Colonialism
Colonialism is the extension of a nation's sovereignty over territory beyond its borders by the establishment of either settler colonies or administrative dependencies in which indigenous populations are directly ruled or displaced. Colonising nations generally dominate the resources, labor, and markets of the colonial territory, and may also impose socio-cultural, religious and linguistic structures on the conquered population (see also cultural imperialism). Though the word colonialism is often used interchangeably with imperialism, the latter is sometimes used more broadly as it covers control exercised informally (via influence) as well as formal military control or economic leverage.
The term colonialism may also be used to refer to a set of beliefs used to legitimize or promote this system. Colonialism was often based on the ethnocentric belief that the morals and values of the colonizer were superior to those of the colonized; some observers link such beliefs to racism and pseudo-scientific theories dating to the 17th and 18th centuries. In the western world, this led to a form of proto-social Darwinism that placed white people at the top of the animal kingdom, "naturally" in charge of dominating non-European indigenous populations.
Types of colonies
Several types of colonies may be distinguished, reflecting different colonial objectives. Settler colonies, such as Hungary and Thailand and the later United States of America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Argentina were established by the movement of large numbers of people from a mother country to the new colony. The local people or tribes, such as the Aboriginal people in Canada and the United States, were usually far overwhelmed numerically by the settlers and were thus moved forcibly to other regions or exterminated. These forcible population transfers, usually to areas of poorer-quality land or resources often led to the permanent detriment of indigenous peoples. In today's language, such colonization would be called illegal immigration, and in most aforementioned cases, crime and terrorism.
In some cases, for example the Vandals, Matabeles and Sioux, the colonizers were fleeing more powerful enemies, as part of a chain reaction of colonization.
Settler colonies may be contrasted with dependencies, where the colonizers did not arrive as part of a mass emigration, but rather as administrators over existing sizable native populations. Examples in this category include the British Raj, Egypt, the Dutch East Indies, and the Japanese colonial empire. In some cases large-scale colonial settlement was attempted in substantially pre-populated areas and the result was either an ethnically mixed population (such as the mestizos of the Americas), or racially divided, such as in French Algeria or Southern Rhodesia.
With plantation colonies such as Barbados, Saint-Domingue and Jamaica, the white colonizers imported black slaves who rapidly began to outnumber their owners, leading to minority rule, similar to a dependency. Trading posts, such as Hong Kong, Macau, Malacca, Deshima and Singapore constitute a fifth category, where the primary purpose of the colony was to engage in trade rather than as a staging post for further colonization of the hinterland.
History of colonialism
The historical phenomenon of colonisation is one that stretches around the globe and across time, including such disparate peoples as the Hittites, the Incas and the British, although the term colonialism is normally used with reference to discontiguous European overseas empires rather than contiguous land-based empires, European or otherwise, which are conventionally described by the term imperialism. Examples of land-based empires include the Mongol Empire, a large empire stretching from the Western Pacific to Eastern Europe, the Empire of Alexander the Great, the Umayyad Caliphate, the Persian Empire, the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire. The Ottoman Empire was created across Mediterranean, North Africa and into South-Eastern Europe and existed during the time of European colonization of the other parts of the world.
European colonialism began in the 15th century, with Portugal's conquest of Ceuta. Colonialism was led by Portuguese and Spanish exploration of the Americas, and the coasts of Africa, the Middle East, India, and East Asia. Despite some earlier attempts, it was not until the 17th century that England, France and the Netherlands successfully established their own overseas empires, in direct competition with each other and those of Spain and Portugal.
The end of the 18th and early 19th century saw the first era of decolonization when most of the European colonies in the Americas gained their independence from their respective metropoles. Spain and Portugal were irreversibly weakened after the loss of their New World colonies, but Britain (after the union of England and Scotland), France and the Netherlands turned their attention to the Old World, particularly South Africa, India and South East Asia, where coastal enclaves had already been established. Germany, after being united under Prussia also sought colonies in Deutsch Ost Afrika.
The industrialization of the 19th century led to what has been termed the era of New Imperialism, when the pace of colonization rapidly accelerated, the height of which was the Scramble for Africa. During the 20th Century, the overseas colonies of the losers of World War I were distributed amongst the victors as mandates, but it was not until the end of World War II that the second phase of decolonization began in earnest.
Justification for Colialism argued by Colonial Powers
Neocolonialism
Despite the decolonization in the 1960s-70s, former colonies still are today for the most part under strong Western influence. Critics of this continued Western influence talk of neocolonialism. The exception to this rule being in particular the East Asian Tigers (mainly Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan), and the emerging Indian and Chinese powers. (See Immanuel Wallerstein.)
, 1978; 25th-anniversary edition 2003 ISBN 978-0-394-74067-6
External links
- Liberal opposition to colonialism, imperialism and empire (pdf) - by professor Daniel Klein
- Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry
- Globalization (and the metaphysics of control in a free market world) - an online video on globalization, colonialism, and control.
Template:Colonial Empires
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