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Nathan Torres
Professor Teri Humphrys
Anthropology 100
4 December 2014
Power, Conquest, and the Global Legacy of Colonialism
Throughout the world, there are extremes of wealth and poverty. Some examples of this
can be seen with wealthy American families, the slums of Rio de Janeiro, East African villages,
and people who live in cages in Hong Kong. We are all human, yet some are treated with great
inferiority. It is said that more than one billion people in the world live on less than one dollar a
day. This is unacceptable and no family should be subjected to these conditions. Some topics to
help explain the poverty are colonialism, the lasting effects of colonialism and how colonialism
and globalization has shaped the lifeways of people around the globe, and how multinational
corporations influence the flow of wealth.
Colonialism is defined to be the "active possession of a foreign territory and the
maintenance of political domination over that territory" (Nanda and Warms 2015:327). Once
colonialism takes place, many colonies are created. Colonies are "foreign territory under the
immediate political control of a nation-state" (Nanda and Warms 2015:327). The Industrial
Revolution created a massive need for colonization. The Industrial Revolution created weapons,
it created a need for raw materials outside of Europe, and vaccines were discovered, which
meant Europeans could now explore other territories without getting sick. Once colonies were
made, the people in charge of the colony had to make money. They did this by taxing their
colonial subjects and making them work for no pay. This was often very unfair to the indigenous

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people because they were now working for people other than themselves and they were being
forced to. Failure to work was often met with great punishments.
There are lasting effects of colonialism that can still be seen today. In the film "The End
of Poverty? Think again," they showed many examples of people who were affected by
colonialism. Colonialism has created an extreme between wealth and poverty. Companies are
becoming extremely rich, and the ones who work for the companies in different countries are
working extremely long hours, and are being paid less than a dollar a day. Many families are
poor and cannot even afford a meal, yet these companies do not care. As long as they are making
a product for cheap, and selling it for a lot of money, they do not care what their workers are
going through.
Multinational corporations "own business enterprises or plants in more than one nation
and bring employment opportunities as well as goods and services to people who otherwise
would not have them" (Nanda and Warms 2014:353). These corporations often make their
money with factories that have poor working conditions, low wages, and long hours. An
example of this can be seen with workers whose job it is to polish iPad cases. When polishing
iPad cases, the air is often filled with aluminum particles that are very harmful to the body, yet
Apple does not care, they only care about their product and making a profit out of it.
Topics to help explain the poverty are colonialism, the lasting effects of colonialism and
how colonialism and globalization has shaped the lifeways of people around the globe, and how
multinational corporations influence the flow of wealth. The way some people have to work just
to survive is hard to imagine. There are families who have to sleep on the floor and skip meals
just because they cannot afford a bed or a meal. These are families that are working hard, yet
they are being taken advantage of. Most of the products we Americans are using are being made

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by these impoverished families. I believe people need to be more aware of where their items
come from. This will be the first step to creating a society in which a gap between the wealthy
and poor will not be so great.