Epilogue: The EC’s Colonial Empire

Abstract

WW II signalled the end the European colonial era, although it took a decade or more before Europeans realized how much the world had changed. Italy lost its colonial possessions: Libya and Ethiopia became independent, while Eritrea, at first occupied by the British, was finally invaded by Ethiopia. Italian Somaliland, also conquered by the British, became a Trusteeship of the UN but under Italian administration, before gaining independence together with British Somaliland in 1960. The fate of the Italian colonies shows that the continuation of colonial rule had ceased to be self-evident. The Dutch, driven out of the Indies by the Japanese, proved unable to regain control over their former colonies. They faced not only a violent uprising in 1945 but also worldwide protest and a condemnation by the UN Security Council. France was confronted with a similar situation in Indochina, which it reoccupied after the retreat of the Japanese, only to confront a massive anti-colonial resistance by the Viet Minh. It found itself trapped in a colonial war it could no longer win. The British Empire gave up its ‘jewel in the crown’ in the face of successful moral campaigns for independence. Only Central West Africa, in particular the vast Belgian Congo, remained rather untouched, although in French and British colonies and protectorates anti-colonial voices arose.

In the nineteenth century the white has made the black into a man; in the twentieth century Europe will make a world out of Africa. To remake a new Africa, to render the old Africa amenable to civilisation, this is the problem. Europe will solve it.

Victor Hugo, 1879¹