Land of Tears by Robert Harms

Author:Robert Harms
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Basic Books
Published: 2019-12-02T16:00:00+00:00

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Berlin, November 15, 1884

The Berlin Conference of 1884–1885 has been characterized as a major turning point in the history of European colonization in Africa, but analysts disagree as to the exact impact of the gathering. To Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana, it was the event where the European powers divided up Africa among themselves, but historian William Roger Louis has argued that its actual consequences for Africa were minimal because, apart from the Congo River basin, its ground rules for the partition of Africa were largely ignored. But even if it did not determine the future political structure of Africa as a whole, it certainly decided the fate of the Congo River basin and set off a chaotic scramble in other parts of Africa.49

The failure of the draft Anglo-Portuguese Treaty to gain support from the other colonial powers had made an international conference almost a necessity. On October 8, 1884, Germany and France jointly issued invitations to Britain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United States to meet in Berlin in November. Invitations to Austria, Russia, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway went out ten days later, and Turkey obtained a late invitation by claiming that some of the areas under discussion touched upon the dominions of the Ottoman Empire. Many of the thirteen invited countries had no colonial possessions in Africa and no direct interest in the issues at hand, but they could provide useful voices in favor of free trade. The International Association of the Congo did not have formal representation at the conference, but it was represented by an unofficial delegation of Colonel Strauch and Emile Vandervelde.

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