what were the benegits to the imperialism of the congo

Assistants of the Belgian Congo

Leopold II's reign in the Congo became an international scandal due to large-calibration mistreatment of the indigenous peoples, including frequent mutilation and murder of men, women, and children to enforce condom production quotas.

Learning Objectives

Describe the brutal ways in which the Belgians abused the inhabitants of the Congo

Key Takeaways

Key Points

• The Congo Free State was a corporate country privately controlled by Leopold II of Belgium through his Association internationale africaine, a not-governmental organization supposedly dedicated to humanitarian purposes.
• Under Leopold 2's assistants, the Congo Costless State became the site of one of the almost infamous international scandals of the turn of the 20th century.
• In the Free Country, colonists brutalized the local population into producing rubber, for which the spread of automobiles and development of rubber tires created a growing international marketplace.
• The police force force, the Strength Publique, routinely mutilated (especially cutting off hands) and murdered the indigenous population to enforce condom production quotas.
• The report of the British Consul Roger Casement led to the abort and punishment of white officials responsible for common cold-blooded killings during a safety-collecting expedition in 1903, including one Belgian national who caused the shooting of at least 122 Congolese natives.
• The parliament of Belgium annexed the Congo Complimentary State and took over its administration on November 15, 1908, as the colony of the Belgian Congo.

Primal Terms

• Congo Reform Association: A movement formed with the alleged intention to help the exploited and impoverished workforce of the Congo by drawing attention to their plight. The clan was founded in March 1904 by Dr. Henry Grattan Guinness, Edmund Dene Morel, and Roger Casement.
• Forcefulness Publique: A armed forces force in what is now the Congo-kinshasa from 1885 (when the territory was known as the Congo Free State), through the period of directly Belgian colonial rule (1908 to 1960). Early on, they were used primarily to campaign against the Arab slave trade in the Upper Congo, protect Leopold's economic interests, and suppress frequent uprisings within the state, but eventually they partook in horrific abuse of the Congolese people, including frequent mutilation and murder.
• Congo Costless State: A large state in Central Africa from 1885 to 1908 in personal union with the Kingdom of Belgium under Leopold II.

Colonization of the Congo

Belgian exploration and administration took place from the 1870s until the 1920s. It was first led past Sir Henry Morton Stanley, who explored under the sponsorship of Male monarch Leopold Ii of Belgium. The eastern regions of the precolonial Congo were heavily disrupted by constant slave raiding, mainly from Arab-Swahili slave traders such as the infamous Tippu Tip, who was well-known to Stanley. Leopold had designs on what would get the Congo and was able to procure the region by convincing the European community that he was involved in humanitarian and philanthropic work and would non tax trade. Leopold extracted ivory, rubber, and minerals in the upper Congo basin for auction on the world market, even though his nominal purpose in the region was to uplift the local people and develop the expanse.

Leopold formally caused rights to the Congo territory at the Conference of Berlin in 1885 and fabricated the land his private property. On May 29, 1885, the king named his new colony the Congo Gratuitous Land. The state would eventually include an surface area now held by the Democratic republic of the congo. Leopold's rėgime began various infrastructure projects, such as construction of the railway that ran from the declension to the upper-case letter of Leopoldville (now Kinshasa) and took eight years to complete. Virtually all such projects were aimed at making it easier to increase the avails Leopold and his associates could extract from the colony.

Administration of the Congo Gratis Land

Leopold used the championship Sovereign King as ruler of the Congo Free State. He appointed the heads of the three departments of state: interior, foreign affairs and finances. Each was headed past an ambassador-general who was obligated to enact the policies of the sovereign or else resign.

Leopold pledged to suppress the east African slave trade; promote humanitarian policies; guarantee costless merchandise within the colony; impose no import duties for twenty years; and encourage philanthropic and scientific enterprises. Beginning in the mid-1880s, Leopold showtime decreed that the state asserted rights of proprietorship over all vacant lands throughout the Congo territory. In 3 successive decrees, Leopold promised the rights of the Congolese in their land to native villages and farms, essentially making nearly all of the Congo Free State state-endemic land. Additionally, the colonial administration liberated thousands of slaves.

