Imperialism In Nigeria And China Essay, Research Paper

The original quest for colonies, which began in the 17th century, was economically justified by the dominance of the mercantilist system. One of mercantilism’s key assumptions was that a country could only become wealthy through the accumulation of gold stock. The only way to maintain a large gold stock was to block trade with other nations, and extract resources from far off colonies. This was the major justification for early colonization. In the quest for profit, England led the way in the industrial revolution of the 18th century. As the leading economic power of the day, England sought to expand their economic dominion by seizing new lands. Newly rich industrialists were eager to invest their wealth in markets at home and overseas. The overseas investments, in most cases paid a higher return, but were inherently more risky. One role of a huge empire is to eliminate the risk of overseas investment. As the empire grew larger, British capital diffused farther. By the dawn of the 20th century, British capital could be found all over the Earth. A second approach to the profit motive was somewhat similar to the supposedly out of favor mercantilist model. Leaders of industry and commerce wanted imperial possessions to be completely reliant on England for all manufactured goods. They believed that a market in which they had complete authority to block other imports would be a profitable market. These actions taken by the British were the start of Imperialism. Two countries that were immense economic profits for England were Africa and China. Examining these two countries will demonstrate how imperialism in Nigeria compared to imperialism in China.

In Africa, many of the chieftains signed several treaties, which gave control over African land and resources to England. The Royal Niger Company treaty, which was commissioned by Queen Victoria, gave the right to exercise political authority in the regions in Africa. These great numbers of treaties served as the basis for the Niger Districts Protectorate, which in turn became the British colony of Nigeria. These treaties were used throughout the region and one only needed to fill in the blanks. One example of a statement from the treaty is, we understand that the said Royal Niger Company have full power to mine, farm, and build in any portion of our country. This line plainly shows that the motives of the British were only to gain in economic power. The chieftains were giving up their land and eventually their culture to people they thought were trustworthy.

In China, only a half a century after Emperor Qianlong sent King George III of England his rejection of the British appeal for trade concessions, Emperor Daoguang strongly felt that there was no other way to deal with the problem. Daoguang sign the Treaty of Nanjing, which opened five Chinese ports to British trade, free British prisoners, and required the Chinese to pay the London government $21 million. More regulations were passed to the Chinese and these were the results of the Opium War. The Opium War was the pinnacle of early Chinese efforts to halt the British sale of opium to the Chinese. In the early 1800s millions of Chinese were addicted to opium and this alarmed Emperor Daoguang, and he decided to ban the importation of opium and sent an official named Lin Zexu, to implement his law. Lin launched campaigns and also wrote to Great Britain s Queen Victoria in 1839, pleading her to eliminate her merchant s sale of opium. He wrote about how China only exported products that benefited people and unlike opium, which were sent harming many Chinese people. An example of Lin s letter to Queen Victoria is, You, I hope, will certainly agree that people who pursue material gains to the great detriment of the welfare of others can be neither tolerated by Heaven nor endured by men Have they no conscience? I have heard that you strictly prohibit opium in your own country, indicating unmistakably that you know how harmful opium is Has China produced one item that is harmful to foreign countries? This letter was never sent and after the actions of Lin, the Opium War was under way. From this passage, one can see that the Chinese people wanted their country to be free from narcotics, but England felt that their economy was more important than the lives of others.

The mechanics of the British imperial economic system were fairly straightforward; get as much as possible out of the land and the natives. The same industrialists that were pushing for the expansion of the empire wanted to make sure that the territories that they were taking over would not be economic rivals. The territories of the empire were therefore geared to producing in accordance with their resources. This imperialistic approach led people of the native countries headed for several problems. The most devastating was increase in population, which resulted in land shortage, famine, and increased poverty because of heavy taxes and inflation.

In conclusion, the causes and outcome of imperialism in Nigeria and China are very similar. Compared with each other, both were pulled away from their own resources and culture by the English. In ways, the English did influence the countries in the beginning, however as time passed the greed for economic power was inherently displayed with the exploitation of these two countries.