History of European Colonisation

• GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, DECOLONISATION OF SOUTH AMERICA

  • VIOLENCE
  • A lot of violence went hand in hand with decolonisation.
  • Between Europeans and colonials
  • In 9 of the 20 independent countries gained their independence following a war
  • Colonials, often supported by other Europeans
  • La Fayette in US → a French general who supported the American troops in the independence wars
  • Britain supports Haiti and Spanish (former) colonies → to weaken the French and the Spanish
  • Between colonials
  • Loyalists to the British throne vs. revolutionaries in the USA
  • Slave insurrection in Haiti
• GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, DECOLONISATION OF SOUTH AMERICA

  • INTERCONNECTION
  • Observation and participation in BNA/U.S.
  • Dominican (‘Haitian’) mulattos in French army BNA → fought along with Americans in these wars, and returned home with the idea of revolution and the optimism of success
  • South American revolutionaries → indirect inspiration by the wars
• GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, DECOLONISATION OF SOUTH AMERICA

  • INTERCONNECTION
  • Direct influence
  • U.S. support to Haitian insurrection in the 1790s
  • Haitian asylum to Bolívar (twice)
  • Reverse consequences → these revolutions, these wars of independence, did not lead to independence but strengthened the ties between the colony and the metro pole
  • Canadian nation grows out of anti-revolutionarism
  • Caribbean landowners prefer colonial status-quo to repetition of Haiti
• GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, DECOLONISATION OF SOUTH AMERICA

  • CONTINUITY
  • Social → there was no social revolution in most countries
  • Elite: white and affluent minority
  • Exceptions: U.S. (majority) and Haiti (black)
  • U.S. and Brazil maintain slavery → slavery was not abolished with decolonisation → Brazil was the last country to abolish slavery
  • The first country to abolish slavery first was United Kingdom
• GENERAL OBSERVATIONS, DECOLONISATION OF SOUTH AMERICA

  • CONTINUITY
  • Political
  • Empires: Haiti, Brazil, Mexico → most independent countries became empires afterwards
  • Reaction against liberal systems in home countries
  • Exception: constitutional confederation in the U.S. → the success of this confederation, these states remained together (unlike the republic of great Columbia)
  • Other confederations fail
  • Economic
  • Produced goods, free trade, ...
  • → all of this continued to exist even after the decolonisation
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • MIGRATION → migration of white people to the colonies
  • 1500-1783
  • 1.4 million European migrants to the New World
  • 1815-1914
  • 22.6 million people left the British Isles
  • 62% to the US
  • Mainly Irish
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • MIGRATION → migration of white people to the colonies
  • 1918-
  • White Australia Policy (1901-1949/73)
  • → A policy in which immigration was racially regulated, white people were much more easily allowed in Australia than others
  • 1922: Canada attracts migrants (Empire Settlement Act)
  • → in 1922 Canada issued the Empire Settlement Act, which privileged immigrants from Britain. (especially farmers, engineers as Canada was in need of those)
  • 1924: immigration quotas in the US
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • RESPONSIBLE GOVERNMENT
  • 1848-55: Canada (<-)
  • Governments are responsible to parliament rather than to the monarch or the imperial government
  • Other white settler colonies
  • 1855: Victoria
  • 1856: New South Wales, New Zealand, South Australia, Tasmania
  • 1872: Cape Colony
  • 1890: Western Australia
  • 1893: Natal
  • 1906: Transvaal
  • 1907: Orange River Colony
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • DOMINIONS
  • Semi-independent polities under British sovereignty
  • 1867: Canada
  • 1907: Australia, New Zealand & Newfoundland
  • 1910: South Africa
  • 1922: Irish Free State (-1937, then Ireland)
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • 1926: Autonomous communities within Empire
  • 1926: Second Balfour Declaration: ‘equal in status’
  • → His first declaration of 1917 for Palestine and the jews
  • → In this second declaration he said that the dominions are equal in status to the metro pole - which suggests that they are somehow independent
  • 1931: Statute of Westminster: legal status
  • → turned dominions into independent states, but still with great ties with Britain
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • 1949/53: Commonwealth realms / members
  • 1949: Commonwealth of Nations
  • → turns his former empire into a Commonwealth of Independent States
  • Now: 56 member states
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • INTERCONNECTEDNESS
  • Plethora of networks
  • Family, business, education, press, sport, ...
  • Many shared experiences → common history, common identity
  • Wars & crises
  • Progressive political culture
  • Responsible government & dominions
  • Secret ballot: Australia 1850s, 10 years before UK
  • Female suffrage: New Zealand 1893, UK 1918
  • Universal male suffrage: NZ 1893, AU 1902, UK 1948
• WHITE SETTLER COLONIES IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURY

  • EROSION OF THE TIES WITH BRITAIN
  • Collapse of the concept of imperial citizenship
  • 1935: Irish Free State asserted its own citizenship
  • Canada follows in 1946
  • Australia, NZ & SA follow in 1948-49
  • Other examples
  • Leaving the Commonwealth: Ireland 1949, SA 1961
  • Queen of Canada 1952, Queen of Australia 1973
  • 1965: maple leaf flag instead of union jack
  • 1982: Canadian constitution
  • Present-day debates → Barbados, Jamaica
• Direct and indirect rule


  Especially Great Britain
• Assimilation & association


  Especially France
• Military rule


  Especially Germany and Italy
• Segregation 


  Especially Belgium and some white settler colonies