Before long afterwards the anti-slavery conference he held in Brussels in 1889, Leopold issued a new decree which said that Africans could only sell their harvested products (mostly ivory and rubber) to the state in a large function of the Costless Country. This grew out of the earlier prescript that all "unoccupied" land belonged to the state and ivory and safety collected from this state also belonged to the state, creating a de facto state-controlled monopoly. Suddenly, the merely outlet a large share of the local population had for its products was the land, which could set purchase prices and therefore control the corporeality of income the Congolese could receive for their work.

The Force Publique (FP), Leopold's private ground forces, was used to enforce the rubber quotas. Early on, the FP was used primarily to entrada against the Arab slave trade in the Upper Congo, protect Leopold'due south economic interests, and suppress the frequent uprisings within the land. The Strength Publique's officer corps included only white Europeans (Belgian regular soldiers and mercenaries from other countries). On arriving in the Congo, they recruited men from Zanzibar and west Africa, and eventually from the Congo itself. In addition, Leopold really encouraged the slave trade amidst Arabs in the Upper Congo in return for slaves to fill up the ranks of the FP. During the 1890s, the FP's primary office was to exploit the natives as corvée laborers to promote the prophylactic trade.

Many of the black soldiers were from far-off peoples of the Upper Congo, while others had been kidnapped in raids on villages in their childhood and brought to Roman Cosmic missions, where they received a military training in weather condition close to slavery. Armed with modern weapons and the chicotte—a balderdash whip fabricated of hippopotamus hibernate—the Force Publique routinely took and tortured hostages, slaughtered families of rebels, and flogged and raped Congolese people. They also burned recalcitrant villages, and above all, cutting off the hands of Congolese natives, including children.

Human being Rights Abuses

Leopold'due south reign in the Congo somewhen earned infamy due to the increasing mistreatment of the ethnic peoples. Under Leopold II'south administration, the Congo Gratuitous State became one of the greatest international scandals of the early-20th century. The report of the British Consul Roger Casement led to the abort and penalization of white officials who were responsible for killings during a safe-collecting expedition in 1903.

From 1885–1908, millions of Congolese died as a consequence of exploitation and disease. In some areas, the population declined dramatically; it has been estimated that sleeping sickness and smallpox killed nigh half the population in the areas surrounding the lower Congo River. A government commission later concluded that the population of the Congo was "reduced by half" during this menstruum, but no authentic records be.

Failure to meet the rubber collection quotas was punishable past death. Meanwhile, the FP was required to provide the hands of their victims as proof when they had shot and killed someone, as it was believed they would otherwise use the munitions (imported from Europe at considerable toll) for hunting. Equally a consequence, the rubber quotas were in function paid in severed hands. Sometimes the hands were collected past the soldiers of the FP and sometimes past the villages themselves. There were even small wars where villages attacked neighboring villages to gather easily, since their rubber quotas were besides unrealistic to fill.

One inferior European officer described a raid to punish a village that had protested. The European officer in command "ordered us to cut off the heads of the men and hang them on the village palisades… and to hang the women and the children on the palisade in the form of a cantankerous." After seeing a Congolese person killed for the first time, a Danish missionary wrote, "The soldier said 'Don't take this to heart so much. They kill us if we don't bring the safety. The Commissioner has promised us if nosotros have enough of hands he will shorten our service.'" In his words:

The baskets of severed hands, set up downwardly at the anxiety of the European mail service commanders, became the symbol of the Congo Costless Land…The collection of hands became an terminate in itself. Force Publique soldiers brought them to the stations in place of rubber; they fifty-fifty went out to harvest them instead of safe…They became a sort of currency. They came to be used to make up for shortfalls in rubber quotas, to supersede…the people who were demanded for the forced labour gangs; and the Force Publique soldiers were paid their bonuses on the ground of how many hands they nerveless.

Mutilated Children From the Congo: Congolese children and wives whose fathers or husbands failed to meet prophylactic collection quotas were often punished past having their hands cutting off.

