The Impact of 19th Century European Colonialism on the Third World - Essay Example

?The Impact of 19th Century European Colonialism on the Third World The advent of colonialism in Africa and Asia has been blamed for the situation that led to the underdevelopment of the Third World and this has led to a high prevalence of poverty. In the modern world poverty has been defined as the shortage of human needs such as clothing, food, and shelter, and today it haunts many people across the Third World as a direct and in some cases indirect result of European colonialism. While this has been the case, it is a fact that very little has been done or is being done to curb this menace, and this has been mainly because of the continued dominance of the former colonial powers over the world economy. The colonial policies were adopted by many of the European governments that led to the deprivation of the natives of the land that they colonized while at the same time ensuring that the colonizers became the biggest beneficiaries. This can be considered to be the origin of the inequalities that have come to exist between the developed world and the Third World, as the gap between them continues to widen. The governments of these countries have caused the prevalence of poverty in the third world a very common state that can be found in most of the states that are categorized as poor, with the most common belief being that this situation. It has been suggested that it is either the governments of the poor countries, which are to blame because they are corrupt or that they make poor decisions. Furthermore, these governments are also blamed for pursuing policies that actually harmful to the successful development of their people. There are, however, deeper, colonial causes of poverty which are rarely discussed because their effects are mostly indirect. Among the factors, which have led to the prevalence of poverty in the third world, is that the colonial governments rarely set up industries in their colonies, instead using them only as sources of raw material. There were behind those decisions, which mainly dealt with economic policies and practices, which are typically influenced or formulated, by the rich and powerful on the European states who wanted to have absolute control over the markets and this required that the colonies do not manufacture their own products (Haynes, 2008). This practice continued long after most of the countries in the third world gained independence and this was because of the fact that while they gained political independence, their economic development tended to rely heavily on the former colonizers for support. It has been found that the former European colonizers often continued to emphasize the raw material producing role of their former colonies, and in the face of such great external pressure. The governments of the third world countries and their people have remained powerless, as a result, the few developed countries continue to become wealthy while the majority, most in the third world struggle with or fall further into poverty (Allen & Thomas, 2004). The former colonizers have played a role in ensuring that these countries remain poor so that they can accumulate more wealth through having a ready market for their products as well as having less competition in the market. The former colonial powers have been behind the introduction of reductions in the expenditure for health, education and other vital social services in countries from the third world as conditions for any form of economic assistance from them. Most of these conditions have come because of the structural adjustment policies prescribed by the major international financial institutions, which are mostly dominated by the former European colonial powers. When most of the European powers left their former colonies, these countries were in dire need of financial assistance in order to develop themselves to the level of their former colonizers. The leaving colonial powers often left their colonies in dire financial situations and this forced the newly independent states to take loans in order to ensure the continued functioning of their governments. While this was the case, the conditions for loans, which were set up by the European powers, required that they open up their economies to compete with the more powerful and established European ones. In order to attract foreign investment, countries in the third world have been forced to enter into a race in a bid to see which country can provide lower standards, reduced payment and inexpensive resources for the multinational corporations of the more developed countries. As a result, there has been an increase in poverty and inequality for most people in these countries, with the prevailing system being a direct result of the colonial policies, which have worked indirectly, to maintain the historic unequal rules of trade between the countries in the world. Around the world, especially in the third world countries, poverty has been present since the beginning of European colonialism, and this situation has continued to worsen as the link between the affluent and the poor is getting wider. The colonial legacy has been detrimental to the development of third world countries especially in situations where there is a lack of individual responsibility, bad government policy, the exploitation by people and businesses with power and influence, among others. (Chant, 2007) Studies within these countries have shown that the high levels of inequality are most likely to affect social cohesion and may lead to problems such as increasing crime and violence within the societies living in the third world. The divide and rule policy that was adopted by European powers in many of their colonies ensured that there had developed an environment of extreme hatred and conflict between the various ethnic groups that existed in the colonies. When the colonial powers left, these conflicts became apparent and in some countries, they have been going on to the current day. The fact that some of these countries are in a state of continued conflict has led to a situation where the people are not able to produce their own food, meaning that most of the population starves (Duke, 2010). The European powers, through their organizations have taken it upon themselves to provide food aid for those affected but this has not always been the case