British imperialism

“ The problem is an extraordinarily difficult one; perhaps the most difficult political problem that has ever faced the sons of men. But it is essentially the same problem which has continually recurred in the history of British imperialism, though it now presents itself on a vastly greater scale, and in a far more complex form, than ever before: it is the problem of reconciling unity with liberty and variety; of combining nationality and self-government with imperialism, without impairing the rights of either. ”

“ But the modern politician does not say, "It would be a good thing if there were a British Imperialism dominating the world." He says, "It is a good thing that there is a British Imperialism dominating the world;" ”

“ These events caused a considerable sensation in Great Britain, even in a generation which had become inured to "graceful concessions." In truth, the part played by her in the Far East has been a sorry one; and if there be eager partisans who still maintain that British Imperialism is an unscrupulously aggressive force, ever on the search for new enemies to fight and new lands to annex, a course of study in the Blue Books dealing with Chinese affairs in 1897-99 may with some confidence be prescribed as a sedative and lowering diet. ”

“ Outside Europe they have made many sacrifices, as in Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, and India, to get rid of military burdens and financial outlay by adopting an attitude of compromise toward demands of native populations for self-government. The imperialism of British foreign policy after the World War was, as we have seen, very quickly checked. British public opinion is alive to the danger of disregarding the aspirations of Asiatic and African peoples, and is prepared to go to almost any length to keep together the empire that has been centuries in the building. ”

“ British imperialism has thus, for four centuries, not endangered but guaranteed the independence of the European States. Further, our Empire is so large that we can hardly extend it without danger of being unable to administer and protect it. We claim, therefore, that we have neither the need nor the desire to wage wars of conquest. But we ought not to be surprised if this attitude is not accepted without reserve by other nations. ”

“ There has been a deterioration in the quality of British imperialism in relation to “subject peoples.” Whether that is a temporary deterioration or whether it is a fated drift towards disruption is a question of the profoundest moment to an English writer, but it is one that it is impossible to discuss properly within the limits of this Outline. But even at its worst it is open to question whether the British rule in India does not compare favourably with any other domination of one entirely remote and alien civilization by another. ”

“ To the Liberals it meant presumption, a love of show and of sounding titles, a readiness to annex to the right hand and the left, a proneness to intervene in foreign quarrels, "a policy of bluster," in short. But in the mouth of its exponents Imperialism meant a desire to knit more closely together Great Britain and her colonies; to treat the empire as a whole, and to govern it without any slavish subservience to the "parochial politics" of England; to make the British name respected by civilized and feared by barbarous neighbours. ”

“ England could combine with Japan for a joint struggle only if the separation process of the Dominions was already so far advanced as to call into question the continued existence of the Empire. Nothing further would be left for British imperialism than.to stake all on a single card, in order to save its continued existence. ”

“ Imperialism is governed for good or ill by the principle that underlies it. At the time of the American War of Independence British government stood for the principle of Domination; even so late as the Boer War there is much doubt whether, for the moment at least, it stood for anything very different. A great change has come. The British Empire stands now, as it never yet stood, for the principle “Live and let live”; for coherence through common ideals and affections, rather than for coherence through force. ”

“ Each of these three periods of development of American imperialism also found its expression in the foreign policy of the United States. In view of the three expansion trends of the United States—America, Asia, Europe—this foreign policy is extremely complicated. In the struggle for the American continent the United States comes into sharp conflict with the annexation desires of British imperialism. ”

“ In spite of such support, and its strong appeal to national vanity, British imperialism never saturated the mass of the British peoples. The English are not a mentally docile people, and the noisy and rather forced enthusiasm for imperialism and higher tariffs of the old Tory Party, the army class, the country clergy, the music-halls, the assimilated aliens, the vulgar rich, and the new large employers, inclined the commoner sort, and particularly organized labour, to a suspicious attitude. ”

“ There is the depopulation of the countryside, and the influx of foreign paupers into our already overcrowded towns. There is the undermining of old-established and valuable British industries by unfair foreign competition. That is not an exhaustive list, but it is sufficient to illustrate my meaning. Well, wherever these and similar evils are eating away the health and independence of our working people, there the foundations of the Empire are being undermined, for it is the race that makes the Empire. Loud is the call to every true Unionist, to every true Imperialist, to come to the rescue. ”

“ Domestic problems of economic development and national unification were all-absorbing, and capitalistic imperialism was quite outside the scope of German policies. France and Russia, not Germany, were the disturbers of British tranquillity in the Orient. ”

“ The opponents of imperialism moreover claim that all the regions fit for colonisation are already pre-empted. There is room for many millions in the five self-governing colonies of Great Britain, as there is in Siberia and South America, but where can place be found in regions newly acquired by imperialism? Where can homes be had to-day for some twenty million Germans (the excess of German population in a single generation) , to say nothing of tens of millions of Italians, British, Austrians and Poles? ”

“ The "imperialism" of the European nations has brought great results to the world. It has made possible that unification of the political and economic interests of the whole globe which we see beginning to-day. It is one of the fine aspects of this grim and horrible war that it affects the interests of the whole world, and that the whole world knows this.
The giant's part which has been played by Britain in the conquest of the world by Western civilisation, and the peculiar character of her work, have been due to two things—British institutions and the British Navy. ”

