The development of anti-colonial and independence movements in the 20th century, including the Indian independence movement (Gandhi, 1947), the decolonisation of Africa, and the ideas of pan-Africanism, non-alignment and post-colonial nationalism

What this dot point is asking

QCAA wants Year 11 students to trace the rise of anti-colonial movements in the 20th century, identify the key case studies (India, sub-Saharan Africa, Algeria, Indochina), and understand the intellectual contributions of pan-Africanism, Fanonian anti-colonialism and the Non-Aligned Movement.

Origins of 20th-century anti-colonialism

Anti-colonial resistance is as old as colonialism itself. What was new in the 20th century was its organisation as a mass political movement using modern techniques (party structures, mass media, civil disobedience, guerrilla warfare).

Key 20th-century turning points:

• The First World War. Wilson's Fourteen Points (1918) and the principle of self-determination raised colonial expectations. The Versailles Treaty (1919) applied self-determination only to European peoples; this disillusioned Asian and African nationalists. The Indian National Congress radicalised after Amritsar (April 1919).
• The Russian Revolution (1917). The Comintern actively supported anti-colonial movements, providing an alternative model to liberal-imperialist Europe.
• The Second World War. Demonstrated European weakness. Japanese conquest of South-East Asia (1942) ended the myth of European invincibility in colonies like Burma, Malaya, Indonesia. Britain promised post-war self-government to India in 1942.

The Indian independence movement

The Indian National Congress (founded 1885). Initially a moderate body lobbying for greater Indian representation.

Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948). Returned from South Africa to India in 1915. Led non-cooperation (1920-1922), the Salt March (1930), Quit India (1942). His method of satyagraha (non-violent resistance) became a template for later anti-colonial and civil-rights movements worldwide.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League. Demanded a separate Muslim state (Lahore Resolution, 1940).

Partition and independence (1947). Britain accelerated withdrawal under Mountbatten. Partition produced India and Pakistan and an estimated $1$ to $2$ million deaths in communal violence; about $14$ million displaced. The largest mass migration in human history.

African decolonisation

Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana). Led the Convention People's Party. Ghana became the first sub-Saharan British colony to gain independence (March 1957). Nkrumah was a major proponent of pan-Africanism.

The Year of Africa (1960). Seventeen African states gained independence in a single calendar year: Cameroon, Senegal, Togo, Madagascar, Benin, Niger, Burkina Faso, Cote d'Ivoire, Chad, Central African Republic, Congo-Brazzaville, Gabon, Congo (the former Belgian Congo, now DR Congo), Somalia, Mali, Nigeria, Mauritania.

The Algerian War (1954-1962). The most violent decolonisation. The FLN (Front de Libération Nationale) launched insurgency on 1 November 1954. The conflict killed several hundred thousand Algerians, used torture systematically (documented by historian Pierre Vidal-Naquet and others), brought down the French Fourth Republic in 1958, and ended with the Evian Accords (March 1962). Independence: July 1962.

Settler colonies. Where significant European settler populations had established themselves (Kenya, Rhodesia, South Africa, Algeria), decolonisation was harder and more violent. Kenyan Mau Mau emergency (1952-1960). Rhodesian UDI (1965) and Bush War. South Africa's apartheid only ended in 1994.

Indochina, Vietnam and Southeast Asia

French Indochina. Ho Chi Minh led the Viet Minh against the French (1946-1954); decisive defeat at Dien Bien Phu (May 1954); Geneva Accords (1954) divided Vietnam. The Vietnam War (1955-1975) followed as the United States replaced France as the foreign power.

Indonesia. Sukarno declared independence August 1945. Four-year war against the Dutch ended with formal independence December 1949.

Anti-colonial ideas

Pan-Africanism. A series of congresses (London 1900; Paris 1919; Manchester 1945) bringing together African and African-diaspora thinkers. Key figures: W.E.B. Du Bois, Kwame Nkrumah, Jomo Kenyatta, George Padmore.

Frantz Fanon (Martinican-Algerian, 1925-1961). "Black Skin, White Masks" (1952) and "The Wretched of the Earth" (1961). Analysed the psychological and political effects of colonisation; argued anti-colonial violence was psychologically necessary for the colonised to reclaim agency. Hugely influential on later post-colonial thought.

The Bandung Conference (April 1955). Twenty-nine Asian and African states met in Indonesia. Established the principle of solidarity among non-aligned, newly independent nations. Led to the formal Non-Aligned Movement (Belgrade, 1961).

Negritude. Aimé Césaire (Martinique) and Léopold Sédar Senghor (Senegal). Literary and intellectual movement asserting Black cultural identity against colonial assimilationism.

Edward Said. "Orientalism" (1978). Foundational text of post-colonial studies. Argued that European representations of "the East" produced a body of cultural knowledge inseparable from imperial power.

Consequences

By 1975 the European empires had been almost entirely dismantled. Over $80$ new states had been created. The post-colonial states faced shared challenges: arbitrary colonial borders (especially in Africa), extractive economies, weak institutions, neocolonial economic relations with former metropoles. The political legacies of decolonisation continue to shape contemporary global politics.

In one sentence

20th-century anti-colonial movements, from the Indian National Congress under Gandhi (independence 1947) to African nationalism under Nkrumah (Ghana 1957, the Year of Africa 1960) and the Algerian FLN (1954-1962), produced over $80$ new states by 1975 and developed intellectual traditions (pan-Africanism, Fanonian anti-colonialism, the Non-Aligned Movement, post-colonial theory) that reshaped modern political thought.