Effects Of Indirect Rule In Africa

Register to read the introduction… Despite all of the problems for Africans, the policy was fairly successful by British standards. In fact, many other European powers that were operating under direct rule switched to indirect rule because of its lower costs. Indirect rule was adopted by the French after World War I, the Belgians in the 1930s, and the Portuguese in the 1950s. However, despite the successes of indirect rule as seen from the colonizers, it was unsustainable, as is evident from the fact that all colonizing European governments eventually relinquished control of their colonies to the …show more content…
Africans had numerous internal problems, such as the use of human sacrifice and burning “witches” to death in certain regions of the continent (Reader 558), but Europeans could have assisted them and traded with them without simultaneously exploiting and dominating them. European treatment of Africans tended to improve over the timeline of history, generally moving from enslavement, to forced labor, to direct rule, to indirect rule, and eventually to African self-governance. Indirect rule was just a stepping stone between complete European domination and African independence. By 1980, virtually the entire continent of Africa had been decolonized through the work of independence movements and indigenous political entities, as well as from pressures within the imperialist powers themselves (Shillington 391). Frankly, Africans wanted self-rule, and the ultimate flaw with indirect rule was that it was forcibly imposed on Africans, few of whom wanted anything to do with …show more content…
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