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Colonialism And Imperialism

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“What do I think of Western civilization? I think it would be a very good idea.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“I would say colonialism is a wonderful thing. It spread civilization to Africa.” – Ian Smith

Over the centuries Colonialism and Imperialism have been viewed, justified and experienced differently throughout the world. The very idea created questions of both legitimacy as well as indignity in the minds of historians, writers, scholars and critics of the world. However, the growing incongruence and dissimilarity among nations brings forth the rationality to infuse the colonial purview in a modernized way in some parts of the world. So long the development of the weak states matters and the overall global effects involved, the approaches …show more content…

Exemplifying the existence of colonialism in various forms and names in the present world, he suggests simplifying the current trend by avoiding the euphemistic camouflage. Taking the cases for colonialism to be beneficial and anti-colonialism to be feeble and imperfect, Gilley draws the point from Abernethy indicating the positive effects of colonial rule in terms of ‘…training for self-government, material well-being, labor allocation choices, individual upward mobility, cross-cultural communication, and human dignity,…’ (2017:3). As an example, he shows the initiative of British counter-insurgency campaign in Kenya during the Mau Mau revolt (1952-1956) and its successive contribution in devising internal security policy as well as training up Kenyan military upheld the reputation of Britain in the minds of the independent government of Kenya much more than the violence it created subsequently. Whereas British contribution on settling peace in Kenya proved meticulous, on the other hand the division of Indian Subcontinent by the British Empire in terms of religion in 1947 prolonged socio-political unrest between India and Pakistan and harvested war and enmity which exists till now. However, the most significant role of colonialism was to abolish the slave trade from its colonies. Even though Karl Marx (1853) criticizes the British colonialism for uprooting Indian (in his terms,

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