La colonización

"In your opinion, and based on the above information, what are the lasting-- major, long-term, negative consequences, effects, or impacts of colonialism for the dozens and dozens ofnewly-independent states whose people experienced it? Were there any benefits?"

Before beginning giving any opinions and analyzing the question, the concept of colonialism mustbe defined. Then, it can be said that this is a term that alludes to the process carried out by a powerful state over an inferior country or culture. This process involves theintroduction of the culture, customs, language and religion in the land colonized. As it was mentioned in class, the main colonial waves took place between the XVI and part of the XXcenturies and the main colonies were European countries, such as the United Kingdom, France, Spain or Portugal, but also Japan or the United States. These countries, especially theEuropeans, took control of important lands in America and Africa mainly thanks to their advanced naval and military technologies that let them settle down in these countries. Behind thecolonization process, there were a lot of motivations: establish new European settlements, economic advantages to invest, strategic reasons, prestige and religion. Hence, the localpeople from these countries had to adjust to the changes made by the colonists. This is, learn the language, changing their culture, customs, habits and traditions, becoming RomanCatholics in most cases or replacing their old institutions by the ones imposed. Therefore, it can be stated that huge modifications were introduced by the colonizers and obviously hadsignificant effects on these territories, persisting some of them nowadays.

As a citizen of Spain, all what I know so far about the colonization in the current Latin America is that