Colonialism and the Lasting Calamity of “Artificial Borders”

Colonial powers, during their rule, delineated artificial borders that cut across territories, ethnic groups, and religious communities to secure control. When colonial rule ended, those borders remained – perpetuating divisions that continue to fuel conflict and instability today

An illustration of the 1884 Berlin Conference, a pivotal moment that led to the subsequent Scramble for Africa by European colonial powers. Source: Times of Eswatini

Colonial powers, during their rule, delineated artificial borders that cut across territories, ethnic groups, and religious communities to secure control. When colonial rule ended, those borders remained – perpetuating divisions that continue to fuel conflict and instability today.

I first came across the term of “artificial borders” while reading about conflicts in Africa during my regional studies class in college. I’ve since lost track of the exact sources, but what struck me then was my discovery that many conflicts around the world aren’t solely driven by nature or geographical landscapes. Rather, they are often rooted in the borders drawn by colonial rulers — designed as instruments of control and expansion.

Case of Rwandan Genocide

The very first case through which I learned about artificial border was the Rwandan genocide. At the onset of genocide, nearly one million people lost their lives between April and July 1994, mostly members of the minority Tutsi and moderate-majority Hutu groups¹. The assassination of Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian President Cyprien Ntaryamira — both from the Hutu majority — when their aircraft was shot down over Kigali, sparked immediate outrage among Rwandan Hutus. The Hutus accused the Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) of carrying out the assassination, which became the main trigger for the mass killings that began in the following hours.

The troubling fact is that both groups — the Hutu and the Tutsi —originally shared the same territory and language for centuries as part of the Banyarwanda, the inhabitants of the region surrounding Rwanda and Lake Kivu. However, following Germany’s defeat in World War I, the Belgian administration, which took over Rwanda and Burundi under a League of Nations mandate, began to impose a system known as an indirect rule. This system institutionalized distinctions between Hutus and Tutsis under the binary classification of natives and non-natives, despite both groups being entirely native².

In parallel with portraying the Tutsis as a distinct, “non-natives” elite, the Belgian administration also propagated the so called “Hamitic myth”, which claimed that the Tutsis descended from a Hamitic or Nilotic lineage originating in the Nile Valley — supposedly a more civilized group comparing to the Hutu and Twa—another original occupant of the land³. Not only imposed the myth, Belgian administration also granted the Tutsis various privileges and preferential treatments, including access to educational institutions for their children and positions within the colonial administration.

The favorable treatment received by the Tutsis — who were often used as instruments of colonial administration, including in enforcing forced labor and punishments — stood in stark contrast to the fate of the Hutus who faced doubled labor burdens that led to several famines and sowed deep resentment among them. This policy alone was enough to fracture the long-standing social cohesion that had existed for decades. Worse still, the colonial administration introduced identity cards that classified individuals according to physical traits, designating them as Hutu, Tutsi, or Twa.

Only when the Tutsi elites began to initiate the independence movement did the Belgian administration shift its attention to the discontented Hutus, whom they believed had been “discriminated against”. The administration then redirected its support toward the Hutus, who subsequently launched uprisings not against the Belgian authorities, but against Tutsi notables and elites —whom the Hutus already labeled as “invaders”.

Years of resentments resulting from this “artificial borders” constructed by colonial power erupted in the 1958 massacre of Tutsis and peaked again 36 years later. Shortly after the genocide, the Tutsi-led RPF invaded Rwanda from Burundi and overthrew Hutu-led government. Although the genocide was brought to an end and Rwandan government abolished the Hutu and Tutsi identities in 1994 to foster reconciliation, tensions between two groups have continued to influence the political climate in Rwanda’s neighborhood, spilling over into the neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo and Burundi. Interestingly, all three of these countries were formerly under the Belgian Mandate established by the League of Nations.

Case of Syria

A very similar example of artificial borders stemming from a colonial legacy can be seen throughout the Levant (Greater Syria / Bilad Al-Sham). Given its role as a bridge connecting Mesopotamia, the Mediterranean, Asia, Europe, and Africa, this vast and strategic region was contested by multiple empires and military campaigns for centuries. These included the Egyptians, Babylonians, Persians, Romans, Byzantines, Abbasids, Crusaders, Ayyubids, Mongols, Mamluks, and Ottomans.

Following the defeat of the Central Powers and the Ottoman Empire in World War I, and the subsequent San Remo Conference of 1920 (later formalized by the Treaty of Sèvres), the Ottomans were forced to cede the majority of their Middle Eastern and North African territories to the victorious Allied powers, France and Britain. This included Greater Syria. Four years prior, in 1916, France and Britain had negotiated a secret pact – drafted by Sir Mark Sykes and François Georges-Picot – to partition Ottoman territories into their respective spheres of influence in the event of the empire’s collapse.

