutch want to keep power in the region
-
South Moluccans (spice islands): fought along with the dutch against the freedom fighters, but were not received well in Netherlands
-
their people had to live in barracks previously used by german POWs
-
East Timor (north of Australia) - Portugese
1974: withdraw of Portugal
1975: Indonesia invasion
2002: East Timor is finally independent
FRENCH Indochina: 1945, Ho Chi Minh declares independence instantly after WW2
- 1946-54: French invasion (failure), Laos and Cambodia are also independent amidst this conflict
- 1954: North Vietnam is communist, South Vietnam is a republic
- 1965-73: Vietnam war, US supports South Vietnam against the communist North Vietnam
- 1976: united Socialist Republic of Vietnam. Its still a soviet republic (but not really, like China)
- Algeria in Northern Africa: colonized since 1830, but always resistant to French colonization.
- 1945: uprising against French suppression
- War (1954-62): 500k French troops vs guierrila fighters.
Algeria wasn’t considered a colony, this was seen as a civil war - it took 8 years, it was very cruel, there were may more French people living in Algeria who wanted to remain a part of France
- ppl in Algeria were determined to succeed
- 1956: Nasser nationalized Suez canal. Britian, France & Israel attack Egypt.
- Washington is against this operation, they oppose this reaction (would be seen as a colonial reaction in a time of 1. decolonization and 2. the USSR, looking for excuses to oppose the west on the basis of their imperialism and 3. it distracted from the Hungarian crisis, which painted the USSR in a bad light)
- Significance: anarchronistic colonial violence, this triggers African decolonization, people grow to hate the imperial powers even more
French colonial disengagement: - Morocco and Tunesia gain independence in 1956 (too many fronts for France to fight on)
- 1958: De Gaulle promises pieds-noirs to fight on Algiers front (but he knows this is a lost fight)
- Violent reactions against decolonization: French police kills up to 300 protestors for French independence
- 14 Sub-Saharan colonies: 1960, they all vote to be independent
- 1962: Algeria is finally independent
THE ALGERIAN FRONT STRETCHES FRANCE SO THIN, THAT THEY BASICALLY LET ALL OTHER COLONIES SLIP OUT OF THEIR HANDS
Sub-Saharan Africa:
Britian first: 1957 Ghana, 1960 Nigeria, 1961 Tanganyika
France: peaceful
Belgium: quick
Portugal: first to colonize, last to decolonize. 1961-74 wars (worst in Guinea-Bissau), 74-75: Carnation revolution and decolonization, Guinea-Bissau, Angola & Mozambique. Following this are many civil wars
ICONS OF INDEPENDENCE:
KWAME NKRUMAH: Ghana independence leader, first leader of the country, important for pan-African movement
JULIUS NYERERE: Tanganyika and African National Union, Tanzania prime minister, African socialism
African British colonies become independent from 1960 to 1980 (12 colonies)
Asian British hesitancy: Malaya, Borneo, Singapore, Yemen, Cyprus, Brunei, Hong Kong
The British Mess: apparently a model colony (and yes, India is a democracy now) → but many conflicts, wars, ethnic tensions, racial tensions, territorial disputes because of England.
Mau Mau uprising 1950s: anti-colonial rebellion. Kenya had a lot of brits, who had the best land. Segragation, hangings, confiscations, thousands of executions, etc.
POSTCOLONIALISM:
the post-colonial heritage is massive
- states, borders, systems, cultures, religions, languages, identities, feelings of inferiority or national pride, displacements of power, globalization
COLD WAR:
- decolonization went together with the Cold War, communists helped in decolonization
- USSR was more appealing to previous colonies, so was communism: Cuba, Vietnam, China
- non-alliance movement: countries that didn’t wanna choose between capitalism and communism
- Us begins supporting dictatorships around the world to oppose communism
- US supporting Mbutu (Reagan, Nixon) - he pockets a lot of money, the Congo does not really benefit
- many new economies are state-directed: economy is developed by government
- nationalization, loans, dependency theory (export of raw materials, West is still dependent on the rest of the world), neoliberalism: countries with debts to the West need to open up themselves to Western market involvements
DEVELOPMENT AID:
- successor to what colonization was promoted to be about (missionaries before)
- NGOs were before only for Europe → then expanded to the whole world
- NGOs replaced missionaries
- development aid: since 1970s, less catholic, more engaged with indigineous problems
- solidarity movements: Vietnam, Chile, Nicaragua, Palestine
- 1980s: humanitarian aid, no longer ‘political’, more value-free
MIGRATION:
- students allowed to travel before and some people…
- people allowed to travel more freely
- migration waves in 1950s (after British Nationality Act of 1948)
- Suriname (Indonesia): 1/3rd of population goes to Netherlands
- Portugal: 150k immigrants
- Less so in Belgium