For more than a century Canadians have gone abroad to do “good” in poorer parts of the world. Whether they spurred positive change or simply became foreign agents should be of interest to international non-governmental organizations.

Few Canadians are familiar with pre-colonial African cities, and even fewer know a Canadian military leader helped sack one of West Africa’s great metropolises. When the British and Canadians took part in the ‘Scramble for Africa’, they did so with impunity, a complete disregard for property, sacred forests and people. They only saw savages that needed to be tamed.