BRITISH EMPIRE (The British Empire), Great Britain and its overseas possessions. The largest empire in human history. The name "British Empire" came into use in the mid-1870s. Since 1931, the British Commonwealth of Nations was officially named, after World War II - the Commonwealth of Nations and the Commonwealth.
The British Empire was formed as a result of centuries of colonial expansion: colonization of the territories of North America, Australia, New Zealand, islands in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans; the subordination of states or areas torn away from them; the capture (mainly by military means) and the subsequent annexation of the colonies of other European countries to the British possessions. The formation of the British Empire took place in the acute struggle of Great Britain for sea domination and colonies with Spain (see Anglo-Spanish wars of the 16-18 centuries), the Netherlands (see Anglo-Dutch wars of the 17-18 centuries), France (18 - early 19th centuries), and also with Germany (late 19th - early 20th century). The rivalry for influence in a number of regions of the Asian continent caused serious contradictions between Great Britain and the Russian Empire. In the process of the formation and development of the British Empire, the British imperial ideology took shape, which left a vivid imprint on all aspects of life, the domestic and foreign policy of Great Britain.
The creation of the British Empire began in the middle of the 16th century, with the transition of England to the policy of conquering Ireland, the east coast of which was captured by it at the end of the 12th century. By the middle of the 17th century, Ireland was turned into a colony. In 1583, England proclaimed sovereignty over the island of Newfoundland, which became its first overseas possession and a base for conquests in the New World.
The defeat by the British in 1588 of the "Invincible Armada" weakened the position of Spain as a leading naval power and allowed them to join the struggle for the colonies. Primary importance was attached to the conquest of positions in the West Indies, which made it possible to control the sea routes connecting Spain with its colonies in Central and South America (transportation of gold, slaves), to seize part of the trade in colonial goods (cotton, sugar, tobacco, etc.) and on acquired lands independently start their production. In 1609, the British established themselves in Bermuda (officially a colony since 1684), in 1627 - on the island of Barbados (a colony since 1652), in 1632 - on the island of Antigua, in the 1630s - in Belize (since 1862, a colony of British Honduras) , in 1629 - in the Bahamas (colony since 1783), in the 1670s the island of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands officially passed into their possession. At the same time, English merchants strengthened their positions on the Gold Coast in West Africa (the first English trading post was founded there in 1553). In 1672, the Royal African Company was established and took over part of the gold and slave trade. As a result of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-14), the British achieved a monopoly on the slave trade in the Spanish colonies, and by capturing Gibraltar (1704) and the island of Menorca (1708), they established control over the communications of Spain directly off its coast. Until the middle of the 18th century, the economic and commercial interests of Great Britain in the "Atlantic triangle" (Great Britain - West Indies - West Africa) were of paramount importance for the development of the British Empire, the construction of which was carried out at the expense of undermining the positions of Spain. From the beginning of the 18th century, having subjugated Portugal to their influence (see the Methuen Treaty of 1703), the British also joined the exploitation of its vast colonial possessions, primarily in South America.
With the founding of the settlement of Jamestown and the colony of Virginia in 1607, the English colonization of the Atlantic coast and the adjacent regions of North America began (see North American colonies of England); New Amsterdam, conquered by the British from the Dutch in 1664, was renamed New York.
At the same time, the British penetrated into India. In 1600, London merchants founded the East India Company (see East India Companies). By 1640, she created a network of her trading posts not only in India, but also in Southeast Asia, in the Far East. In 1690, the company began building the city of Kolkata. As a result of the Seven Years' War of 1756-63, Great Britain drove France out of India (see the Anglo-French struggle for India) and significantly undermined its position in North America (see also the Anglo-French wars in Canada in the 17-18 century).
The British Empire experienced its first crisis, losing 13 of its colonies as a result of the 1775-83 War of Independence in North America. However, after the formation of the United States (1783), tens of thousands of colonists moved to Canada, and the British presence there strengthened.
