Continent Africa After Imperialism

Post-Colonial Africa

As anyone that knows history understands full well, the history of Africa has been fairly tumultuous over the years. Just looking over the last half a millennium reveals a very turbulent stretch of time that is full of slavery, colonialism, escape from said colonialism, genocide, starvation, anarchy and so forth. However, there have also been some good to great things that have happened in Africa and many of them are recent. This report shall look at the totality of post-colonial Africa. Much like the rest of the world, Africa has had to make a lot of adjustments since the imperialism of the French, British and Spanish has fallen away. Africa is far from being the only corner of the world that can say this about itself but Africa has quite obviously been hit harder than most continents and regions and this is especially true over the last half century.

Analysis

As noted in the introduction, a lot of what has happened within and surrounding Africa over the last five hundred years has been quite depraved and nasty. The blacks and Muslims (among others) that have lived on that continent have themselves had major issues and there has also been the very negative influence of Western countries like those in Europe and even the United States at one point. However, since the post-colonial shift there have been some good results but the overall mix of results is decidedly mixed. An example of a good result is seen via the West Africa Today video whereby Chinese and Lebanese entrepreneurs are making a concerted effort to invest and pour money into West Africa ("West Africa Today," 2015). Given the struggles they are facing now with Ebola and so forth, that is no small thing because of the risks and political dimensions involved (CDC, 2014). When it comes to self-rule in general, the results have also been mixed. Countries like Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Somalia are in varying state of disarray. However, when countries like the Congo are having free and fair elections of any sort, then that is a huge development, as made clear by the Democracy in the Rough video ("Democracy in the Rough," 2015).

Speaking of the bad things, one was just touched on. The ongoing genocide and depravity occurring in Rwanda is almost unspeakable in its horror. The Rwanda: A History of Genocide video makes this crystal clear ("Rwanda," 2015). However, it is generally clear that Africa is mostly moving in the right direction. Regardless, it is apparent that change is in the air and that much of the change is good. Africa is clearly very behind the curve set by the West when it comes to economics and health standards. However, these developing countries are starting to play catchup and the end of the colonial era has helped moved this along in a sense. At the same time, the colonial era itself is a large part of what put them behind in the first place, as discussed here and there in the Wind of Change video and the Gilbert/Reynolds class text ("Wind of Change," 2015; Gilbert & Reynolds, 2012).

Conclusion