Suppose, in the 15th and 16th centuries, Western Europeans --who were starting their project of world exploration and conquest-- had decided to do "the right and ethical thing" that liberal college professors --famed for their grasp of reality....-- have excoriated them for
not doing, and only aimed at setting up trading outposts all over the world, coastal settlements only, with no direct attempt to enter, explore or control the lands or peoples other than these places, culturally, religiously or militarily. A proto-Prime Directive from
Star Trek....(which, of course, would never have been created...no Gene Roddenberry.)
The World in 1500
Suppose that England, Portugal, Spain, France and Holland --the only five groups involved--- had otherwise left the rest of North America, South America, the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, India, Southeast Asia and Australia alone.
As the late unlamented John Lennon wrote, "Imagine."
3 comments:
Didn't the Danes, the Swedes and the Russians also get into this colonization game?
Not til the 17th-18th centuries and on a very tiny scale: a few islands and outposts. Russian Alaska was large and later, but the Russians did little with it. And the Germans got into Africa later, briefly. As did Belgium.
But "Western Colonialism" is really Spain and Portugal, England and France.
And Holland.
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