After establishing dominance in the Congo Basin, Leopold extracted large quantities of ivory, rubber, and other natural resources. It has been estimated that Leopold made 1.1 billion in 2005 dollars by employing a variety of exploitative tactics. Soldiers demanded unrealistic quantities of rubber be collected by African villagers, and when these goals were not met, the soldiers held women hostage, beat or killed the men, and burned crops. These and other forced labor practices caused the birth rate to decline as famine and disease spread. All of this was done at very little monetary cost to Belgium. M. Crawford Young observed, "[the Belgian companies] brought little capital – a mere 8000 pounds ... [to the Congo basin] – and instituted a reign of terror sufficient to provoke an embarrassing public-protest campaign in Britain and the United States at a time when the threshold of toleration for colonial brutality was high." The system of government implemented in the Congo by Belgium was authoritarian and oppressive. Multiple scholars view the roots of authoritarianism under Mobutu as the result of colonial practices. Indirect and direct rule of the colonial political system Systems of colonial rule can be broken into the binary classifications of direct and indirect rule. During the era of colonisation, Europeans were faced with the monumental task of administrating the vast colonial territories around the globe. The initial solution to this problem was direct rule, which involves the establishment of a centralized European authority within a territory run by colonial officials. In a system of direct rule, the native population is excluded from all but the lowest level of the colonial government. Mamdani defines direct rule as centralized despotism: a system where natives were not considered citizens. By contrast, indirect rule integrates pre-established local elites and native institutions into the administration of the colonial government. Indirect rule maintains good pre-colonial institutions and fosters development within the local culture. Mamdani classifies indirect rule as “decentralized despotism,” where day-to-day operations were handled by local chiefs, but the true authority rested with the colonial powers. Indirect rule In certain cases, as in India, the colonial power directed all decisions related to foreign policy and defense, while the indigenous population controlled most aspects of internal administration. This led to autonomous indigenous communities that were under the rule of local tribal chiefs or kings. These chiefs were either drawn from the existing social hierarchy or were