The greatest violence in human history has happened because of the colonisation drive that several of the resurgent European powers, devoid of any ethical considerations, initiated to grab whatever they could in the rest of the world. It began with the coming of the Age of Discovery. Initially in the closing decade of the 15th century it was marked by Portuguese and Spanish exploration of the New World (Americas), the coasts of Africa, the Middle East, India and East Asia making them global empires in turns. Subsequently during 16th, 17th and 18th centuries England, France, the Dutch Republic and Tsarist Russia also joined this race of exploration and expansion leading them to establish their own empires. Therefore, the European quest to secure colonies led to colonial wars among the aspiring colonial powers like Spain, Portuguese, Britain, France, Dutch and Russia in different parts of the world. Within India itself a number of such wars were fought among French, Portuguese, Dutch and British till Britain finally neutralised the rest and established almost a complete control over the sub-continent and its peripheries. In a way World War 1 & 2 were culmination of colonial wars among the established and aspiring colonial powers (like Italy, Germany and Japan) that brought so much of destruction (mainly) in Europe that considerably weakened all these thereby contributing, as a vital factor, in the decolonisation process.
Colonialism did violence in places that it occupied. This violence had political, economic,social, cultural, physical and environmental dimensions and consequences. In the context of newly discovered continentslike Americas and Australia it decimated almost whole populations ofaboriginals (natives), replacing them with Europeans on their lands. Itdislocated the whole populations from parts of Africa putting them in theservice of white masters as slaves. These were used to exploit and extractwealth from lands that the colonisers occupied. It left a terrible legacy ofviolence for colonies to deal with even after their independence. Colonialism alsocontributed to wars resulting from the resistance that prospective coloniesoffered to the colonising process. In India there were a series of such battlesand wars. The significant among these were, the Battle of Plassey (1757) withwhich the British East India company took over the control of the rich provinceof Bengal establishing foothold to press further in India, and First War ofIndependence (1857) the victory in which established the complete sway of theBritish imperial control over whole of India. In between there were a largenumber of violent campaigns that British got into with the resisting rulers indifferent parts of the country. The violent conflicts also happened because ofthe various civil groups offering resistance at their level as well.
After establishment of colonialism a new wave ofanti-colonial struggles followed (wiser from their previous experiences of thefailures of the violent resistances) mostly in civil, political and non-violentway. There were violent segments of anti-colonial struggles like INA in India.But along with these, more important factor that prompted decolonisation wasthe self destructive war (WW. II) that brought considerable destruction inEurope and undermined the capacity of conventional colonial powers to hold onto their colonies any further. In the history of colonialism only instancewhere mainly a violent resistance pushed out a powerful colonial power with itsown indigenous resources was the American War of Independence (1776-83) whichresulted in the formation of the United States of America. The success of thestruggle was more because the people on both sides by and large were of sameorigin, had similar social, cultural and educational background and operatedwith comparable strategy, technology and weaponry. In this the Americans hadadvantage of operating within a favourable geo-social context and enjoyed anumber of other operational, tactical, geo-physical advantages that playedimportant role in their success.
Colonialism created its own contentious legacy fordecolonised countries to grapple with. Colonial powers were insensitive tohistorically recognised natural borders in colonies in ethno-cultural andgeographical terms. Its border management was subordinate to its own interestsand conveniences. Thereby it disturbed ethnic balances, undermined developmentprocesses, creating economic distortions, submerged regions and divided manyfor its own convenience and interests. Thus borders got erected somewhatarbitrarily with little regard to the geo-physical feasibility, composition ofpeople and their historical placement in terms of cultural connectivity,communication and economic linkages etc. Because of this a number of countrieswere artificially divided and created that had “little relationship with thesocio-cultural make-up of the people and their history”. In the process anumber of new issues of contention got created. For example border problembetween India and China, India and Pakistan (now Bangladesh), Pakistan andAfghanistan, Sri Lankan Tamil issue, the problems in the Northeast of India,Palestinian issue, Arab fragmentation, along with many other problems have beenborn out of the colonial legacy. Ethnic imbalances and divides, issues ofcommunalism, apartheid and slavery were also the legacy of colonialism thatcreated violent internal strife within several postcolonial states.
While some of these problems stand addressed by now thereare many that continue to be contentious afflicting several of the postcolonial states with a number of violent conflicts. Some conflicts like borderissues between India & China after 1962 war has remained dormant allowinguneasy peace between the two countries. Some issues like the Tamil problem inSri Lanka under the stronger state might that defeated the LTTE has been onlypushed under carpet but not addressed with the objective of resolving theissue. Most chronic of these unresolved issues that resulted in a number ofwars and continued internal strifes constantly threaten peace in theirrespective regions. There are a few cases where, at the face of it, violentresistance seem to have succeeded in defeating colonial/hegemonic powers. Butin their case it was a combination of factors that brought the change. Duringhey days of sweeping decolonisation process French lacked legitimacy to hold onto Algeria beyond a point against the violent anti-colonial uprising. In suchand some other cases the occupying powers had even internal domestic factorsthat added pressure for their withdrawal from their former colonies.
In addition, to conflicts created by the colonial legacy,global peace in the post World War II period was undermined by the cold warbetween the former Soviet Union & the United States. Because of theirmutual nuclear deterrence they did not go for any direct violent engagementwith each other. But they tried to undermine each other through a number ofproxy conflicts like in the Koreas (1950-1953) Vietnam, (1955-1975) &Afghanistan (1978-1989), just to mention a few. Most of these conflicts endedin a stalemate forcing aggressive power to an un-ceremonial retreat but leavingbehind very bad legacy as in the case of Koreas and in Afghanistan. In the postcold war period there were a number unilateral aggressions undertaken by the UnitedStates for its own global hegemonic designs like in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libyaetc. But the end result of these was the US failure to shape global reality asper its own designs that considerably dented its prestige and influence. Itinflicted considerable human loss, social dislocation and physical and economicdestruction in the affected countries.
Historically speaking the violence has been used as a mediumof politics i.e. as instrument of expansion and exploitation by the dominantand as the mechanism of resistance and defiance by the weak, oppressed andaggrieved. Historically it manifested more as interstate wars. But along withthat there has been non state agencies and groups engaged with violentcampaigns as a mechanism of achieving various types of political goals. Therehave been many of the contentious issues born out of the colonialism that haveresulted in (and continue to cause) violent conflicts. However, after World War II, more so duringlast few decades, there are strong reasons for serious rethinking on war andviolent conflicts being viable and feasible means of attaining politicalobjectives and resolving issues. It was the countries in the Europe thatinitially recognised this emerging phenomenon. After having suffered the calamitouseffects caused by the two great wars the countries there realized the value ofliving in peace. Europe has made a number of strides in evolving a new paradigmof relationship based on peaceful coexistence, open borders, reconcilingindividual nationalism to cooperative living thereby creating a new example ofrelationship for rest of the world to follow. Today European Union shoulddefine the evolving order that the countries in other regions of the world needto emulate.