What reasons might the Europeans have had for dominating and colonizing Africa?

Answer 1

A good book on this subject is Guns germs and steel

Answer 2

High School: The three G's to remember for your essays and test questions are Gold, Glory and God.

Gold - Refers to not just Gold! But all material resources including spices, exotic woods, tea, sugar etc. Citing the Dutch and Portuguese trading ports in Africa and East Indies, Spanish colonies in the Americas. Explain the Mercantilist system and bullion (national Gold and Silver reserves)

Glory - Refers to the competition for prestige between European monarchs. Particular examples include the Anglo-Spanish War (Spanish Armada), Privateer system (Queen Anne's War), Treaty of Tordesillas between Spanish and Portuguese.

God - If you watched Shogun on HBO, you might remember the Portuguese missionaries wanting to install Christian governments everywhere.

Undergrad: The three G's are great and all, but the industrial Colonization of Africa only truly begins to form as an ideology after the Treaty of Vienna 1815 ending the Napoleonic War and establishing the New European Order, and the Berlin Conference 1884 which arbitrarily granted swathes of Africa to European powers. The arrival of the modern age brought new economic incentives in Africa, in particular, rubber in the Congo region, new gold mines discovered in the Transvaal, and vast oil deposits found across Libya and the Niger Delta.