Dutch Entrepreneurs in the Partition of Africa (1880s–1890s)

This chapter analyses the Dutch entrepreneurs from the moment the Afrikaansche Handels-Vereeniging or AHV went bankrupt to the end of the nineteenth century (1879–1899). These two decades were the apex of the Partition of Africa, which had substantial effects on the Dutch entrepreneurs in West and West Central Africa. The growing power of European imperial states, among them the Congo Free State under Leopold II, meant the Nieuwe Afrikaansche Handels-Vennootschap or NAHV, which succeeded the AHV after 1879, encountered a challenging entrepreneurial environment with regard to property rights and long-term strategy. The majority of the chapter focuses on the relationship between the NAHV and the Congo Free State, among other things chronicling discussions over tariffs, the involvement of the NAHV in the so-called Congo-Arab War of 1892–1893, the establishment of the concession system in the Congo Free State and the decision by the NAHV to refocus its efforts on the French Congo and Angola after 1892/1893. Moreover, the chapter tracks the gradual decline of Muller & Co in Liberia in the 1880s and 1890s and eventual merger with the Oost-Afrikaansche Compagnie or OAC in 1893. Overall, the chapter demonstrates how the Dutch entrepreneurs managed and confronted the manifold challenges associated with doing business in a time of expanding European imperial control in Africa.