Decolonisation of Africa
The Decolonisation of Africa followed World War II, when colonised people agitated for independence and colonial powers withdrew their administrators from Africa.[1]
Background
Main article: Scramble for Africa
During the Scramble for Africa in the late nineteenth century, Western European powers divided Africa and its resources into colonies at the Berlin Conference of 1884-85.[2][3] By 1905, control of almost all African soil was claimed by Western European governments, with the only exceptions being Liberia (which had been settled by African-American former slaves) and Ethiopia (which had successfully resisted colonisation by Italy).[4] Britain and France had the largest holdings, but Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, and Portugal also had colonies. As a result of colonialism and imperialism, a majority of Africa lost sovereignty and control of natural resources such as gold and rubber. Following the concept of Rudyard Kipling's poem "The White Man's Burden", some Europeans who benefited from colonisation felt that colonialism was needed to civilise Africans.[5][6]Causes
Dates of independence of African countries
By the 1930s, the colonial powers had cultivated, sometimes inadvertently, a small elite of leaders educated in Western universities and familiar with ideas such as self-determination. These leaders came to lead the struggles for independence, and included leading nationalists such as Jomo Kenyatta (Kenya), Kwame Nkrumah (Gold Coast, now Ghana), Julius Nyerere (Tanganyika, now Tanzania), Léopold Sédar Senghor (Senegal), Nnamdi Azikiwe (Nigeria), and Félix Houphouët-Boigny (Côte d'Ivoire).[citation needed]
Timeline
This table is the arranged by the earliest date of independence in this graph; 58 countries have seceded.
- Colonialism
- Decolonization
- Indépendance Cha Cha, a 1960 Congolese song widely considered as the anthem of African independence
- Economic history of Africa
- Scramble for Africa
- Wars of national liberation
- States and Power in Africa
- Year of Africa
