Blown by the west wind: neocolonialism and the impacts on African women

Abstract

Since the colonisation of African countries and the slave trade, African women have been continuously deprived of their basic human rights. They lost their right to selfdetermination, the right to enjoy the benefits of their work and the natural resources of their lands, the right no to suffer from racial and gender discriminations, the right to health, the right to human dignity, the right to political participation, the right to be freed from violence, the right to be freed from slavery and exploitation, in general the right to enjoy their human rights on an equal basis. These human rights violations are sustained by neocolonialism which allows new forms of control of their lives. The postcolonial approach of this work is a means to highlight the roots of the problems that are to be found in history, but also it proves along the study that their sufferings are 12 directly linked to the white male supremacy which ensured for centuries the constant inferiority of African women through racist and sexist ideologies. Indeed, an analogical analysis thanks to postcolonial authors and theories evidence the similarities in attitudes, policies and ideologies between the colonial and postcolonial era which engender the denigration of African women. Different illustrations of this statement such as globalisation, international sexual tourism, discriminations and failed integrations are tackled thus displaying the historic, economic and sociologic factors of these neo-colonialist phenomena, the consequences for African women and more importantly the remedies for their empowerment.