From the mid-18th century, British penetration into the coastal regions of New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Islands intensified. In 1788, the first British settlement appeared in Australia - Port Jackson (future Sydney). In 1840, British colonists appeared in New Zealand, after which it was incorporated into the British overseas possessions. Resistance of the local population was suppressed (see Anglo-Maori Wars 1843-72). The Congress of Vienna in 1814-15 secured the Cape Colony (South Africa), Malta, Ceylon and other territories seized in the late 18th - early 19th centuries to Great Britain. By the middle of the 19th century, the British had basically completed the conquest of India (see Anglo-Mysore Wars, Anglo-Maratha Wars, Anglo-Sikh Wars), control over Nepal was established (see Anglo-Nepal War of 1814-16). The port of Singapore was founded in 1819. In the middle of the 19th century, as a result of the Anglo-Chinese War of 1840-42 and the Anglo-French-Chinese War of 1856-60, unequal treaties were imposed on China, a number of Chinese ports were opened for British trade, and the island of Hong Kong passed into the possession of Great Britain. At the same time, Great Britain switched to a policy of colonial conquests on the African continent (see Anglo-Ashantian wars, Anglo-Buro-Zulu war of 1838-40, Lagos-English war of 1851).
During the period of the "colonial division of the world" (the last quarter of the 19th century) Great Britain seized Cyprus (1878), established full control over Egypt and the Suez Canal (1882), completed the conquest of Burma (see Anglo-Burmese Wars), established a de facto protectorate over Afghanistan (see Anglo-Afghan wars, Anglo-Afghan treaties and agreements), imposed unequal treaties on Siam and achieved the seizure of a number of territories from it (see Anglo-Siamese treaties). She conquered vast territories in Tropical and South Africa - Nigeria, the Gold Coast, Sierra Leone, Southern and Northern Rhodesia, Bechuanaland, Basutoland, Zululand, Swaziland, Uganda, Kenya (see Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, Anglo-Boer War of 1880- 81, Opobo-English War 1870-87, Brohemi-English War 1894, Sokoto-English War 1903). After the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902, Great Britain annexed to its colonial possessions the Boer republics of the Transvaal (the official name is South Africa) and the Orange Free State (annexed as a colony of the Orange River) and, combining them with the Cape and Natal colonies, created the South -African Union (1910).
The British Empire consisted of states and territories that had different (over time, in many cases, changing) international legal status: dominions, colonies, protectorates and mandate territories.
Dominions - countries with a large number of immigrants from Europe, which had relatively broad rights of self-government. North America, and later Australia and New Zealand, were the main destinations for emigration from Britain. They had a multimillion "white", mostly English-speaking, population. Their role in the world economy and politics became more and more prominent. If the United States won independence, then other overseas British possessions with a "white" population gradually achieved self-government: Canada - in 1867, the Australian Union - in 1901, New Zealand - in 1907, the Union of South Africa - in 1919, Newfoundland - in 1917 ( became part of Canada in 1949), Ireland (without the northern part - Ulster, which remained part of Great Britain) - in 1921. By the decision of the imperial conference in 1926, they became known as dominions. Their independence in domestic and foreign policy was confirmed by the Westminster Statute of 1931. Economic ties between them, as well as between them and the metropolis, were consolidated by the creation of sterling blocs (1931) and the 1932 Ottawa Agreements on imperial preferences.
The overwhelming majority of the population of the British Empire lived in the colonies (there were about 50 of them). Each colony was governed by a Governor General, who was appointed by the British Colonial Office. The governor formed a legislative council from officials of the colonial administration and representatives of the local population. In many colonies, the traditional institutions of power were reorganized and integrated into the system of colonial government as "native" administrations, the local nobility was left with a part of power and sources of income (indirect government). The largest colonial possession - India - officially became part of the British Empire in 1858 (before that it was controlled by the British East India Company). Since 1876, the British monarch (at that time - Queen Victoria) was also called the emperor of India, and the governor-general of India - the viceroy.
The nature of the administration of the protectorates and their degree of dependence on the metropolis were different. The colonial authorities allowed some independence of the local feudal or tribal elite.
Mandate territories - parts of the former German and Ottoman empires, transferred after the 1st World War by the League of Nations under the control of Great Britain on the basis of the so-called mandate.
