Impact and Evaluation of Western European Colonialism and Colonization

Impact And Evaluation Of Western European Colonialism And Colonization

Colonialism is the policy or practice of acquiring full or partial political control over another country, occupying it with settlers, and exploiting it economically. Historically, this has often involved killing or subjugating the indigenous population. With the spread of Hellenic and Roman culture and technology by the Roman Empire, the Renaissance and the Enlightenment of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries and the Industrial Revolution of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, most of the world has at some point been colonised by a European country. The most notable colonial powers were Rome, Greece, Britain, France, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark, whose combined empires covered at various times the whole of North, Central and South America, Africa, Australia, much of Indonesia, the countries lying in the Levant, much of the Indian subcontinent as well as most of the countries lying in between. In short, most of the world. It is interesting to note that all of these colonial powers have a large coastline. Historically, the settlements of new lands and the maintenance of trade and prosperity have depended heavily on naval power.