European Imperialism In Rwanda

When Belgium colonized Rwanda in 1916 they split up the people into two classifications, the Hutu and the Tutsi. While there is little actual difference between them the Tutsi were believed to have a higher social status, better job and political voice. The Hutu was the lower class, labor, farming and low social standing. The Hutu eventually took over Rwanda by force in the early 1960s. “When the Belgians chased the Germans out of the territory in 1916 they discovered that two groups of people shared the land.

“The official Belgian attitude was paternalism: Africans were to be cared for and trained as if they were children. They had no role in legislation, but traditional rulers were used as agents to collect taxes and recruit labour; uncooperative rulers were deposed” (Belgian Congo). Unlike Leopold II, Belgian imperialistic powers focused on civilizing the Africans. “Belgium proclaimed its colonial mission to be that of spreading civilization… Belgium 's attention was focused overwhelmingly on the vast, resource-rich Central African territory of Congo, 75 times larger than Belgium itself. The deal was implicit: in exchange for extracting immense wealth from its colony, Belgium offered schools, roads, Christianity and, yes, civilization” (Riding).

Berlin Conference of 1884 assigned Rwanda to Germany, and in 1919 it was passed to Belgium. Colonialists intensified bipolar differentiation between Tutsi and Hutu by imposing a system of identity cards in 1935, which put an end to movement between classes and emphasized ethnicity; a land reform, which privatized all the territory owned by Hutus with low compensation to the latter; and securing Tutsi domination

However, one could go back to colonial times where the Belgians divided the country only to renew the tensions between the Hutus and the Tutsis. Or the French who aided and equipped the extremist army. Lastly, the world around Rwanda has to hold some blame for the genocide. The surrounding world, especially the super power nations, did nothing and remained quiet throughout the whole thing. The Rwandan genocide was not one specific action because wars are rarely about one specific action, there was a plethora of conditions led to the Rwandan genocide, such as political propaganda, socioeconomic conditions, and religious differences leading to the genocide.

Leopold’s acquisition and eventual conquest of the Congo can be seen as a reign of terror during which millions were mutilated and repressed while he continued to profit tremendously. He continued to profit from his use of slave labor, while the Congolese continued to suffer during his reign. Leopold’s reign of terror is an example of European colonialism and one’s greed for wealth and power. He set out to acquire the Congo under the guise of philanthropy and humanitarianism, but rather looted the Congo for its natural resources for his personal gain and enslaved natives in the process to produce ivory and rubber. King Leopold II of Belgium was able to make himself rich by exploiting Africans for natural resources and millions of Congolese died as a result of his

Van Buren got an idea of using the newspapers as propaganda instruments to inform citizens of his new party which allowed more people to learn about his party faster. By having this nightmare Van Buren increased the discussions of slavery, which only made tension between the North and South greater. In Van Burens idea to suppress the slave issue he increased the size and power of the federal government and another failure that he made was ensuring more jobs than his opponents to

Towards the close of the nineteenth century and the start of the twentieth century, European imperialist governments in their quest to expand their territories for various reasons aggressively scrambled and invaded the African continent. Initially, the gullible African societies, most of which were decentralized, welcomed the foreigners but after realizing the stakes some mounted resistance (Johnston,43). As expected, the more sophisticated imperialist governments prevailed in most of the colonies and subdued the natives. The effects of the foreign presence were monumental, and it would take more than half a century for these colonies to free themselves from the oppressive rule and become independent governments. Until the late 1800’s,

There was simply no turning back for the German military now. Time became somewhat of an issue when the Germans began marching through Belgium. Belgium would stand up against the German forces only to fall miserably in defeat; however, they had managed to steal small amounts of time away from the German troops. Marching through Belgium was a high price Germany would have to pay. Not only did Belgium slow them down, but by marching through Belgium it made England enter the war against Germany.

Maslow’s obsession was travelling to Congo and getting ivory which would make a lot of profit for the Europeans. Conrad explains that he saw a lot of blacks naked and chained to one another. It was explained to him by the rulers that they were the blacks that had violated the laws and were being punished the blacks also suffered from starvation, disease and confusion. “They were all dying slowly, it was very clear. They were not enemies, they were not criminals, and they were nothing earthly now-nothing but black shadows of diseases and starvation lying confusedly in greenish gloom...” (Heart of Darkness.p.25) Power in the novel was represented by the white skin colour belonging to the Europeans.

Included in the negative tone was the military deaths that the British Empire incurred; 22,000 British dead opposed to 6,000 Boers. The lopsided numbers were due to the Boers use of guerilla warfare and their desire to protect their homeland. There were two concessions included in the Treaty of Vereeniging; there were to be no recriminations and Afrikaner children in public schools will be taught the Dutch language. In addition, there was an unspecific promise made in the Treaty of Vereeniging that the Boer colonies would eventually be able to be self-governed. Due to the conduct of the recent war by the British, the promise was fulfilled when the Conservative British government was replaced in 1906 by a Liberal administration.