In 1922, during the period of its greatest territorial expansion, the British Empire included: the metropolis - Great Britain (England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland); dominions - Ireland (without Northern Ireland; colony before 1921), Canada, Newfoundland (dominion in 1917-34), Australia, New Zealand, Union of South Africa; colonies - Gibraltar, Malta, Ascension Island, Saint Helena, Nigeria, Gold Coast, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Mauritius, Seychelles, Somaliland, Kenya, Uganda, Zanzibar, Nyasaland, Northern Rhodesia, Southern Rhodesia, Swaziland, Basutoland, Bechuanaland, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Cyprus, Aden (with Perim and Socotra islands), India, Burma, Ceylon, Straits Settlements, Malaya, Sarawak, North Borneo, Brunei, Labrador, British Honduras, British Guiana, Bermuda, Bahamas , Jamaica Island, Trinidad and Tobago Islands, Windward Islands, Leeward Islands, Turks and Caicos Islands, Falkland Islands, Barbados Island, Papua (Commonwealth of Australia), Fiji, Tonga Islands, Gilbert Islands, Solomon Islands and a number of small islands in Oceania; mandated territories - Palestine, Transjordan, Iraq, Tanganyika, part of Togo and part of Cameroon, Southwest Africa (mandate of the Union of South Africa), Nauru island, former Germanic New Guinea, Pacific islands south of the equator, West Samoa (mandate New Zealand). British domination actually extended to Egypt, Nepal and Hong Kong (Hong Kong) and Weihawei (Weihai), which were torn away from China.
The struggle of the Afghan people forced Great Britain to recognize the independence of Afghanistan in 1919 (see Anglo-Afghan treaties of 1919, 1921). In 1922, Egypt became formally independent, in 1930 the British mandate to govern Iraq was terminated, although both countries remained in the sphere of British rule.
The collapse of the British Empire came after World War II as a result of a powerful upsurge in the anti-colonial struggle of the peoples inhabiting it. Attempts to preserve the British Empire by maneuvering or using military force (colonial wars in Malaya, Kenya and other British possessions) failed. In 1947, Great Britain was forced to grant independence to the largest colonial possession, India. At the same time, the country was divided along regional and religious lines into two parts: India and Pakistan. Transjordan (1946), Burma and Ceylon (1948) proclaimed independence. In 1947, the UN General Assembly decided to terminate the British Mandate for Palestine and create on its territory two states - a Jewish and an Arab. In 1956, the independence of Sudan was proclaimed, in 1957 - of Malaya. The Gold Coast became the first British possession in Tropical Africa to become an independent state in 1957, adopting the name Ghana.
1960 went down in history as the "Year of Africa". 17 African colonies achieved independence, including the largest British possession in Africa - Nigeria, as well as Somaliland, which united with the Italian-ruled part of Somalia to create the Republic of Somalia. Subsequent major milestones of decolonization: 1961 - Sierra Leone, Kuwait, Tanganyika; 1962 - Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda; 1963 - Zanzibar (in 1964, having united with Tanganyika, formed the Republic of Tanzania), Kenya; 1964 - Nyasaland (became the Republic of Malawi), Northern Rhodesia (became the Republic of Zambia), Malta; 1965 - Gambia, Maldives; 1966 - British Guiana (became the Republic of Guyana), Basutoland (Lesotho), Bechuanaland (became the Republic of Botswana), Barbados; 1967 - Aden (Yemen); 1968 - Mauritius, Swaziland; 1970 - Tonga, Fiji; 1980 - Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe); 1990 - Namibia. In 1997, Hong Kong became part of China. In 1961, the Union of South Africa proclaimed itself the Republic of South Africa and withdrew from the Commonwealth, but after the elimination of the apartheid regime (1994), it was again admitted to it.
The collapse of the British Empire did not mean, however, a complete rupture of the close economic, political and cultural ties between its parts that had developed over many decades. The British Commonwealth of Nations itself has undergone fundamental changes. After the proclamation of independence by India, Pakistan and Ceylon (since 1972, Sri Lanka) and their entry into the British Commonwealth of Nations (1948), it became a union not only of the metropolis and the "old" dominions, but also of all states that arose within the British Empire. The word “British” was removed from the name “British Commonwealth of Nations”, and later it was called “Commonwealth”. At the beginning of the 21st century, it had 53 members: 2 in Europe, 13 in America, 9 in Asia, 18 in Africa, 11 in Australia and Oceania. Mozambique was admitted to the Commonwealth, which was never part of the British Empire.
