EARLY BELGIAN COLONIAL EFFORTS - The University of Texas at ...
EARLY BELGIAN COLONIAL EFFORTS - The University of Texas at ...
EARLY BELGIAN COLONIAL EFFORTS - The University of Texas at ...
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expanded on the conditions th<strong>at</strong> existed before Leopold II so th<strong>at</strong> study and scholarship<br />
in this area, especially <strong>of</strong> a broader n<strong>at</strong>ure, will advance.<br />
Much <strong>of</strong> the historical record on Belgium’s role in nineteenth century<br />
colonialism reflects a fairly confined, orderly review and analysis <strong>of</strong> the <strong>of</strong>ficial record<br />
and its closely rel<strong>at</strong>ed documents. This is changing. It is hoped th<strong>at</strong> this effort here,<br />
although also mostly based on the <strong>of</strong>ficial records, by its broader view reflects a very<br />
small part <strong>of</strong> the much larger historical effort in Belgium today. Leopold II may have<br />
been the subject <strong>of</strong> a deeper study <strong>of</strong> Belgian colonialism in the Congo but it may have<br />
broadened the inquiry to all <strong>of</strong> Belgian colonial activity, and by definition the larger<br />
world <strong>of</strong> European imperialism.<br />
<strong>The</strong> forced examin<strong>at</strong>ion <strong>of</strong> Belgium and Leopold’s past and Belgian colonialism<br />
and imperialism has in many ways recast the way Belgium and its historians view this<br />
facet <strong>of</strong> Belgium’s past. Guy Vanthemsche, <strong>of</strong> the <strong>University</strong> <strong>of</strong> Brussels, in a 2006<br />
paper entitled “<strong>The</strong> Historiography <strong>of</strong> Belgian Colonialism in the Congo,” 402 explained<br />
some <strong>of</strong> the shortcomings and advances Belgian colonial history has and must take. His<br />
words are relevant beyond the Congo. In discussing a work by two Belgian historians,<br />
Hein Vanhee and Geert Castryck, Vanthemsche wrote:<br />
A few years ago, these two authors produced a stimul<strong>at</strong>ing essay on the st<strong>at</strong>e<br />
<strong>of</strong> the art and the future perspectives <strong>of</strong> colonial historiography in Belgium,<br />
introducing a special issue <strong>of</strong> the Belgian review <strong>of</strong> contemporary history,<br />
consisting <strong>of</strong> several articles on Belgian colonial history. This is certainly the<br />
symptom <strong>of</strong> the fact th<strong>at</strong> something is indeed changing in the Belgian historical<br />
world. But in comparison to other former imperial countries, Belgian colonial<br />
402 Guy Vanthemsche, “<strong>The</strong> Historiography <strong>of</strong> Belgian Colonialism in the<br />
Congo,” in Europe and the World in European Historiography, ed. Lévai, Csaba. (Pisa:<br />
Pisa <strong>University</strong> Press, 2006), 119.<br />
207