because sometimes, food aid is given to those people who do not need it. Food aid, when not given to a country for emergency relief, can actually be very destructive on the financial system of the nation that is receiving this aid and it may contribute to an increase of the hunger and the poverty that will be experienced in the long term. The provision of free subsidized and cheap food by developed countries to the third world are often beneath the market prices, and this tends to undercut local farmers who are not able to compete with this food in the market. As a result, the farmers in the third world end up being driven out of their source of livelihood and into the jaws of poverty, further increasing the share of the market for the farmers in the United States and in Europe. The corrupt practices of most of the leaders of third world countries were encouraged by the European powers, which had previously colonized them, and this was mainly because of their need to control the resources from such countries. While this may have been the case, the situation seems to have gone out of control as these leaders tended to almost bankrupt their countries in their extravagant lifestyles at the expense of their own people. The realization of this has made it among the most important policy decisions for the leaders of developed nations to set conditions for loans to the governments of third world countries. The most common of these conditions is that aid and loans will only be given when the leaders of third world nations with a reputation of corruption show that they are stamping out corruption (Kamrava, 2000). While it is a fact, that corruption needs to be stamped out of third world countries in order for them to develop. The wealthy countries that often work with the corrupt leaders can be considered to be among the largest facilitators of corruption in these poor countries and most of the economic policies they prescribe tend to only increase the problem. It has been found that the only way of ensuring the beginning of development within the third world is through the ending of corruption so that there can be a swift decrease in the instances of poverty and inequality between them and their developed counterparts. It can be said that the actions of the European colonial powers in their colonies is the reason behind much of the unbalanced distribution of resources in the world economy and in many third world countries. As a result, the populations in the third world massively feel the problems, which are related to poverty. In the recent times, most of the third world countries have tried to build their economies through the introduction of industry and technology but many of these countries lack the necessary raw materials and the knowledge and skills gained through formal education and training; a direct result of the legacy of colonialism. These countries also lack the infrastructure necessary for development such as transportation systems and power generating facilities and because such infrastructure is a necessity for the establishment of industry, they have remained backward when compared to the more developed countries. Because of the difficulty in developing their own industries, many third world countries have come to heavily rely on trading with the developed countries for processed goods, most of which they can barely afford (Hoppes, 2012). The former colonial powers continue to practice a form of colonialism known as neo-colonialism, and this is because of the fact that most of the wealth of these countries has for the last century been established to a large degree on an atmosphere that is conducive for them in trading with the third world. The former colonizers are able to get cheap natural resources from the third world and multinational corporations, which use low wageworkers in their factories, manufacture these; this practice contributes to the dependency of these third world countries whose people’s standards of living remain low. It has been identified that the colonial history of some third world countries is an important creator of the barriers to advancement in poor countries because of a lack of basic infrastructure such as roads and viable means of communication. In many of the third world countries that experienced colonialism, the European colonial powers tended to only develop the local economies for facilitating the removal of resources for their own economic growth and development. This has remained the same in the current age, with the policies of governments and companies keeping people poor because these policies ensure that global trade benefits the rich and not the poor and as statistics show, the three richest men in the world have more wealth than the forty-eight poorest countries in the third world combined. In many of the third world countries, mainly due to the colonial legacy, political power is disproportionately centralized so that one major party, politician or region is responsible for the decision-making throughout the country and this often causes development problems. Corruption also accompanies the centralization of power because leaders are not accountable to the people they serve and it inhibits development when leaders help themselves or reward their families and friends with public money that would otherwise have been used for development projects. The social inequality that began during colonial rule is one of the most entrenched causes of poverty in the world. It stems from cultural ideas about the relative worth of the members of different genders, classes or races, and its main purpose is to maintain the status quo with the elite of the various third world countries remaining at the top of the hierarchy. This is a scenario that needs to be gotten rid of swiftly so that a social uprising does not develop in third world countries. References Allen, T. & Thomas, A. (eds). 2004. Poverty and Development, London: Polity. Chant, S. 2007, Gender, Generation and Poverty, London: Edward Elgar Publishers. Duke, J. 2010, "The Impact of Colonialism on the Development of Management in Nigeria", International Journal of Business and Management, vol. 5, no. 8, pp. 65-75. Haynes, J. 2008, Development Studies, Short Introductions, London: Polity. Hoppes, P. 2012, Understanding Development, London: Polity.  Kamrava, M. 2000, Politics & Society in the Developing World, London: Routledge. Read More