Belgium and the Congo, 1885-1980

"Yes, I think so. There are a whole series of studies of the Congo, some of them written with a strong sense almost of wanting to put the Belgians on trial for their engagement with the Congo. This is a book which tries to get beyond those sorts of disputes. It sets out the complicated interrelationship between sections of Belgium and the Congo. We’ve got to remember that the Congo emerges in Belgium’s history somewhat by accident, in the sense that it was the product of an initiative by the king at the time—Leopold II—to create the Congo Free State. It was to be an independent entity, largely financed by his own funds, but soon became a source of finance for his own funds. It was when crises developed about the governance of the Congo in the early 20th century that Belgium, and Belgium’s parliament in particular, took over responsibility for it and turned it into something like a colony, much like other sections of Africa were divided up between other European states. Belgian engagement with the Congo was always limited to rather specific lines. It was obviously related, again, to Catholicism and to missionary activity and the role that the church played in education and health. But it was also to do with economic interests and the discovery of various mining assets in the east of the Congo, which meant that banks like the Société Générale became very engaged with the Congo. The idea that this is “our colony” is something that only, I suspect, developed very briefly in Belgium, largely after World War II, when it becomes tied up with the whole notion of modernisation and how, by having the Congo, Belgians are somehow proving themselves to be a modern European society. But then all that comes crashing down in 1960-61 when Belgium retreats very quickly and precipitously from the Congo, and leaves Belgians debating whatever it was that caused them to be there in the first place. Guy Vanthemsche’s book is a very good book because it isn’t just about the Congo, it’s a book about Belgium as well and he tries to explain the dynamics and the relationship between the two. I don’t know how one measures those indices of colonial crimes. The British could easily be put in the same category. What’s true of the Congo is that it was, first of all, a very difficult area to govern in any effective way—not least due to its size and the distribution of the population. The other is that it was such a belated acquisition in Belgian life—it only really got going as a serious entity in the 1920s, once Belgium had been liberated from German rule—with the consequence that the ability of the Belgian authorities to establish effective control over different areas of the Congo was quite limited and left space for all sorts of forms of abuse and exploitation. World War II is another complicated period because the Belgian administration of the Congo is cut off from the motherland. It had links with the Belgian government-in-exile in London but it didn’t have any resources coming to it from London, so, again, the Congolese authorities were left to fend for themselves. Thus, the period when Belgium was able to exert effective control over the Congo was really very limited."