“ It depends entirely on the kind of statecraft Great Britain brings to bear on the settlement of the new colonies and on its results, whether the progressive elements in the existing population—the population waiting for the gates to be opened to it may, for the purposes of this argument, be considered as entirely progressive—range themselves on the side of British imperialism, or whether they will join themselves to those forces, already existing, which openly or secretly aim at the establishment of a republican régime. ”

“ At the zenith of free competition in Britain, between 1840 and 1860, her leading capitalist politicians declared themselves against colonial policy, considering the emancipation of the colonies and their complete separation from the Mother Country as being not only inevitable but very desirable. M. Beer shows in an article on Modern British Imperialism, published in 1898, that in 1852, Disraeli, despite his general inclination to an imperialist policy, nevertheless declared: "The colonies are millstones round our necks." ”

“ It is of more value to our trade, for, if there is one thing absolutely indisputable, it is that these communities buy ever so much more of us per head than foreign nations do. But it is not only a question of trade; it is a question of the future of our people. By encouraging the development of the British Dominions beyond the seas we direct emigration to them in preference to foreign lands. We keep our people under the flag instead of scattering them all over the world. We multiply not merely our best customers but our fellow citizens, our only sure and constant friends. ”

“ Under a particularly aggressive and offensive imperialism system the Germans were plunged into conflict with most of the rest of the civilized world. But it was repeatedly declared by the British and by the Americans, if not by others of the combatants, that they fought not against the German people but against this German imperialism. The British war propaganda in particular did its utmost to saturate Germany with that assurance and to hold out the promise of generous treatment and a complete restoration of friendship provided there was a German renunciation of imperialism and militarism. ”

“ Apart from a small contingent sent from Australia to the Soudan in 1885, British colonies had never before—indeed, no European colony had ever before—sent men oversea to fight in a common cause: and this not because their immediate interests were threatened, but for the sake of an idea. For that reason the South African War marks an epoch not merely in the history of the British Empire, but of European imperialism as a whole. ”

“ It is their State and their Empire—theirs to possess, theirs to control, but theirs also to support and to defend. And I for one have such faith in the common sense and fair-mindedness of the British people that I believe you have only to convince them that you have a really sound national policy, and they will rally to it, without having to be bought by promises of a penny off this and twopence off the other—a sort of appeal, I regret to say, which is not only confined to Radical orators, but in which Unionists also are sometimes too apt to indulge. ”

“ That lack of any essential hatred does not mean that British opinion is not solidly for the continuation of this war against militarist imperialism to its complete and final defeat. But if that can be defeated to any extent in Germany by the Germans, if the way opens to a Germany as unmilitary and pacific as was Great Britain before this war, there remains from the British point of view nothing else to fight about. ”

“ The argument against the use of anything from its abuse has always struck me as one of the feeblest of arguments. And just see how particularly absurd it is in the present case. The effect of duties on foreign imports, even such moderate and carefully devised duties as those to which I have referred, would, we are told, be ruinous to British trade. It would place intolerable burdens upon the people. Yet for all that the people would, it appears, insist on increasing these burdens. ”

“ British history, for the last century and more, proves that Imperialism is not naturally incompatible with Political Liberty, nor with the respect due the national aspirations of divers ethnical groups. The unity and the consolidation of the Empire made their greatest strides since the close of the war which resulted in the independence of the neighbouring Republic. As previously explained, they were the outcome of the very wise and statesmanlike change of colonial policy then adopted by England. ”

“ Without it we are unable to defend ourselves against illegitimate foreign competition; we are unable to enter into those trade arrangements with the great self-governing States of the British Crown across the seas, which are calculated to bestow the most far-reaching benefits upon them and upon us; and we are unable to obtain the revenue which is required for a policy of progressive Social Reform. ”

“ Three years later, in 1907, Great Britain came to an agreement with another of her rivals in the East—Russia. The Tsar, chastened by military defeat abroad and by revolution at home, recognized a British sphere of interest in Persia, relinquished all claims in Afghanistan, and acknowledged the suzerainty of China over Tibet.39 The understanding with France had assured the safety of the Suez Canal from an attack from the Sudan; the agreement with Russia removed the menace of an attack upon India from the north and northwest. Germany became Great Britain’s only formidable rival in the Near East. ”

“ Hobson, writing in 1902, states that during the period since 1870, when Great Britain launched into its latest imperialistic policy, British foreign commerce did not grow as rapidly as population, and actually declined in proportion to wealth. The British colonies increased their trade with other nations more rapidly than with the home country. The newly acquired colonies, the last fruits of imperialism, were the least profitable. ”

“ Most of our elder statesmen seem to have learnt nothing and forgotten nothing during the years of wildest change the world has ever known. But in the general mind of the British peoples the movement of opinion from a narrow imperialism towards internationalism has been wide and swift. And it continues steadily. One can trace week by week and almost day by day the Americanization of the British conception of the Allied War Aims. It may be interesting to reproduce here three communications upon this question made at different times by the present writer to the press. ”