A different look at African independence.

I was looking at the dates of African independence for various countries for a video I was making. And came across this website with the different dates Awesome resource!.

But it did make me think, there is actually a lot of data in this table, how can I get different insights from this table and perhaps visualize African independence in a different way.

This is best experienced on the desktop

I hope you enjoy scrolling!

02468101214161820United States Britain Italy Britain/Egypt France Spain Belgium Portugal South Africa Ethiopia

Who were the Colonizers?

This was one of the questions I asked when re-arranging the data, also was one fo the easiest insights to get!

It doesn't take a history buff to know that much of the colonization of the African continent was attributed to the Europeans who went out into the world is such of resources and cheap labour. But which ones were the real forces driving the mission??

It turns out whilst Britain was definitely a leader in the pack, controlling 21 nations, France was equally a dominant force taking 20 nations. Spain and Portugal also played a key role among others. As we look into the graphic below we can learn more about what this looked like.

What years were the peak of independence ?

024681012141847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993 1847 1910 1922 1941 1951 1956 1957 1958 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1968 1969 1973 1975 1976 1977 1980 1990 1993

Soo... when was the peak of independence?

In the original table, next to each country name is the date of independence, whilst this may at first look like a long list of randon dates, when broken down next to the colonizers on the previous viz, a story starts to emerge.

In this viz we arrange the data to understand what years nations became independent and who they gained interdependence from. You can definitely see leading up to 1960 the momentum that was happening as year after yeardifferent nations gett their independence leading to this major peak in 1960 where the majority of African nations got their independence.

With Britain and France specifically losing their hold on many nations, it didn't take long for other colonizers to suffer the same fate.

United_States

Britain

Italy

Britain_Egypt

France

Spain

Belgium

Portugal

South_Africa

Ethiopia

Which countries got taken over?

According to the webster dictionary the definition of colonization is: The subjugation of a people or area especially as an extension of state power

In the 1800’s European nations had a desire to get a lead to widespread imperialism in Africa. Why? Well besides the belief that, at the time, they were better than everyone else there were 2 main reasons: Expansion of territory with the limited land potential in europe, the opportunity to acquire land and natural resources was very appetizing and of course...Money. And so the scramble for Africa began, it got so intense at times that there was fear that war between Eurpean nations.

In the infamous words of Edwin starr war...what is it good for, absolutely nothing. So to avoid the potential for war The Berlin Conference came to be in Feb 26, 1885. In this meeting, the Europeans divided up the land of africa, determining who owned which territory (the people living there currently obviously did not count), creating the map of Africa we see to day. Excluding Ethipoia and Liberia every African nation that we now know to day was put under the rule of a nation.

United States

Britain

Italy

Britain/Egypt

France

Spain

Belgium

Portugal

South Africa

Ethiopia

> Stiring the potThe BridgeLiberation from the westWe still goingAnother jumpThe new commers & Future

What are we looking at?

What we have been looking at in the project is the reimagining of a table with static dates of African Independence, to something a bit more dynamic that tells a story.

After going through the previous visualizations, I think a story does come to light, by splitting the various years into specific buckets, we can see various themes in the journey to an Independent Africa. Here the years are packaged into year buckets with the colours representing which nations colonizered them. Hover over the circles to see which countries sit where.

Can you guess which countries come under which bucket?

And that's the end!

Hope you enjoyed the story, here is the link the Original article