The relationship between the colonizers and the mass of the colonized
remained much as it had been before. District officers, with the help of many
“native” subordinates, continued to do their paternal duty to settle disputes
between peasant villagers, punish criminals, and collect taxes. European
planters and merchants still relied on African or Asian overseers and brokers
to manage laborers and purchase crops and handicraft manufactures. But late
19th century colonial bureaucrats and managers sought to instruct African and
Asian peasants in “scientific” farming techniques and to compel the colonized
peoples more generally to work harder and more efficiently. Here was an
important extension of dependent status in the Western-dominated world
economy, as pressure for new work habits supported the drive for cheap raw
materials (exports) and drew in a growing segment of the colonial labor force.
A wide range of incentives was devised in response to the expansion of
production for export and also the abolition of prior forms of slavery. Some
of these incentives benefited the colonized peoples, such as the cheap
consumer goods that could be purchased with cash earned producing marketable
crops or laboring on European plantations. In many instances, however,
colonized peoples were simply forced to produce crops or raw materials that
the Europeans desired for little or no remuneration. Head and hut taxes were
imposed that could only be paid in ivory, palm nuts, or wages earned working
on European estates. Villagers were forced to grow market produce on lands
they normally devoted to food crops. Under the worst of these forced-labor
schemes, such as those inflicted on the peoples of the Belgian Congo in the
final decades of the 19th century, villagers were flogged and killed if they
failed to meet production quotas, and women and children were held hostage to
ensure that their menfolk would deliver the products demanded on time. Whether
out of self-interest or fear, the colonial overlords were determined to draw
their subjects into fuller participation in the European- dominated global
market economy.
As increasing numbers of the colonized peoples were drawn into the
production of crops or minerals intended for export to Europe, colonized areas
in Africa, India, and Southeast Asia were reduced to dependence on the
industrializing European economies. Roads and railways were built primarily to
facilitate the movement of farm produce and raw materials from the interior of
colonized areas to port areas where they could be shipped to Europe.
Benefiting from Europe’s technological advances, mining sectors grew
dramatically in most of the colonies. Vast areas that were previously
uncultivated or (more commonly) had been planted in food crops were converted
to the production of commodities – such as cocoa, palm oil, rubber, and hemp -
in great demand in the markets of Europe and, increasingly, the United States.
The profits from the precious metals and minerals extracted from Africa’s
mines or the rubber grown in Malaya went mainly to European merchants and
industrialists. The raw materials themselves were shipped to Europe to be
processed and sold or used in the manufacture of industrial products. The
finished products were intended mainly for European consumers, whether these
be members of middle and working class families or government contractors. The
African and Asian laborers who produced these products were generally poorly
paid – if indeed they were paid at all. The laborers and colonial economies as
a whole were steadily reduced to dependence on the European-dominated global
market. Thus, economic dependence complemented the political subjugation and
social subordination of colonized African and Asian peoples in a world order
loaded in favor of the expansionist nations of western Europe.
Tags: Africa, African people, Belgian Congo, Government, India, Race and ethnicity in the United States Census, Southeast Asia, United States
