Dbq Imperialism Essay

433 Words2 Pages

Imperialism is when a strong country extends its power and influence on a weak country. In the 1800’s, Europeans were trying to colonize Africa so they can profit from. In addition, it was completely different than other imperialistic takeovers as now you had several powerful countries all looking to colonize an entire continent. Europeans used imperialism to colonize Africa for many reasons such as religious, moral, political and economic gain. The first motive was to spread Christianity to the native peoples of Africa. Missionaries wanted to convert Africians to Christianity as they “believed that it was their duty to spread the benefits of western civilization” as they wanted to help them live a better life and thought their religion was superior to others. This ties into the moral motive that Europeans “viewed themselves as the most advanced civilization in the world, and some saw it as their mission to ‘enlighten’ and ‘civilize’ people in the rest of the world.” (doc …show more content…

Not only did the movement bring out people’s pride for their country, it also created a competition among European countries. As countries went to war with each other, they realized they needed more colonies and the conquering of African nations gave them an advantage. (doc 12) However, the strongest and most critical motive for imperialism was for economic purposes. In addition to nationalism, Europeans were also experiencing a period of industrialization. In order to produce goods,“factories in Europe required raw materials to be manufactured into marketable products.” As a result, they sought both a source for new materials (like rubber, ivory, gold and diamonds) as well as a marketplace to sell them. (DBQ - document D) They “played a large role in the colonization of Africa”, as Europe wanted to access Africa’s natural resources to produce goods that they could then sell back to Africians for their personal economic

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