This was a paper I wrote for History class last year.
After World War II, European world power began to decline. The native population of European colonies saw the instability in Europe as a weakness and would begin to seek independence. The additional turmoil of the Cold War shifted attention from the colonies to the situation in Eastern Europe.
The classic example of the fall of European world power is that of France. France fought a war in Indochina over its colonies there. Indochina only seemed important to the aristocratic class but the loss of Indochina was to lead to Algerian Muslims wanting their own independence from France as well. The French People saw Algeria as an eternal integral part of France so the war there was for the pride of the average French citizen. Many French citizens settled in Algeria. The Fronte de Liberation Nationale, an Algerian Muslim terrorist organization launched a guerilla terrorist war on French targets in Algeria. Eventually the terrorists would defeat France and gain independence for Algeria. After the end of French rule in North Africa, many North African Muslims immigrated to France. Many North African Jews, who were full French citizens in North Africa, fled to France and Israel to escape Anti-Israel Anti-Semitism.
The new reality in France was that it now had a large immigrant population from its former colonies which made it multi-ethnic rather than purely ethnic French. New tensions arose as a result within France between the different ethnic groups. Muslim immigrants recently rioted and both native French Anti-Semites and Muslim Anti-Semites attack Jews in France. As a result of the North African immigration, many French people turn to far Right parties such as that of Jean Marie Le Pen. The French government as a result of the large Arab population appeases Arab interests in the Middle East even though Arabs in France commit terrorist acts on French soil. Many see the native European population declining all over Europe and being over run by the North African Muslim immigrant population. This is because of zero or even negative population growth among many ethnic Europeans.
France eventually lost the rest of its colonies in Africa as well. The Second World War had a fatal blow to European colonies in general. The new world powers were the United States and the Soviet Union. Western European powers were exhausted after the war, especially France, with had been under German Nazi occupation. The new preoccupation was how to stop the spread of Communism and the situation in the two Germanies.
Topic: The Decline of France (Read 10647 times)