Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Young, Crawford

Titel

Decolonization: The Belgian Vision

Ist Teil von

• Politics in Congo, 2015, p.33-58

Ort / Verlag

Princeton: Princeton University Press

Erscheinungsjahr

2015

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• “Les jours du colonialisme sont révolus,” declared Belgium’s greatest colonial pro-consul, Pierre Ryckmans, in 1946 in his last address as Governor-General of the Congo, which he chose to title “Vers l’avenir.”¹ This statement hardly seems spectacular today, but, when delivered, the Ryckmans speech created a sensation in Belgian colonial circles. It articulated a general feeling of uneasiness, a realization that the colonial system was beginning to be on the defensive, that World War II had entirely changed the international environment. Other authoritative voices began to echo this sentiment; Guy Malengreau, an influential figure in liberal Catholic circles, warned in 1947