The turn of the 20th and 21st centuries was marked by the release in Great Britain of fundamental research on the history of the British Empire, including those devoted to the problems of interaction of cultures of the peoples of the empire, various aspects of decolonization and transformation of the empire into the Commonwealth. A long-term project of a multivolume publication "British Papers on the End of the Empire" was developed and started to be implemented.
Lit .: Cambridge history of the British Empire. Camb., 1929-1959. Vol. 1-8; Erofeev N.A. The empire was created like this ... English colonialism in the 18th century. M., 1964; he is. The decline of the British Empire. M., 1967; he is. English colonialism in the middle of the 19th century. M., 1977; Ostapenko GS British Conservatives and Decolonization. M., 1995; Porter B. The lion's: share: a short history of British Imperialism, 1850-1995. L. 1996; Oxford history of the British Empire. Oxf. 1998-1999. Vol. 15; Davidson A.B. Cecil Rhodes - Empire Builder. M .; Smolensk, 1998; Hobsbawm E. Age of Empire. 1875-1914. Rostov n / D., 1999; Empire and others: British encounters with indigenous people / Ed. by M. Daunton, R. Halpern. L. 1999; Boyce D.G. Decolonization and the British Empire, 1775-1997. L. 1999; The commonwealth in the 21st century / Ed. by G. Mills, J. Stremlau. L. 1999; Cultures of empire: colonizers in Britain and the Empire in the nineteenth and twentieth century: a reader / Ed. by S. Hall. Manchester; N. Y. 2000; Lloyd T. Empire: the history of the British Empire. L .; N. Y. 2001; Butler L. J. Britain and empire: adjusting to the post-imperial world. L., 2001; Heinlein F. British government policy and decolonisation. 1945-1963: scrutinising the official mind. L., 2002; Churchill W. The World Crisis. Autobiography. Speeches. M., 2003; Seeley J.R., Cramb J.A. British Empire. M., 2004; James L. The rise and fall of the British Empire. L., 2005; Bibliography of imperial, colonial and commonwealth history since 1600 / Ed. by A. Porter. Oxf., 2002.
Despite the stubborn opposition of the metropolis, industry developed in the countries of the British Empire (especially in the resettlement colonies and India), the national bourgeoisie and the proletariat were formed, which became an increasingly serious force in political life. The Russian Revolution of 1905-07 exerted a great influence on the development of the national liberation movement in the British Empire. The Indian National Congress in 1906 put forward a demand for self-government for India. However, the British authorities brutally suppressed anti-colonial demonstrations.
In the first decades of the 20th century, the dominions of the Australian Union (1901), New Zealand (1907), the Union of South Africa (1910), and Newfoundland (1917) were formed. Dominion governments began to be involved in the discussion of foreign policy and defense of the British Empire at imperial conferences. The capitalists of the dominions, together with the British capitalists, participated in the exploitation of the colonial part of the British Empire.
In the late 19th - early 20th centuries. the Anglo-German imperialist contradictions (including their colonial and naval rivalry), which played a major role in the outbreak of World War I in 1914-18, acquired special significance. The entry of Great Britain into the war automatically entailed the participation of the dominions in it. The domination of Great Britain actually extended also to Egypt (area 995 thous. km 2, population over 11 million people), Nepal (area 140 thousand km 2, population about 5 million people), Afghanistan (area 650 thousand km 2, population about 6 million people) and China Xianggang (Hong Kong) with a population of 457 thousand people. and Weihaiwei with a population of 147 thousand.
I world War broke the established economic ties in the British Empire. This contributed to the accelerated economic development of the dominions. Great Britain was forced to recognize their rights to conduct an independent foreign policy. The first performance of the Dominions and India on the world stage was their participation in the signing of the Versailles Peace Treaty (1919). The dominions joined the League of Nations as independent members.
As a result of World War I, the British Empire expanded. The imperialists of Great Britain and the dominions seized a number of possessions from their rivals. The British Empire included the mandated territories of Great Britain (Iraq, Palestine, Transjordan, Tanganyika, part of Togo and Cameroon), the Union of South Africa (South-West Africa), the Australian Union (part of New Guinea and the adjacent islands of Oceania), New Zealand (the islands of Western Samoa). British imperialism expanded its positions in the Near and Middle East. Many states of this region, which were not formally part of the British Empire (for example, the states of the Arabian Peninsula), were in fact semi-colonies of Great Britain.
