The European conquest of Africa and Asia, 1750-1914

History must be understood, not ignored

     In my last post, I tried to succinctly describe an historically important example of what I am calling “the dialectic of domination and development.”  I tried to show that the Iberian conquest of vast regions of the Americas was an important causal factor in the modernization of agriculture and the expansion of craft manufacturing of Northwestern Europe during the sixteenth century (see “The Spanish and Portuguese conquest of the Americas, 16th century,” May 25, 2021).

     This is not a matter of idle intellectual or historical curiosity.  Humanity today must focus on finding the road to overcoming the dialectic of domination and development, the historic human tendency to base development on the conquest and superexploitation of other lands and peoples.  Nations must discover the road to economic development and prosperity through the creation of a world-system based in cooperation and mutually beneficial trade among nations, as is being proposed today by the neocolonized.  The …