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Imperialism has been interpreted from a variety of viewpoints. There are many positive and negative effects of imperialism.

Imperialism has benefitted the colonial power and the colonies. Imperialism will benefit many different business groups, so it is a big interest of many nations. The Europeans, in colonializing Africa, received many raw materials and sources of power. They wre able to

set up the colonies to benefit their own economies, as pointed out by Sekoutoure, a Western African nationalist in 1962. The imperialism also benefitted Africa. The Europeans built many roadways, railroads, and improved many aspects of the society by improving health care. They also build factories to help industrialize their colonies.

At the same time imperialism is having negative effects, mostly on the colonies. Imperialism is usually by force, and the colonial powers used their superior military technology to obtain their colonies, sometimes resulting in many dealths. The Europeans brought many diseases to their colonies, such as Africa, Latin and South America, and Asia. The Europeans also forced their culture on their colonies, demonstrated in document four from the African proverb. The Europeans used a lot of forced labor. An example would be the African slave trade in the 1800’s, where the West brought many Africans to their country to be used as slaves. Dave Diop wrote about the forced labor in "an anthology of Western African verse" in 1957. The political cartoon of document two also demonstrates this point. Imperialist caused many nations to lose self-confidence and to get away from their own culture to adopt Western ways.

Most nations used imperialism to obtain their needed raw materials, but to obtain these it has had many side effects on the natives of the colonies. These side effects may be positive, but the majority of them have a negative effect.