Modern Empires--IHEID Web Version without References

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Modern Empires--IHEID Web Version without References

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• Publié par: olonilux
• Nombre de lectures: 39
• Langue: Français

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Incomplete Working Draft: Strictly Not for Citation Fully Referenced Version Available on Request     Modern Overseas Empires: Makings and Make-Overs    

G. Balachandran Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva   The main focus of this paper is the making of modern empires. By modern empires, I mean the overseas territories of the European powers in the 19 th  and 20 th  centuries. ‘Modern’ and ‘empire’ are not unproblematic categories anymore. It is therefore useful not merely to ask what made empires happen in the modern world (by which I mean the world that grew out of the prolonged social and political changes in Europe lasting from about the middle of the 18th to the end of the 19 th  century), but also what, if anything, made these empires and the imperial projects of which they were a part, ‘modern’. Early-mid 20 th century commentators, of whom Schumpeter is the best known, spoke of imperialism as a form of atavism at odds with liberal, rational capitalism. Whether or not this was so, it is also relevant to ask what, if anything, their empires may have done to make the colonizing powers more or less ‘modern’. The latter question is, however, outside the scope of this paper.  The first question, viz. the motive forces behind empire, was hotly debated in the 1960s and 1970s and produced a vast literature. While most participants in the debate aimed to uncover what was spoken of at the time as the ‘“causes” of imperialism’, much of their research as Eric Stokes argued in a well-known essay, was based on mis-construing colonialism as imperialism. This mis-specification is not of pressing significance here for two reasons. My concern in this paper is with overseas empires (i.e. the larger political unit created by the acquisition of overseas territories and colonies without the consent of their

 

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  original inhabitants), not imperialism per se. Secondly, even if overseas empires were not the sole consequence of 19 th  imperialism, they may safely be regarded as representative of the latter phenomenon for the limited purpose of this paper.  The ‘“causes” of imperialism’ literature of the 1960s and 1970s was partly motivated by the belief that it was possible to identify a single, unique, causative factor driving the global expansion of the major European powers. Arguing against this were usually those who believed there was nothing unified or coherent about 19 th  century European expansion, especially on the periphery, and that it was really an unintended consequence of a multitude of events, motivations, and factors.  Serendipitist imperialism has its supporters. The best known advocate of this view is perhaps Seeley who famously suggested that Britain acquired its empire in a ‘fit of absence of mind’. But it says something about this ‘fit’ that it lasted more than two centuries; and about the ‘mind’ that its reported absence endured the loss of the American colonies, the 1857 rebellion in India, the late-19th century scramble to partition the world, rising rivalries in Europe, and World War I, and only ended reluctantly after World War II.  Though not in the manner Seeley intended, ‘fit’ and ‘absence of mind’ are not irrelevant terms to use to explain Europe’s global 19 th  century expansion. It has generally escaped attention that the historiography of imperialism ranges across the divide of reason: ‘rational’ factors (search for markets and raw materials) are not entirely absent in explanations for German and Japanese imperialism, but there is also an undeniable emphasis here on ‘irrational’ fears, anxieties, and ideologies. By contrast, British imperialism is more usually thought of as a ‘rational’ project motivated by identifiable, if not altogether lucidly spelt out, economic, political, and strategic goals that were pursued well or badly in a world of uncertainty and imperfect information.  This distinction implies there were not one, but at least two European imperial

 

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