Under the influence of the Great October Socialist Revolution, a powerful national liberation movement began in the colonial and dependent countries. The crisis of the British Empire unfolded, which became a manifestation of the general crisis of capitalism. In 1918-22, 1928-33 there were massive anti-colonial demonstrations in India. The struggle of the Afghan people forced Great Britain in 1919 to recognize the independence of Afghanistan. In 1921, after a stubborn armed struggle, Ireland achieved the status of dominion (without the northern part - Ulster, which remained part of Great Britain); in 1949 Ireland was declared an independent republic. In 1922 Great Britain formally recognized the independence of Egypt. In 1930, the British Mandate over Iraq was terminated. However, enslaving "allied treaties" were imposed on Egypt and Iraq, which in fact retained British domination.
There was a further strengthening of the political independence of the dominions. The Imperial Conference of 1926 and the so-called Westminster Statute of 1931 officially recognized their complete independence in foreign and domestic policy. But economically, the dominions (except for Canada, which was becoming more and more dependent on the United States) remained largely agro-raw materials appendages of the metropolis. The countries of the British Empire (except Canada) entered the sterling bloc created by Great Britain in 1931. In 1932, the Ottawa Agreements were concluded, establishing a system of imperial preferences (preferred duties on trade between countries and territories of the British Empire). This indicated that there were still strong ties between the metropolis and the dominions. Despite the recognition of the independence of the dominions, the metropolis basically still retained control over their foreign policy relations. The Dominions had practically no direct diplomatic ties with foreign states. At the end of 1933, Newfoundland, whose economy was on the verge of collapse as a result of the rulership of the British and American monopolies, was stripped of its dominion status and came under the control of the British governor. World economic crisis 1929-33 significantly exacerbated the contradictions within the British Empire. American, Japanese and German capital penetrated into the countries of the British Empire. However, English capital retained a dominant position in the empire. In 1938, about 55% of the total amount of British investments abroad fell on the countries of the British Empire (1945 million pounds sterling out of 3,545 million pounds sterling). Great Britain occupied the main place in their foreign trade.
All countries of the British Empire were covered by a single system of "imperial defense", constituent parts which became military bases in strategically important points (Gibraltar, Malta, Suez, Aden, Singapore, etc.). British imperialism used the bases for the struggle to expand its influence in the countries of Asia and Africa, against the national liberation movement of the oppressed peoples.
At the very beginning of World War II, 1939-45. centrifugal tendencies intensified in the British Empire. If Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa entered the war on the side of the metropolis, then Ireland (Eire) declared its neutrality. During the war, which exposed the weakness of British imperialism, the crisis of the British Empire sharply intensified. As a result of a series of heavy defeats suffered in the war with Japan, the position of Great Britain was undermined in Southeast Asia. A wide anti-colonial movement developed in the countries of the British Empire.
The results of World War II, which ended in the complete defeat of the bloc of fascist states, the formation of the world socialist system and the general weakening of the positions of imperialism created extremely favorable conditions for the struggle of the colonial peoples for their liberation and for the defense of their newly acquired independence. The process of disintegration of the colonial system of imperialism unfolded, part of which was the collapse of the British colonial empire. In 1946, the independence of Transjordan was proclaimed. Under the pressure of a powerful anti-imperialist struggle, Great Britain was forced to grant independence to India (1947); at the same time, the country was divided along religious lines into India (dominion from 1947, republic from 1950) and Pakistan (dominion from 1947, republic from 1956). Burma and Ceylon also took an independent path of development (1948). In 1947, the UN General Assembly adopted a decision to abolish (since May 15, 1948) the British Mandate for Palestine and to create on its territory two independent states (Arab and Jewish). Trying to stop the struggle of the peoples for independence, the British imperialists waged colonial wars in Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus, and Aden, and used armed violence in other colonies.
