Imperialsim

By Professor Peter Marshall

new perspective Vol 2,  No 2

IN EVERYDAY LANGUAGE ‘IMPERIALISM’ tends to be a vague term with implications that often make it an epithet of rather indiscriminate abuse. Yet it is still a term that students of history should not be afraid of using, provided they do so with some care.

In a general sense ‘imperialism’ means the exercise of power by one state or one people over another. Thus it is perfectly acceptable to talk about the expansion of ancient Rome at the expense of its neighbours as ‘Roman imperialism’ or to talk about ‘Spanish imperialism’ in America in the sixteenth century. In this generalised sense ‘imperialism’ can often mean the creation of empires, that is, the subjugation of peoples by conquest and the creation of systems of foreign rule. Conquest and rule are, of course, the exercise of power in the most direct and obvious way. But power can be exercised in other, less direct, ways: historians are interested in phenomena that they call ‘economic imperialism’ or even ‘cultural imperialism’. The dominant position that industrial Britain enjoyed for much of the nineteenth century or the huge disparities between western countries or Japan in their dealings with ‘third-world’ countries in modern times are sometimes said to have created relations of economic imperialism in which the rich can impose their will on the poor. Similarly, powerful, self-confident cultural movements, such as missionary christianity or the modern film industry, may be able to make powerful inroads into the cultural life of other societies. Any attempt to apply the term ‘imperialism’ to coercion beyond actual physical force does, however, require caution. If the word is to mean anything, it is necessary to be able to show that domination has been effectively exercised. Trading relations or cultural exchanges between the strong and the weak are not necessarily imperialistic, since they may rest on relatively free choice. Strong states may wish to manipulate apparently weaker states without directly ruling them, and thus exercise what is sometimes called ‘informal imperialism’ over them. But effective manipulation can be very difficult to achieve.

The term ‘imperialism’ came into use in the later nineteenth century and for many historians the years from the end of the nineteenth century to some point in the early twentieth century are the classic ‘age of imperialism’ for the European powers. This was a period in which existing empires, notably those of Britain, France and Russia, greatly expanded and new empires were created by Germany, the United States and Japan. But claims that this was an age specially characterised by imperialism usually depend less on the quantities of people or territory incorporated into empires (which were not especially notable by comparison with some other periods) than of the attitudes to overseas expansion shown by the western societies and their governments.

In Britain in the 1870s and 1880s those like Disraeli, who were thought to be excessively committed to the use of force abroad and to boasting about the extent of empire, were dubbed ‘imperialists’ by their critics. Sections of opinion in most western countries were indeed becoming increasingly committed to beliefs that expansion overseas was fundamental to their national wellbeing. Various benefits were anticipated from programmes of imperialism: for some it was wealth from overseas trade and investments, for others it was power from the control of territory, for yet others it was moral improvement from the spread of culture and ‘civilising’ missions overseas. The extent to which the expectations behind such beliefs were ever fulfilled or western publics as a whole were ever committed to them is very debatable indeed; but there can be no doubt that highly competitive attitudes to overseas expansion had an important influence on European politics in the late nineteenth century. It is reasonable to call such attitudes ‘imperialistic’ ones and thus, while recognising their probable limitations in practical terms, also to accept conventional descriptions of this period as ‘an age of imperialism’.

A further specialised use of the term ‘imperialism’ developed at the end of the nineteenth century. This was a use particularly associated with economic expansion. The assumption behind this use of the term was that economic motives underlay the drive for domination overseas. Certain business or financial interests, whose profits depended on securing new outlets abroad, were said to be very powerfully entrenched in western societies at this time. Programmes of imperialism thus essentially reflected their needs. This line of argument was taken up by writers in the Marxist tradition, especially by Lenin who, in a famous pamphlet simply called Imperialism of 1916, described ‘imperialism’ both as a stage in the development of capitalism, when the great banks and other financial interests have become dominant, and as the practice of attempting to divide up the world between the countries where such interests were particularly powerful. Non-Marxist historians have rarely been able to accept in full either that western economies were as Lenin described them or the very heavy weighting given to certain economic interests as the explanation for imperial enthusiasm and expansion in Marxist historiography. Nevertheless. for many who use the term, ‘imperialism’ is still primarily related to the activities overseas of business interests.

Imperialism therefore, like so many historians’ terms has both general an and specific meanings. It can be used generally to describe a phenomenon that exists at any time in human history: domination over others, exercised either directly through foreign rule or by indirect means. Imperial-ism has, however, come also to be associated with a particular period, from the late nineteenth century onwards. Its use then is rather diffuse, being applied both to the practice of domination overseas, and at home to attitudes, political programmes and, for some historians, primarily to developments within the economies of the major powers and the consequences that followed from these developments.

Professor Peter Marshall, King’s College London, is the author of many books on the imperialism theme, the latest is The Cambridge Illustrated History of the British Empire, 1996