ABSTRACT
The 1890s showed that the Congo regime would make no substantive changes in response to criticism, whether private or public, measured or sensational, friendly or hostile. Reform would come only through the exercise of power: through international coordination, unilateral British military action, or the Belgian political process. All three required the British government to take a strong stand, as Morel recognized, “How can it be stopped? Only … by publicity and popular pressure upon the Governments … [to] force it upon the world’s diplomacy.”2 The Congo reformers had set themselves a difficult task, but they succeeded in altering British diplomacy to be more consistent with their ends.
