Editing Berlin Conference (section)

==General Act==
The General Act fixed the following points:
* Partly to gain public acceptance,<ref name="DS">{{cite web|last1=David|first1=Saul|title=BBC – History – British History in depth: Slavery and the 'Scramble for Africa'|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/abolition/scramble_for_africa_article_01.shtml|website=bbc.co.uk/history|publisher=BBC|access-date=19 September 2017}}</ref><ref name=Craven/> the conference resolved to end slavery by [[Slavery in Africa|African]] and [[History of slavery in the Muslim world|Islamic]] powers. Thus, an international prohibition of the slave trade throughout their respected spheres was signed by the European members. In his novella ''[[Heart of Darkness]]'', [[Joseph Conrad]] sarcastically referred to one of the participants at the conference, the [[International Association of the Congo]] (also called "International Congo Society"), as "the International Society for the Suppression of Savage Customs".<ref name="HistoricalContext">"Historical Context: ''Heart of Darkness''." EXPLORING Novels, Online Edition. Gale, 2003. [http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/DC Discovering Collection]. {{subscription required}}</ref><ref>Stengers, Jean, "Sur l'aventure congolaise de Joseph Conrad". In Quaghebeur, M. and van Balberghe, E. (eds),  ''Papier Blanc, Encre Noire: Cent Ans de Culture Francophone en Afrique Centrale (Zaïre, Rwanda et Burundi)''. 2 Vols. Brussels: Labor. Vol. 1, pp. 15–34.</ref> The first name of this Society had been the "[[International African Association|International Association for the Exploration and Civilization of Central Africa]]".
* The properties occupied by Belgian King Leopold's International Congo Society, the name used in the General Act, were confirmed as the Society's. On 1 August 1885, a few months after the closure of the Berlin Conference, Leopold's Vice-Administrator General in the Congo, [[Francis de Winton]], announced that the territory was henceforth called "the [[Congo Free State]]", a name that in fact was not in use at the time of the conference and does not appear in the General Act.<ref name=Cornelis/><ref name=Katzenellenbogen/><ref name=Crowe /> The Belgian official ''Law Gazette'' later stated that from that same 1 August 1885 onwards, Leopold II was to be considered Sovereign of the new state, again an issue never discussed, let alone decided, at the Berlin Conference.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Thomson |first1=Robert |title=Fondation de l'État Indépendant du Congo: Un chapitre de l'histoire du partage de l'Afrique |date=1933 |location=Brussels |pages=177–189}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=Moniteur Belge / Belgisch Staatsblad |date=1885–1886 |location=Brussels |pages=22}}</ref> 
* The 14 signatory powers would have [[free trade]] throughout the [[Congo Basin]] as well as [[Lake Malawi]] and east of it in an area south of 5° N.
* The [[Niger River|Niger]] and [[Congo River|Congo]] rivers were made free for ship traffic.
* The Principle of Effective Occupation (based on effective occupation, see below) was introduced to prevent powers from setting up colonies in name only.
* Any fresh act of taking possession of any portion of the African coast would have to be notified by the power taking possession, or assuming a [[protectorate]], to the other signatory powers.
* Definition of regions in which each European power had an exclusive right to pursue the legal ownership of land

The first reference in an international act to the obligations attaching to [[spheres of influence]] is contained in the Berlin Act.

===Principle of effective occupation===<!-- This section is linked from [[Congo Free State]]. -->
{{more citations needed|date=June 2021}}
The '''principle of effective occupation''' stated that a power could acquire rights over colonial lands only if it possessed them or had effective occupation: if it had treaties with local leaders, flew its flag there, and established an administration in the territory to govern it with a police force to keep order. The colonial power could also make use of the colony economically. That principle became important not only as a basis for the European powers to acquire territorial [[sovereignty]] in Africa but also for delimiting their respective overseas possessions, as effective occupation served in some instances as a criterion for settling colonial boundary disputes. However, as the scope of the Berlin Act was limited to the lands that fronted on the African coast, European powers in numerous instances later claimed rights over interior lands without demonstrating the requirement of effective occupation, as articulated in Article 35 of the Final Act.

[[File:Scramble-for-Africa-1880-1913-v2.png|thumb|280px|Comparison of Africa in the years 1880 and 1913]]
At the Berlin Conference, the scope of the Principle of Effective Occupation was heavily contested between Germany and France. The Germans, who were new to the continent, essentially believed that as far as the extension of power in Africa was concerned, no colonial power should have any legal right to a territory unless the state exercised strong and effective political control and, if so, only for a limited period of time, essentially an occupational force only. However, Britain's view was that Germany was a latecomer to the continent and was assumptively unlikely to gain any possessions beyond those it already held, which were swiftly proving to be more valuable than British territories.{{citation needed|date=January 2023}} That logic caused it to be generally assumed by Britain and France that Germany had an interest in embarrassing the other European powers on the continent and forcing them to give up their possessions if they could not muster a strong political presence. On the other side, [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|Britain]] had large territorial holdings there and wanted to keep them while it minimised its responsibilities and administrative costs. In the end, the British view prevailed.

The great powers' disinclination to rule their territories is apparent throughout the protocols of the Berlin Conference but especially in the Principle of Effective Occupation. In line with Germany and Britain's opposing views, the powers finally agreed that it could be established by a European power establishing some kind of base on the coast from which it was free to expand into the interior. The Europeans did not believe that the rules of occupation demanded European hegemony on the ground. The Belgians originally wanted to include that effective occupation required provisions that "cause peace to be administered", but Britain and France were the powers that had that amendment struck out of the final document.

That principle, along with others that were written at the conference, allowed the Europeans to conquer Africa but to do as little as possible to administer or control it. The principle did not apply so much to the hinterlands of Africa at the time of the conference. This gave rise to [[hinterland]] theory, which basically gave any colonial power with coastal territory the right to claim political influence over an indefinite amount of inland territory. Since Africa was irregularly shaped, that theory caused problems and was later rejected.<ref>Herbst, Jeffrey. ''States and Power in Africa''. Ch. 3, pp. 71–72.</ref>