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While occupation of other new lands, such as the Americas, had only been accomplished through a series of major wars among European colonizers, the occupation of Africa was a far more peaceful process, insofar as it related to colonizing countries, and not the oppressed native occupants of the colonized areas. The Berlin Act, "created the rules for "effective occupation" of conquered lands, ensuring that the division of Africa would take place without war among the European powers" (Aronson, 1999).
Perhaps the most clearly imperialistic part of the conference was the assumption of European ability to dictate control of the various segments of Africa, without even seeking the input of any segment of the indigenous population. While much of Africa had been colonized and had been under European rule for varying amount of time, to characterize the continent as colonized would have been erroneous. In fact, only coastal Africa had significant colonization, and the interior of Africa was largely untouched by Europeans. "At the time of the conference, 80% of Africa remained under traditional and local control. What ultimately resulted was a hodgepodge of geometric boundaries that divided Africa into fifty irregular countries....
This new map of the continent was superimposed over the one thousand indigenous cultures and regions of Africa. The new countries lacked rhyme or reason and divided coherent groups of people and merged together disparate groups who really did not get along" (Rosenberg, 2012).
To say that the consequences of this arbitrary division have been disastrous is not an overstatement; Africa has been rocked by a series of violent civil and tribal wars, which can be attributed in part, if not wholly, to the random division of the country that began with this 1884 conference. These wars continue in present day Africa, and have resulted in the loss of millions of lives, the exacerbation of problems caused by famine and other natural disaster, genocide, and a series of horrific war crimes.
References
Aronson, G. (1999). The Berlin Conference: 1884. Retrieved May 13, 2012 from the Web
Chronology Project website: http://www.thenagain.info/webchron/africa/berlinconf.html
Rosenberg, M. (2012). Berlin Conference of 1884-1885 to divide Africa. Retrieved May 13,
2012 from About.com website: http://geography.about.com/cs/politicalgeog/a/berlinconferenc.htm
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