No scramble for Africa, only settlers colonies and trade posts

What would have happened if the europeans had sticked to the previous patterns of African colonization, so no colonies in central africa but only in places were European immigrants can settle and trade posts.
The pod could be less protectionist policies, the need for new markets created the need for colonies. Also a more cordial relationship between European powers could help prevent the scramble for colonies
 
You’ll want to butterfly away the New Imperialism era altogether. Maybe the PoD could be that German and Italian unifications fail because those events shook up the balance of power in Europe sufficiently to begin the vicious competition that led to things like the Berlin Conference.
 
I suggest looking over a map over Portuguese trade posts. They were plastered over Africa from Spain to Somalia.
 
I think this is hard - countries like to conquer territory if they can. Even for the territories in central Africa that didn't seem valuable, colonial apologists argued that they might turn out to have value in the future, so they were worth it as an investment.

You can have slow things down and have no Berlin conference but I think there is almost certainly going to be colonization once Europeans develop medicine to fight the tropical diseases.
 
I think this is hard - countries like to conquer territory if they can.
I don't know about that. Both the Dutch and the Danish sold their African Gold Coast colonies to Britain in the 19th century, because they simply weren't worth anything anymore. I could easily see it possible that the Germans, Italian and Belgians aren't interested in colonies, while the Britain, Portugal, Spain and France merely focus on the coastal regions they already have (or even sell them to another colonial power) or try to grab some areas that have some obvious value to them (like Egypt or maybe North Africa for Spain and France).

You probably need a POD earlier in the 19th century or preferably even earlier. I could see Portugal, Spain and France skip over Africa, if they hadn't lost a large part of their colonial empire in the past.
 
I think this is hard - countries like to conquer territory if they can. Even for the territories in central Africa that didn't seem valuable, colonial apologists argued that they might turn out to have value in the future, so they were worth it as an investment.

You can have slow things down and have no Berlin conference but I think there is almost certainly going to be colonization once Europeans develop medicine to fight the tropical diseases.
Honestly I don't think so, countries don't want to actually have to militarly control and police entire continents. The Brits didn't want to conquer India from the start, it just happened by accident. Another example is china, the majority of the western powers preferred to keep China independent but subaltern, this way they could enjoy the advantages of colonialism without the disadvantages of a military occupation
 
What would have happened if the europeans had sticked to the previous patterns of African colonization, so no colonies in central africa but only in places were European immigrants can settle and trade posts.
The pod could be less protectionist policies, the need for new markets created the need for colonies. Also a more cordial relationship between European powers could help prevent the scramble for colonies

This might actually lead to the European empires surviving to the present day. Trading posts or small enclaves (like Hong Kong, Gibraltar, or the French overseas departments) are less likely to want to go off in their own direction than full-sized countries are, so you probably wouldn't have much of a push for decolonisation.
 
A lot of the colonialization in Africa was not driven by great desires to see large swathes of jungle with your countries color on a map. Explorers would penetrate, and perhaps there would be some unfortunate incident so the natives must be taught not to eat explorers, or kill them etc, and a punitive expedition turns in to a permanent fort and then you need civil governance etc. Missionary activity was a big driver, must protect the missionaries you know. You find some sort of resource away from the coast, to extract it properly you need a RR from the resources to the port, a reliable (tractable) work force and there you go. Of course since the Europeans tended to look on much of Africa as terra nullis, if another country you are not overly friendly with is advancing claims approaching what you consider a valuable area you need to achieve strategic depth.

Very little of colonial Africa was a true settler colony, outside of South Africa places that had a white settler minority were few, and limited numbers of Euopeans although in Kenya, Rhodesia, and some other spots they had significant land ownership. In most of Africa white immigrants were mostly involved in colonial administration or business and quite concentrated.
 
This is definitely interesting and I do see that perhaps that while a scramble wouldn't occur for land, I do think that they'd settle for probably alliances with various peoples. Basically, they play favorites with the local kingdoms and engage kinda like in proxy wars for land and resources.
 

Vuu

Banned
Settler colonies were established almost accidentally - areas like that were settled from the overpopulated european places at the time or by people mass deported from Europe, combined with the trade with the natives turning into accidental (and afterwards deliberate) genocide because back then nobody really thought that there were different diseases everywhere.

By the time there's technology to live in Africa comfortably, nobody wants to move, and the natives are immune to all the diseases. Make Europe undergo some sort of population boom and you can have limited settler colonies in Africa
 
Some of the 'central' African colonies were intended as traditional settler colones - Kenya for instance, her interior discovered by European explorers who claimed it temperate, green and pleasant with little in the way of problems. However they overplayed their reports to impress financiers and the local 'outpost' colonial admins who supported their treks. They in turn wanted more focus and cash for their often disregarded postings.

Zanzibar and East Africa is an interesting example. The tiny island officially ruled an 'empire' of thousands of square miles along the East Africa coast. Britain had long had a consulate in Stone Town to oversee the valuable trade nexus between India, Europe and the 'dark interior' but let this massive region to the Sultan.

Slavery often threatened to encourage British action but the Zanzibari claimed it nessecary to turn a profit on cloves and other cropes, also being limited to the African mainland and the sea trade officially stopped London didn't care enough to interfere. Their agent by the 1880s was man named Kirk who had petitioned for years to have Britain take more direct control however London had none of it, seeing it as an effort at self-aggrandisement and even going a little native (Kirk wanted the Zanzibari Empire to be a respected princely state to form an African Raj around, with himself as Viceroy). Kirk encouraged Stanley and others to explore Kenya and despite claims of great lands for white settlers, Gladstone basically turned around and said "Why do we want to fight thousands of Masai warriors for some farmland?".

It took Carl Peters sniffing around what would become Tangynika in the name of German presitge building (as in reality the Zanzibari had practically no control over their continental lands) for the British to feel the need to plant a flag on the mainland and take control of Kenya > in order to secure the Lakes region > in order to secure the connetion up the Nile but most importantly ensure Stone Town remained a British influenced trade centre.

I'd say Germany unites peacefully into a fairly loose confederacy that remains focused on internal matters and provincial bickering. This avoids major German empire building but also avoid France's need to prove itself in the late 19th century. If Paris is more self-confident, her and London (along with Madrid and Lisbon to a lesser extent) may carry on as they had for centuries, with limited direct influence and patronage of native kingdoms.
 
Settler colonies were established almost accidentally - areas like that were settled from the overpopulated european places at the time or by people mass deported from Europe, combined with the trade with the natives turning into accidental (and afterwards deliberate) genocide because back then nobody really thought that there were different diseases everywhere.

By the time there's technology to live in Africa comfortably, nobody wants to move, and the natives are immune to all the diseases. Make Europe undergo some sort of population boom and you can have limited settler colonies in Africa
And even then, the colonies would be more to manage the extraction of resources on the back of Africans and any Asians they ship in, so that they can keep your metropole in comfort.
 
One thing that hasn't been mentioned yet is that settler colonies in Africa are hard. They don't generate much profit, the local diseases are devastating, and raids and attacks on settlements are much more likely than they were in North America. You'd need a really really good reason, along with significant medical care.
 
If the 1871 Paris Commune succeeds in French socialist revolution, and it spreads across Europe, then that would stop imperialism.


Not entirely impossible or hard to achieve but it depends on the PoD
 
Tbh just make Eurafricans official status as Europeans amongst the various monarchs when it comes to dealing with West, Central and Southern Africa.

Tbh that already sort of happened anyways, I'd just be nice to see it more with non-lusophone Eurafricans.
 
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