Role Of Imperialism In Ethiopia

Imperialism in Africa began in the late 19th century. It began when King Leopold II began the Scramble for Africa. All of the major colonial powers went after Africa. Their goal was to gain the most wealth and to have the most territory. Having more territory and claiming valuable parts of the continent was a symbol of power. Imperialism in Africa had negative and positive consequences on both the Europeans and Africans, these can be shown through human rights issues, new industry and advancements, and wealth and influence.

European Imperialism began because there was a need for natural resources and for new markets to sell European manufactured products. The Industrial Revolution created this need for natural resources, and because of the steadily increasing population in Europe and the limited land, expansion seemed necessary. One of the places Europe expanded was Africa. Africa was a very attractive continent because it had large deposits of natural resources such as gold, diamonds, and rubber. Africa’s people were also very primitive in relation to the Europeans after an Industrial Revolution, which made taking control of them even easier.

For the start of the Imperialism in Africa there could be several different reasonings of why it began. Anything from the improvement of technology, to trading goods. “By the 1800’s Africa was under full assault as European nations competed with one another for the control of the continent.” What was the motive for extending Europe's power into Africa along with wars? The main motives were morals, economic reasonings, and also technological improvements.

The Europeans colonized colonized many parts of the world but the most colonized was the continent Africa. The European explorers started imperializing Africa after exploring into the interior of Africa and finding the resources that African countries had. What is imperialism? Imperialism is the policy of taking control of another country. There were three main reasons for European imperialism in Africa: Political reasons, technology, and economic reasons.

Between 1870 and 1920, the European nations took the use of imperialism due to economic, political, and social forces to control the less-developed locations of the world. Economical forces used the need for raw materials for a reason to take locations. Social forces such as racism, thinking that themselves, the Europeans were better than whomever they were taking over. Political forces used militarism more often than not to take the less-developed locations of the world. The use of economical, political, and social forces were all important during the rise of imperialism during the 1870s through 1920s due to the humanitarianism (used in both political and social forces), racism, and the market through world trade with the need for militarism.

Imperialism is defined in the dictionary as being a " The policy of extending a nation's authority by territorial acquisition or by establishing economic and political hegemony over other nations" (p 681 American Heritage college Dictionary). Usually people associate imperialism as being the domination of a small country by a larger, more powerful country, usually to the advantage of the larger country. At the beginning of the nineteenth century most of the countries in Europe were involved in imperialism. Each country had it's own motives for wanting to gain an empire and some of the reason were Economic, Political, Religious and Exploitation.

The time period of Imperialism in Africa began in the 1870s and ended in the 1910s. It involved a group of European countries that wanted to expand and gain new territories and the materials found in those territories. As the definition of imperialism implies, the powerful nations wanted to control the political, economic, and cultural affairs of another nation or region. They divided the territory during the Berlin Conference and began the process of attempting to colonize the new additions to their nations. The imperialist powers were Europe, the United States, and Japan with the affected regions of Africa, Asia, the Pacific, and Latin America.

The Europeans all scrambled to colonize Africa for t’s raw materials and land. THey had justified it as the White Man’s burden. They believed that is was their responsibility as a more developed race to help Africa catch up in technology, government, economics etc. Rhodes even said, “-and that the more of the world we inhabit, the better it is for the human race.” (Doc, 1) With this mindset, Europeans colonized Africa and started to export raw materials such as rubber, diamonds, gold, palm oil etc. White man’s burden led to Imperialism because they thought taking over other countries was the only to help them move forward. In doing so, they also spread their power and influence throughout the world. The White man's burden was also accompanied

Since there were many nations involved, there were many attributes that led up to imperialism. Firstly, the Europeans wanted economic expansion. Since the industrial revolution had taken place, the Europeans were in need of more natural resources. They also wanted new markets for the sake of selling industrial products. To achieve this they had to look for more places outside of Europe and colonize it.

Imperialism is defined as a policy of extending a country 's power and influence through diplomacy or military force. Countries during the Industrial Revolution wanted to imperialize due to social, political, and economic reasons. As early as the mid 1800’s, the European countries craved the idea of power and conquering new lands in order to obtain resources/raw materials. They took over Africa, the Ottoman Empire, India, and Southeast Asia due to this as well as for their convenient location. They believed that the more land one owns, the stronger the country would be. Although some can argue the fact that imperialism had a detrimental effect because these countries lost their culture and independence, the end result of this was definitely more positive than negative both short term and long term. These countries would not be as thriving today if this had not happened. European Imperialism in parts of the Middle east, Africa, and Asia had more of a positive impact on the world due to education, modernization, healthcare/sanitation, and more trade/resources used.

Africa was filled with a phenomenal and immense amount of natural resources. Many European countries were in a race to get these resources and to gain land. The only problem was that a race for this beautiful land and these natural resources deemed as economy boosters could cause an all out war between the European nations. European countries never were concerned for land in Africa nor their resources. That was until the late 1880s when King Leopold II of Belgium started sort of a trend by acquiring a private “country” of 900,000 square miles in Africa. This “country” was dubbed the Congo Free State and it was 95 times the size of Belgium. Leopold was making a gargantuan amount of money by taking out ivory and rubber. Many European countries started to notice what Leopold was doing and wanted to join in on finding these natural resources and gaining land. Otto Von Bismarck of Germany proposed a conference for European countries to divide up Africa so that there wouldn't be any wars over land or resources. Technological advancements, cultural causes, and national pride are all important Driving Forces to European imperialism, but the main reason was economical.

Europeans colonized Africa in 1750 for natural resources, land, and slaves. The European countries try to colonize some countries in Africa. They started the Berlin Conference by giving each European country an African country or more. Europeans claimed every country in Africa except Ethiopia and Liberia. This kind of colonization was called imperialism. Imperialism could increase trade such as trading slaves into the Americas. They claimed natural resources to create products. Sometimes imperialism in Africa can cause conflicts with natives and Europeans. It can be used for importing and exporting products.

There has been many significant events of the 20th century that helped shaped what Ethiopia is today. Through imperialism, wars about boarding issues and the death of many great ruler this nation has been standing strong.Today Ethiopia is the second most populated country in Africa, it's the home to over 80 ethnic groups. The largest being the Oromo tribe that makes up over 34% of the population. Not only are they a big ethnic group in Ethiopia but also the neighboring countries such as Kenya and Somalia. Another big ethnic group is Ahmera who are taking up most of the politics and economy in Ethiopia. The rest is the minorities and have a smaller percentage of people or are other people who are are nationally from bordering countries such as Somali and reside in ethiopia. There are around 6.7% of Somalis who live in Ethiopia and adapted to their culture as well.

Imperialism is defined as one country’s domination of the political, economic, and social life of another country. In Africa in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, imperialism was present and growing. The main countries involved in the imperialism in Africa were the French, German, and Great Britain. The French’s empire was mainly in North and West Africa while Britain’s colonies were scattered throughout the continent. Germany ruled over such countries as Tanganyika, Togoland, and Cameroon, until their defeat in World War I.

Ethiopia is located in the horn of Africa and there are living over 75 million people. It’s one of the populous countries in sub-Sahara Africa. Most of the people, over 85% are living in countryside. Ethiopia is one of the least developed countries in the world. Ethiopia has lots of poverty, estimated 47% of people are living under the poverty line. Poor nutrition, low education levels, widespread poverty and difficulties to get health care services are caused, that the life expectancy is 54 years.