International Outcry

Joseph Conrad'due south Heart of Darkness, originally published in 1899 as a iii-office series in Blackwood'southward Magazine based on a cursory experience as a steamer captain on the Congo 12 years before, sparked an organized international opposition to Leopold's genocidal activities. Increasing public outcry over the atrocities in the CFS moved the British regime to launch an official investigation. Roger Casement, then the British Consul at Boma (at the oral cavity of the Congo River), was sent to the Congo Complimentary State to investigate. Reporting back to the Foreign Role in 1900, Casement wrote, "The root of the evil lies in the fact that the regime of the Congo is above all a commercial trust, that everything else is orientated towards commercial gain…"

The Congo Reform Association (CRA) was established in Great Great britain by Morel every bit a straight result of Casement's 1904 detailed, bystander Congo report, known as the Casement Study. The Congo Reform motion'due south members included Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain, Joseph Conrad, Booker T. Washington, and Bertrand Russell.

Leopold offered to reform his regime, but international opinion supported an end to the king's rule, and no nation was willing to accept this responsibility. Belgium was the obvious European candidate to run the Congo. For two years, information technology debated the question and held new elections on the event.

Yielding to international force per unit area, the parliament of Kingdom of belgium annexed the Congo Costless State and took over its assistants on November fifteen, 1908, as the colony of the Belgian Congo. Despite being effectively removed from power, the international scrutiny was no major loss to Leopold or the concessionary companies in the Congo. By then Southeast Asia and Latin America had become lower-cost producers of rubber. Forth with the effects of resources depletion in the Congo, international commodity prices fell to a level that rendered Congolese extraction unprofitable. Simply prior to releasing sovereignty over the CFS, Leopold had all evidence of his activities in the CFS destroyed, including the archives of the departments of finance and of the interior. Leopold lost the absolute power he had had there, but the population nonetheless had a Belgian colonial authorities, which had get heavily paternalistic, with church, state, and private companies instructed to oversee the welfare of the inhabitants.

The Rubber Industry

In the 1890's, rubber saw a major price blast with the invention of inflatable rubber bicycle tubes and the growing popularity of the auto. This led to massive profits for the Belgian colonists in the Congo and increased exploitation of the native population.

Learning Objectives

Calculate the value of the rubber manufacture to the Belgian authorities

Fundamental Takeaways

Key Points

• Rex Leopold Ii, who owned the Congo Gratuitous Land as a private enterprise, systematically exploited the native population for his own commercial benefit, near notably with the production of wild rubber.
• To enforce the prophylactic quotas, the colonists cut off the limbs of the natives every bit a matter of policy.
• To extract the condom, Congolese workers would lather their bodies with latex, which hardened and was painfully scraped off the peel.
• By the final decade of the 19th century, John Boyd Dunlop's 1887 invention of inflatable rubber bicycle tubes and the growing popularity of the automobile dramatically increased global demand for condom, leading to major economical boom for rubber production and an increase in the exploitation of the natives.
• The Abir Congo Visitor was one of the main companies that exploited prophylactic during the time of Leopold's dominion.

Key Terms

• Congo rubber: Rubbers obtained from a wild species of vines, namely the Landolphia. Unlike rubber from Brazil and other places, which comes from trees, this type of rubber cannot exist cultivated. The intense drive to collect latex from wild plants was responsible for many of the atrocities committed under the Congo Gratis State.
• Abir Congo Visitor: A visitor that exploited natural condom in the Congo Costless State, the private holding of Rex Leopold Ii of Belgium.
• Casement Report: A 1904 certificate written by the British diplomat Roger Casement (1864–1916) detailing abuses in the Congo Free State under the private ownership of King Leopold II of Kingdom of belgium. This report was instrumental in Leopold relinquishing his private holdings in Africa. He had owned the Congolese state since 1885, granted to him by the Berlin Conference, and exploited its natural resources (mostly condom) for his ain private wealth.

Rubber Production in the Congo Gratuitous State

In the Congo Complimentary State, colonists brutalized the local population into producing condom, for which the spread of automobiles and evolution of safe tires created a growing international market place. Rubber sales made a fortune for Leopold, who congenital several buildings in Brussels and Ostend to honor himself and his country. To enforce the condom quotas, the army, the Force Publique, cut off the limbs of the natives as a affair of policy. Rubber acquirement went directly to King Leopold 2, who paid the Free State for the loftier costs of exploitation. Considering of the human rights abuses suffered under King Leopold Two's rule, Congo rubber was eventually nicknamed "red prophylactic," in reference to the blood of the Africans killed during production.

