International School History - European Schools - S7 4 hour option
S7 4hr History Last update - 17 May 2023 Official European School History S6 Syllabus: English, French, German
Compulsory Theme - 7.4C - Decolonisation and Independence since 1945  - syllabus
Key Questions and syllabus references. Lessons Additional materials and external links
Key Question - Why was there a process of decolonisation in Asia and Africa after WWII?

What factors, both internal and external, encouraged decolonization in Asia and Africa after 1945?
 

Key words: Decolonisation, Independence, Nationalism, Third World, Non-alignment

Possible Reference Points: Asia-Africa Conference in Bandung (1955)

 

 
People's Century video which examines the causes and consequences of decolonisation.

Excellent textual version of the People's Century episode on Decolonisation.

Worksheet 1 and summary diagram to be completed with the help of the presentation below..
 
Prezi Presentation introducing decolonisation.

 

 Historian Clive Ponting's excellent overview of decolonisation - web version or download.

Historian Eric Hobsbawn's chapter on decolonisation.

Video on the importance of the Suez Crisis in the history of decolonisation.

Webpage provides an illustrated history of decolonisation in the 1950s.

Wikipedia on the importance of the Bandung Conference.

 
The CVCE website has a European perspective of decolonisation.

What were the different routes to independence?
 

What similarities and differences were there in the experience of independence?

Possible Reference Points: Independence of India (1947)
 

 India: a case study of negotiated decolonisation.

Worksheet 2.

BBC eyewitness: end of British rule in India

Gandhi: hero or villain video
 
The CVCE website on India

A short film to illustrate negotiated decolonisation in Trinidad and Tobago.

 
What were the different routes to independence?

 

What similarities and differences were there in the experience of independence?		 Indo-China: a case study of violent decolonisation.

Worksheet 3.

Additional sheet that explains why France lost in 1954.

Video on decolonisation movement in French Indo-China.
 

 Ho Chi Minh: hero or villain? videos
 
The CVCE website on Indo-China
What were the different routes to independence?

 

What similarities and differences were there in the experience of independence?

Possible Reference Points: Independence of Belgian Congo (1960)
 

Also from Compulsory Theme - 7.4A - Cold War What influence did the logic of the Cold War have on regional conflicts? and Can the UN resolve international conflicts?

 Congo: a case study of accelerated decolonisation.

Worksheet 4 - The Congo Part 1 and Part 2
 
Prezi Presentation - How the Belgian media reported the assassination of Lumumba.

BBC report on why Lumumba was assassinated.

The Guardian 'the most important assassination of the 20th century'.

Documentary video - The assassination of Lumumba.

 
Recommended further reading, In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz, a brilliant account of Mobutu's Congo.

Adam Hochschild on Lumumba - extract from King Leopold's Ghost and short video interview.

BBC - Who killed Lumumba?  Also World Socialist Website review. Probe - The Assassination of Lumumba and the Mysterious Death of Dag Hammarskjold
 
The CVCE website on African decolonisation

BBC on the conspiracy theories behind the death of Dag Hammarskjold (September 2011)
 
Lumumba is a 2000 film directed by Raoul Peck centred around Patrice Lumumba in the months before and after the Democratic Republic of the Congo achieved independence from Belgium in June 1960.

Video - Film Century - Channel 4 Schools - examines decolonisation in West Africa and how film represented that at the time.

 
Key Question - How did former colonies develop after independence?

What factors promote or limit the political stability and international independence of former colonies?

Key words: Decolonisation, Independence, Nationalism, Third World, Non-alignment,

 

 Worksheet 5 - The experience of decolonisation in India, Pakistan and the Congo.

Table to download and complete. Earlier work on Vietnam to complete the table.

Short documentary film from the 1980s BBC schools about decolonisation and the concept of the Third World.
Recommended further reading, In the Footsteps of Mr Kurtz, a brilliant account of Mobutu's Congo.

An extract from a contemporary c1980s American investigative documentary into Mobuto's rule.

Video - Congo and Africa's World War: Crash Course World History 221

Video - BBC historian Dan Snow's recent trip to find the remains of Mobuto's palace in the jungle. See complete film.

The Guardian - 'Where Concorde once flew: the story of President Mobutu's 'African Versailles'

 
Key Question - How did former colonies develop after independence?

What factors promote or limit the political stability and international independence of former colonies?

Key words: Decolonisation, Independence, Nationalism, Third World, Non-alignment

Possible Reference Points: Independence of Angola and Mozambique (1975)

 

 Worksheet 6 - Middle East and Lusophone Africa: Post-colonial experiences

Short documentary film from the 1980s BBC schools Arab-Israeli conflict.
Video - Cold War episode 17 Good Guys, Bad Guys and accompanying website. This includes a transcript of the episode. The first part deals with the Middle east, the second with Lusophone Africa.
Key Question - How did former colonies develop after independence?

What factors promoted or limited the economic and social development of the newly independent countries after 1945?

 

 

 Worksheet 7 - The economic and social development of the newly independent countries after 1945  

 
 

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