The Sykes-Picot Agreement outlined the future territorial divisions agreed upon by both nations. Relying on long-standing narratives of traditional guardianship, France was to assume control over the portions of Greater Syria along the Mediterranean coastline and the Mount Lebanon region, which was predominantly inhabited by Maronite Christians. A few years later, in 1922, France would carve out this territory from a now much-diminished Greater Syria to establish the new state of Lebanon. Britain, meanwhile, claimed mandates over Transjordan, Iraq, and Palestine, aligning with its deliberate policy to fulfill the promise of a Jewish national homeland, as articulated in the 1917 Balfour Declaration.

In addition to Lebanon, France established control over the epicenter of Greater Syria: Syria itself and the city of Damascus. France initiated this takeover by invading Damascus, defeating the army of the Arab Kingdom of Syria at the Battle of Maysalun, and abolishing the newly formed monarchy, which had lasted a mere four months. Significantly, this action represented a profound betrayal of King Faisal – the head of the short-lived state – as well as a direct violation of the 1915 – 1916 Hussein-McMahon correspondence between Hussein bin Ali (Sharif of Mecca) and Sir Henry McMahon (British High Commissioner for Egypt). This correspondence documented Britain’s pledge of independence for Arab nations in exchange for their revolt against the Ottoman Empire. While the Arabs fulfilled their end of the agreement, the British ultimately left their promises unfulfilled.

After assuming control of Syria and Lebanon under the legal framework of a League of Nations mandate, France immediately sought to consolidate its authority through a strategy of divide et impera (divide and rule). To counter the influence of the Sunni Arab majority, the French cultivated political networks that granted disproportionate privileges to local ethnic and religious minorities. This system was institutionalized by partitioning Syria’s vast geographical landscape into several distinct cantons – specifically the Jabal al-Druze, the Alawite State, and the northern (Aleppo) and southern (Damascus) states. The French further entrenched these divisions by actively recruiting these minority groups into their newly formed indigenous military force, the Troupes Spéciales.

Furthermore, the politically motivated Troupes Spéciales actively excluded the Sunni majority from both its general ranks and leadership positions. Ultimately, this French policy of division failed, sparking a series of ethnically fueled rebellions across the newly formed cantons. Another unilateral decision by the French – the 1938 handover of the Sanjak of Alexandretta, Greater Syria’s northern coastal region, to Kemalist Turkey – only further exacerbated the Syrian public’s resentment toward French mandatory rule.

The Syrian public’s accumulated resentment toward the French reached a boiling point at the outbreak of World War II. Reconciliation efforts between Syrian nationalists and the French administration had completely collapsed, a situation further exacerbated by mounting international scrutiny, particularly from Britain and the United States. The French bombardment of Damascus in May 1945 solidified global criticism, ultimately prompting British intervention in June and forcing the final withdrawal of French troops from Syria on April 15, 1946.

Despite the departure of the French, the enduring impact of the artificial borders drawn by the former colonial power can be traced directly back to this formative period. Much like the tragic case of Rwanda, this artificial architecture was built on power-privilege dynamics that empowered ruling ethnic minorities to suppress the ethnic majority, deliberately pitting them against one another. Today, this institutionalized sectarianism looms as a primary root cause of Syria’s recent instability, contributing directly to decades of civil war and persistent horizontal conflicts across various provinces. It is a familiar colonial legacy of unilateral segregation – one that has left behind indelible scars and a vicious cycle of consequences.

Breaking the cycle perpetuated by these so-called artificial borders will require future generations to intentionally dismantle this entrenched colonial legacy. Doing so demands a shift away from ethno-religious divides, moving instead toward a unified civic nationalism grounded in equal rights and inclusive nation-building.

References:

1. BBC, Rwanda: How the genocide happened, BBC, 17 May 2011, available at https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-13431486 .

2. Mamdani Mahmood, When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Genocide in Rwanda, 2001, Princeton University Press, available at https://dokumen.pub/when-victims-become-killers-colonialism-nativism-and-the-genocide-in-rwanda-9781400851720.html .

3. Braeckman Colette, Belgium’s role in Rwandan genocide, Le Monde Diplomatique, June 2021, available at https://mondediplo.com/2021/06/11rwanda .

4. Dostal, Jörg Michael, Syria and the Great Powers (1946–1958): How Western Power Politics Pushed the Country Toward the Soviet Union, 2015, Journal of Syria Studies, 7(4), 7–56, Leibniz Institut für Sozialwissenschaften, available at https://www.ssoar.info/ssoar/handle/document/57358 .

5. Altug, Seda, Refugees, Labour and Sectarianism in Syria under the French Mandate (1921–1950), Journal Les études sur Les Mondes Musulmans et Les Humanités Numériques, 156 (2/2024), available at https://journals.openedition.org/remmm/21593 .