However, all attempts to preserve the colonial empire failed. The overwhelming majority of the peoples of the colonial part of the British Empire achieved political independence. If in 1945 the population of the British colonies was about 432 million people, then by 1970 it was about 10 million. The following were freed from British colonial rule: in 1956 - Sudan; in 1957 - Ghana (the former British colony of the Gold Coast and the former British trust territory of Togo), Malaya (in 1963, together with the former British colonies of Singapore, Sarawak and North Borneo (Sabah) formed the Federation of Malaysia; Singapore in 1965 left the Federation); in 1960 - Somalia (the former British colony of Somaliland and the former UN Trust Territory of Somalia, which was under Italian rule), Cyprus, Nigeria (in 1961, the northern part of the UN Trust Territory Cameroon Britain became part of the Federation of Nigeria; the southern part of British Cameroon, merging with the Republic Cameroon, formed the Federal Republic of Cameroon in 1961), in 1961 - Sierra Leone, Kuwait, Tanganyika: in 1962 - Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda; in 1963 - Zanzibar (in 1964, as a result of the unification of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, the United Republic of Tanzania was created), Kenya; in 1964 - Malawi (formerly Nyasaland), Malta, Zambia (formerly Northern Rhodesia); in 1965 - Gambia, Maldives: in 1966 - Guyana (former British Guiana), Botswana (former Bechuanaland), Lesotho (former Basutoland), Barbados; in 1967 - the former Aden (until 1970 - the People's Republic of South Yemen; from 1970 - the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen); in 1968 - Mauritius, Swaziland; 1970 - Tonga, Fiji. The pro-British monarchical regimes in Egypt (1952) and Iraq (1958) were overthrown. Independence was achieved by the former Trust Territory of New Zealand Western Samoa (1962) and the former Trust Territory of Australia, Great Britain and New Zealand Nauru (1968). "Old dominions" - Canada (in 1949 Newfoundland became part of it), Australia, New Zealand, South Africa - finally turned into states politically independent from Great Britain.
France in the 18th century was a monarchy based on bureaucratic centralization and a regular army. The socio-economic and political regime that existed in the country was formed as a result of complex compromises developed during the long political confrontation and civil wars of the XIV-XVI centuries. One of these compromises existed between the royal power and the privileged estates - for the renunciation of political rights, the state power by all means at its disposal protected the social privileges of these two estates. Another compromise existed in relation to the peasantry - during a long series of peasant wars of the XIV-XVI centuries. the peasants achieved the abolition of the overwhelming majority of monetary taxes and the transition to subsistence relations in agriculture. The third compromise existed in relation to the bourgeoisie (which at that time was the middle class, in whose interests the government also did a lot, preserving a number of privileges of the bourgeoisie in relation to the bulk of the population (the peasantry) and supporting the existence of tens of thousands of small enterprises, the owners of which constituted the French stratum. bourgeois). However, the regime that emerged as a result of these complex compromises did not ensure the normal development of France, which in the 18th century. began to lag behind its neighbors, primarily England. In addition, over-exploitation increasingly armed the popular masses against themselves, whose most legitimate interests were completely ignored by the state.
Gradually during the XVIII century. At the top of French society, the understanding was ripening that the Old Order, with its underdeveloped market relations, chaos in the government system, a corrupt system of selling public offices, the absence of clear legislation, a "Byzantine" taxation system and an archaic system of estate privileges, needed to be reformed. In addition, the royal power was losing confidence in the eyes of the clergy, nobility and the bourgeoisie, among whom the idea was asserted that the power of the king was a usurpation in relation to the rights of estates and corporations (the point of view of Montesquieu) or in relation to the rights of the people (the point of view of Rousseau). Thanks to the activities of the enlighteners, of whom the physiocrats and encyclopedists are especially important, a revolution took place in the minds of the educated part of French society. Finally, under Louis XV and even more so under Louis XVI, reforms were initiated in the political and economic fields, which inevitably had to lead to the collapse of the Old Order.
Empire of the British
"Why was the British Empire created and preserved? .. From the earliest times of British colonization to the present day, this question has occupied the minds of British thinkers and politicians." - wrote one of the English historians, K. Knorr. At different times, different authors gave different answers to this question. The variety of points of view is also characteristic of the twentieth century. Charles Lucas named high moral values, philanthropy, and considerations of national security as the reasons for the creation of the British Empire, and T. Smith saw the main reason for expanding the boundaries of the empire in political calculations and ambitions of statesmen and pressure from external circumstances. R.Haum explained the expansion by the British's overabundance of energy, despite the fact that they consciously did not want any empire, G. Wilson - the constant need for defense, and D. Yuzaug emphasized the dominant importance of the economic factor. A number of works proving that the British Empire was beneficial to the financial oligarchy, works proving that it was beneficial to the entire English people and works proving that it was equally disadvantageous to anyone. And there are almost no works in which they try to explain what their empire actually was for the British.