By the last decade of the 19th century, John Boyd Dunlop's 1887 invention of inflatable condom bicycle tubes and the growing popularity of the auto dramatically increased global need for prophylactic. To monopolize the resource of the entire Congo Free State, Leopold issued three decrees in 1891 and 1892 that reduced the native population to serfs. These forced the natives to evangelize all ivory and rubber, harvested or institute, to state officers, thus nearly completing Leopold's monopoly of the ivory and condom merchandise. The Congo safety (genus Landolphia) came from wild vines in the jungle, which cannot be cultivated, unlike the rubber from Brazil (Hevea brasiliensis), which was tapped from copse and could be cultivated. The intense drive to collect latex from these wild plants was responsible for many of the atrocities committed nether the Congo Free State. To extract the condom, instead of tapping the vines, the Congolese workers slashed them and lathered their bodies with the ensuing latex. When the latex hardened, information technology was painfully scraped off the skin, taking the pilus with information technology.

Leopold ran up loftier debts with his Congo investments earlier the beginning of the worldwide safe nail in the 1890s. Prices increased throughout the decade as industries discovered new uses for rubber in tires, hoses, tubing, insulation for telegraph and telephone cables, and wiring. By the late-1890s, wild rubber had far surpassed ivory as the chief source of revenue from the Congo Costless Country. The peak twelvemonth was 1903, with rubber fetching the highest price and concessionary companies raking in the highest profits.

Nevertheless, the boom sparked efforts to observe lower-toll producers. Congolese concessionary companies faced contest from rubber cultivation in Southeast Asia and Latin America. As plantations were started in other tropical areas—mostly under the ownership of the rival British firms—earth rubber prices started to dip. Competition heightened the drive to exploit forced labor in the Congo to lower product costs. Meanwhile, the cost of enforcement and the increasingly unsustainable harvesting methods ate abroad at profit margins. Every bit competition from other areas of rubber tillage mounted, Leopold's private rule was left increasingly vulnerable to international scrutiny.

A drawing depicting Leopold Ii as a rubber vine entangling a Congolese rubber collector.

Abir Congo Company

The Abir Congo Visitor (founded as the Anglo-Belgian Bharat Rubber Company) exploited natural rubber in the Congo Free Land, the private property of King Leopold Two of Belgium. The company was founded with British and Belgian capital and was based in Belgium. By 1898 there were no longer whatsoever British shareholders and the Anglo-Belgian India Condom Company inverse its name to the Abir Congo Visitor and its residence for revenue enhancement purposes to the Free State. The visitor was granted a large concession in the north of the state and the rights to revenue enhancement the inhabitants. This revenue enhancement was taken in the course of prophylactic obtained from a relatively rare safe vine. The collection organisation revolved around a series of trade posts along the ii main rivers in the concession. Each post was allowable by a European agent and manned with armed sentries to enforce revenue enhancement and punish any rebels.

Abir enjoyed a smash through the belatedly 1890s, past selling a kilogram of rubber in Europe that cost them just ane.35 francs for up to x francs. However, this came at a cost to the human rights of those who couldn't pay the tax, with imprisonment, flogging, and other corporal penalization recorded. Abir's failure to suppress destructive harvesting methods and maintain condom plantations meant that the vines became increasingly deficient, and by 1904 profits began to fall. During the early on 1900s, famine and affliction spread across the concession, a natural disaster judged past some to have been exacerbated by Abir's operations, further hindering rubber drove. The 1900s also saw widespread rebellions against Abir'due south dominion in the concession and attempts at mass migration to the French Congo or southwards. These events typically resulted in Abir dispatching an armed force to restore guild.

A serial of reports into the operation of the Gratuitous State were issued, starting with the British Delegate Roger Casement's "Casement Report" and followed past reports deputed by the Gratuitous State and Leopold II. These detailed unlawful killings and other abuses by Abir, and Leopold Two was embarrassed into instituting reforms. These began with the appointment of American Richard Mohun by Leopold II as manager of Abir. However, prophylactic exports continued to fall and rebellions increased, resulting in the Gratuitous State assuming control of the concession in 1906. Abir continued to receive a portion of profits from condom exports and in 1911 was refounded as a prophylactic plantation harvesting company.

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Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/the-belgian-congo/

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