Resistance, Nationalism, and Independence in Africa

European colonial rule spread across most of Africa during the late 1800s and early 1900s, but African people did not respond to colonialism in one single way. Different communities resisted, negotiated, protested, cooperated, or adapted depending on their circumstances.

Resistance also changed over time. At first, many efforts focused on defending existing kingdoms, communities, land, or political authority from colonial conquest. Later, some Africans demanded greater rights and opportunities within colonial systems. By the middle of the twentieth century, nationalist movements increasingly called for an end to colonial rule and the creation of independent nations.

Nationalism is the belief that people who share a national identity should have the right to govern themselves. In Africa, nationalist movements varied from place to place, but many shared the goal of greater African political control.

When European powers tried to establish direct colonial control, many African rulers and communities resisted.

Some resistance was military. African states and local communities fought colonial armies to defend their territory and political independence. Other leaders tried negotiation or diplomacy. The results varied. Some resistance lasted for years, while other movements were defeated by European forces that often had greater access to modern weapons and military resources.

These early movements are sometimes called primary resistance because they occurred as colonial rule was being established. Their immediate goal was often to protect an existing government, community, or territory rather than to create the modern independent nations that developed later.

Even when military resistance failed, opposition to colonial rule continued.

After World War I, new forms of political opposition became more common. A growing group of educated Africans, including teachers, lawyers, journalists, civil servants, and other professionals, challenged inequalities within colonial systems.

Many did not initially demand immediate independence. Instead, they called for greater political representation, better educational and employment opportunities, equal treatment under the law, and a larger African role in government.

Workers, farmers, religious groups, women, and other community organizations also protested particular colonial policies. They organized strikes, boycotts, petitions, demonstrations, and associations.

These movements helped people build political organizations and develop experience challenging colonial governments. They also helped spread the idea that Africans should have a larger role in making decisions about their own societies.

World War II helped accelerate demands for political change.

Hundreds of thousands of Africans served in military and support roles during the war. The Allies described the war partly as a struggle against dictatorship and for freedom. For some African veterans and political leaders, those ideas highlighted a contradiction: European powers spoke about freedom while continuing to govern colonies whose people had limited political rights.

The Atlantic Charter of 1941 also stated that peoples should have a voice in choosing their form of government. British leaders did not originally intend this principle to promise immediate independence to their colonies, but anticolonial leaders in Africa and elsewhere used its language to support demands for self-government.

Events outside Africa mattered as well. After World War II, independence movements succeeded in parts of Asia. India became independent from Britain in 1947. Examples such as India demonstrated that European colonial rule could end.

Within Africa, nationalist political parties, labor unions, newspapers, community organizations, veterans, students, women, and political leaders increased pressure for change. Some independence movements relied heavily on elections, negotiations, strikes, and mass political organization. Others faced violent conflict.

The pace of decolonization increased during the 1950s and 1960s. Ghana became independent from Britain in 1957, becoming the first colony in sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence in the postwar period. Guinea became independent from France in 1958.

Then came 1960, often called the Year of Africa. Seventeen African countries became independent that year, including many countries in West and Central Africa.

Independence did not occur through one single process. Some governments negotiated transfers of power with colonial rulers. In other places, political conflict or violence played a larger role. Leaders also disagreed about what new governments should look like and how independent countries should relate to their former colonial powers.

What these movements shared was a major political change: people who had lived under foreign colonial rule increasingly demanded the right to govern themselves.