We will try to do this from the point of view of ethnopsychology and will begin by explaining how the English people perceive the territory they are going to explore. And by the way, we note that for Russians, the study of the British Empire has its own special value, because its history can only be compared.
Let's start with the simplest. Let's highlight several main features inherent in English colonization. First, until the last third of the 18th century, the British occupied only sparsely populated parts of the world. Secondly, the ties of the British with the local population of their colonies were minimal. Mixed marriages were exceptional, and the spirit of missionary activity was scarce until the 19th century. The British seemed to ignore the natives. Third, until the 19th century, the British government took minimal part in the founding of the colonies. The English historian E. Barker wrote: "When we started colonization, we already had an idea - a socio-political idea - that in addition to the English state, there is also English society, or rather, English voluntary societies (both in the form of religious congregations and in the form of trading companies) who were willing and able to act independently of the state and at their own expense ... It was the English voluntary societies, not the state, that established settlements in our early colonies and thus began to create what we call empire today. "
And what is also characteristic, the English settlers seemed to want not to carry England with them, but to create something new, which should not have become a second England. They settled in their new country, identified their interests with it and worked for its good. At the same time, until the last third of the 19th century, the English colonies were not perceived by the British as a particularly significant value - this is another distinctive feature of English colonization. Lord J. Seeley, theorist of British imperialism, wrote: “There is something extremely characteristic in the indifference with which the British relate to the powerful phenomenon of the development of their race and the expansion of their state. ".
This can be explained to some extent by the specifics of the British colonies. The English emigration originally had religious reasons, the English colonists broke all ties with the Old World, and this rupture left a deep imprint on their souls. Trading posts arose in parallel. But were they quite perceived as colonies? From the point of view of commercial interests, an increase in territory was not only not necessary for England, but even undesirable. She only needed to keep in her hands the points dominating the main routes. "In the 18th century, English merchants valued the two West Indian islets more than the whole of Canada. In the days of sailing ships, these islands dominated the sea routes connecting Europe with all American ports. In the same place where England acquired really large possessions, that is, in India and Canada , this was done mainly because here it was necessary to fight for every strong point with a constant rival - France, so an extensive rear was needed to strengthen the position ... During the 19th century, the British Empire grew out of these trading stations and ports. the new territories were no longer of interest to British settlers.
As strong and populous were the British colonies, once founded on sparsely populated lands, the process of interiorization of lands with any significant density of native population was just as difficult for the British. Thus, by the end of the 19th century, the English population in India, who was neither in the military nor in the public service, barely approached 100 thousand. And this despite the fact that since 1859, after the suppression of the rebellion, the British government pursued a policy aimed at attracting the British to India, and on the Indian subcontinent there were highlands, in terms of climate, vegetation and the relative rarity of the local population, quite suitable for colonization, in every way. case, more suitable for agricultural colonization than the "cotton lands" of Central Asia, actively settled by Russian peasants. British official B. Hodgson, who served in India for thirty years of his life, wrote that the Indian Himalayas could be "a splendid find for the starving peasants of Ireland and the highlands of Scotland." Even more acute is the question of British colonization of the northern regions of India.
But the question remained on paper. In order to live in the Himalayas, it was required to enter into a strong relationship with the local population. The latter, by its very nature, was even cute to the British. The British gave the most idyllic characteristics to the inhabitants of the Himalayas. Monks and ascetics, who found refuge in the snowy severity of the high mountains, became the main characters in European descriptions of the Himalayas. Unlike the usual Indian sensuality, travelers found here the greatest self-restraint that so impressed the Victorians. The Himalayas, in the minds of the British, was a predominantly romantic place. The life of the peasants was also described mainly in idyllic tones. Attention was drawn to their unusually clean and beautifully cultivated land.
However, the British population, which consisted mainly of forestry officials, lived in villages, to which local residents were strictly prohibited from approaching, as if an invisible barrier had been erected. And when European settlements do arise in Garwal, one of the Himalayan areas, the British do with these romantic mountains in the same way as at the same time with the romantic mountains of their homeland - the mountains of Scotland: they strive to cut down natural forests and plant the mountain slopes with ship pines. The actions of the British could seem purely pragmatic, if we do not take into account that they thereby deprived themselves of one of the few footholds for the British colonization of India, entering into a protracted conflict with the local population. As a result, the British settlements of Garhwal never surpassed the total population of a thousand.
