British and French Colonialism

1. Similarities between British colonialism and French colonialism:

- They justify their colonization that they have responsibilities to civilize undeveloped countries. In reality, everybody knows that it is not their goal for colonization.

- Their goals are for economic reasons. Their colonization is all about profit they get from their colonies.

- Their ambition is also about land. France and Britain compete in who will win more lands in the world than the other. They try to possess as more lands as they can. This is obviously seen by their colonies spreading all over the world in Asia, Africa, and North America.

2. Differences between British colonialism and French colonialism:

- The British colonialism runs their colonies by giving them a kind of self-government. The French colonialism, on the other hand, doesn’t run their colonies in that way. Most of the heads of French colonies are appointed by the French government. In Vietnam, they divided the country into three parts: the North, the Central, and the South. This policy tries to break the Vietnamese unity apart so that they can easily run the country.

- The British colonialism tries to make their colonies more developed. They pour a lot of money into colonies to promote businesses, build infrastructure, and so on. Hong Kong is one of successful examples of the British colonialism. In contrast, the French colonialism is more brutal than the British colonialism. Their policy for colonization is to exploit their colonies rather than to invest them. Vietnam is one of horrible examples of the French colonialism. They try to exploit lands, raw materials, and cheap labor. They applied heavy taxes on goods and they also applied monopoly policies on salt, opium, and alcohol. These are all about the French economic and profit interests, not about their colonies.

- The British