Project of

BRITISH EXPANSION IN AFRICA

R E A S O N OF E X P A N S I O N

British expansion in Africa was all part of the "Scramble for Africa" during the 19th century. Having been of less interest than other strategic bits of the Empire - notably India - for a long time, Africa principally came to the attention of the British because of the interest of other European powers.As India was the "jewel" in the imperial crown - and the economic and resource powerhouse - British interest in Africa had mainly been linked to India. Securing what is now South Africa meant that the sea routes to India round the Cape of Good Hope would remain clear. And, later, Egypt was important because it guaranteed access through the Suez Canal - a much shorter route to India.Great power rivalry increased greatly as the Industrial Revolution really took hold. In particular, France, Portugal and Germany started to explore and mark out parts of Africa - although Belgium also held a huge swathe of south-central Africa which is now the DR Congo. But as one country staked its claim to chunks of the continent, the others competed. Britain, with the biggest empire of all, felt that it should hold territory from the mineralrich south all the way to the transport hub of Egypt and Suez - "from the Cape to Cairo". These were the two main impulses which drove British expansion in these areas (and explains why British interest in west Africa was limited to small coastal colonies).

E X P A N S I O N IN A F R I C A

In 1875 the two most important European holdings in Africa were Algeria and the Colony. The Cape Colony was a lock up point for the British Trading Fleet en route from India and the Far East. By 1914 only Ethiopia and the republic of Liberia remained outside formal European control. The transition from an "informal empire" of control through economic dominance to direct control took the form of a "scramble" for territory by the nations of Europe. Britain tried not to play a part in this early scramble- being more of a trading empire rather then a colonial empire, however it soon became clear it had to gain its own African empire to maintain the balance of power. This is the direct link to Hobson's Theory of 'Overseas Investments'. Hobson saw the 'greedy capitalists' and the British Aristocracy, that he called the 'shady elite' to be investing into Africa to only gain personally at the start. However, when the problems began to raise the 'shady elite' would request the British Government to help and overtake the problems. Hobson saw the partition of Africa as deliberate British policy for benefit of elite group of 'greedy capitalist' investors. However, most investment in Africa occurred after the Scramble for Africa. This is due to the fact that Britain was more interested in the USA's economy. As French, Belgian and Portuguese activity in the Lower Congo River region threatened to undermine orderly penetration of tropical Africa, the Berlin Conference of 1884-85 sought to regulate the competition between the powers by defining "effective occupation" as the decisive factor for international acknowledgment of territorial claims. This is the interlinking factor to A.J.P. Taylor's 'The Primacy of Political and Diplomatic Factors'. Taylor suggests that the Partition of African resulted from changes in the power politics and society in Europe. It is advanced by the creation of Germany in 1871, which upset the power balance in Europe. (France-Russia vs. Germany-Austria-Hungary became power balanced and therefore a power deadlock in Europe). The Power deadlock led to the growth of Nationalism, which was acted out in overseas colonisation. Colonisation was a result of rivalry between European powers, not events in Africa. Britain's 1882 military occupation of Egypt, itself

P I C T U R E S

E N D OF B R I T I S H R U L E

On the eve of World War II, a small, impoverished group of Africans and West Indians in London dared to imagine the unimaginable: the end of British rule in Africa. In books, pamphlets, and periodicals, they launched an anti-colonial campaign that used publishing as a pathway to liberation. West Indians George Padmore, C. L. R. James, and Ras Makonnen; Kenyas Jomo Kenyatta and Sierra Leones I. T. A. Wallace Johnson these were writers in a common cause: envisioning Africa freed of European rule. Joined by South African Peter Abrahams during the war and the Gold Coasts Kwame Nkrumah toward the wars end, the community expanded its reach through ties with Americans W. E. B. Du Bois and Richard Wright, Nigerian Nnamdi Azikiwe, and West Indians Eric Williams and Arthur Lewis a powerful array of committed political intellectuals.Publishing in Britain, the United States, and across the colonial world, they built an international base of support. When British authorities banned and seized their publications in the colonies, they made their point: that colonial rule was oppressive and inconsistent with the democratic ideals Britain claimed at home.Ending British Rule in Africa draws on previously unexplored manuscript and archival collections to trace the development of this publishing community from its origins in George Padmores American and Comintern years through the independence of Ghana in the 1957 a case study of publishings role in promoting political change. This book will be of interest to scholars and general readers interested in social movements, diaspora studies, empire and African history, publishing history, literary history, and cultural studies.

B Y K A R I S H M A