Friday 24 January 2014

counter-colonization!

the comparison between the colonized territories and the territories of the colonizing metropolis is awesome! United Kingdom colonized almost 140 times its size! Portugal 115 times its own territory!
The Netherlands possessed an empire that was almost 90 times bigger than its own country! almost the same for Belgium that controlled an empire of 82 times its size! Denmark had "just" a 70 times bigger empire (most of which is still existent!). Spain with the excuse that its proper country is not that small had an empire that was only 40 times bigger that its proper land area. The same for France, only 25 times the size of proper France. Italy reached an empire of only 13 times its surface and Germany with its colonies didn't reach an area of 10 times the original country.

the data come from wikipedia article "list of largest empires"

These data represent the amount of violence and injustice necessary to create such huge empires. the abnormal disproportion of the sizes of land areas of the colonies and the metropolis is like a thermometer of the brutality of the colonizing countries during their own history.
and that is History, my friends.

but now what would happen if all the colonized countries should compensate all this historical violence by mean of colonizing a proportional part of their own metropolis? for sure they would possess just a small area of land, a very small compensation, but the political geography of western Europe would change completely in a very curious way.


we are not used to think that other countries can just take a part of Europe simply because they like to do it, but that's exactly what European countries did during all history!

if you weren't satisfied with the country that is now possessing your town or your region and you'd better prefer another one, don't worry: that's exactly the same sensation that the colonized populations of America, Asia and Africa have been feeling for centuries.

3 comments:

  1. Vero!!!! Noi siamo colonizzati dall'italia.... ma se esistesse la repubblica veneta, mi sentirei colonizzato dai veneti???

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    1. haha. probabilmente si! dai veneziani. in ogni caso, boh, era così tanto per fare. ero in dubbio se mettere slovenia, rep.ceca, slovacchia come colonie dell'austria o della germania, etc... ma si complicava troppo se consideravo anche gli europei o le nazioni senza stato... la prossima volta... hehe

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  2. yujuuuu! Tacos valencianos!!!

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