The British and abstracted from the local population, and created for themselves a myth about the mysterious inhabitants of the Himalayas, and glorified the wonderful nature of the region, and recognized almost only its economic use. Their perception was, as it were, bifurcated. As a result, realizing both the possibility and desirability of peasant colonization of the Garhwal area, the British did not dare to embark on it.
It seemed as if there was always an invisible barrier between the British and the local population, which they could not overcome. So, even during the colonization of America, "the threat emanating from the Indian took on a natural total character for the Puritan, and the Indian savage and the wild element of nature that gave birth to him were merged into the image of the enemy ... The Puritan image of the Indian hawk left its imprint on the perception of space by the settlers: it is active for them. , it is a trap space full of moving and unexpected obstacles. "
The British created for themselves a narrow world in their possessions, into which no natives were allowed and which would have to reproduce English society in miniature. However, the psychological inadequacy of this feeling is revealed by the fact that, having lived for several years in such colonies, the British, from colonial officials to the last vagabonds, felt even greater discomfort when they got back to England. Those who, by the will of fate, were faced with the necessity of more or less close contact with non-Europeans (which the British avoided) acquired a complex of "aristocrats" and thus essentially turned into marginalized in English society. The history of any other European nation knows nothing of the kind.
Any new territory where an Englishman settles is, in his perception, a "blank slate" on which he creates his own world to his liking. This applies equally to the colonization of America and the creation of the Indo-British Empire. Thus, "the Puritans, despite their missionary claims, viewed America as their own country, and its native inhabitants as an obstacle to their predestination as Americans. As pioneers in a rich undeveloped country, the early Americans believed in their ability to build a society that responded to them. desires ". Likewise, "the Indian tabula rasa seemed in all respects eminently suitable for organizing a society there in its own way."
Outwardly, this perception may resemble the "wild field" of the Russians, but there is one very significant difference. The Russians are mastering the "wild field", absorbing it into themselves, not trying to either limit it or remove the obstacles encountered on it. Russians seem to ignore the conflict-generating factors associated with the new territory and do not make any efforts to eliminate their possible destructive effect. These conflictogenic factors are initially viewed not as external difficulties, but as internal ones, which cannot be avoided, but which cannot be systematically eliminated, but can be removed only in the broader context of the people's activities. The British, if they could not avoid the very collision with what gives rise to conflict - and the very fact of the existence of the native population is already conflict-generating for the British, because the native population in one way or another hinders the implementation of English ideas proper - then they tried to put between themselves and the local population barrier.
What did the presence of a psychological barrier between the British and the indigenous population of the colonies lead to? Edward Spicer, in Cycles of Conquest, describes how the concept of reservations gradually evolved from the "politics of isolation", which was embodied in relations with the Indians of North America. Initially, this concept was expressed in the fact that agreements on territorial delimitation were signed with a number of Indian tribes. But the essential in these treaties for the British was not the definition of territorial boundaries (on the contrary, they initially ignored these boundaries), but the fact that as a result of the very act of signing the treaty, the Indian tribe turned for the British into a kind of legal entity, through which relations with it were introduced strictly definite and limited scope. The obvious senselessness of endowing the Indians with the status of a legal entity, despite the fact that no rights were de facto recognized for them, parallel to the obsessive desire of Anglo-Americans to adhere to certain rituals inherent in international relations even in cases of outright violence, indicate that the external status of the Indians had an independent value in the eyes of the colonists. He made it possible to exteriorize the indigenous factor, to separate it from oneself and thereby get the opportunity to abstract from it.
Such complex psychological complexes, it would seem, should have stopped colonization. Meanwhile, the British created an empire much more solid than, for example, the Spaniards, although the latter made more conscious efforts to create the empire. Does this mean that the key lies in the commercial abilities of the British?
"Empire is trade," said Chamberlain. Indeed, there is considerable fairness in the words that the British Empire was "a commercial combination, a business syndicate." But this explanation is not enough, for how psychologically could this hypertrophied self-isolation of the British be combined with the gigantic scale of their trading operations, forcing them to penetrate into the most remote parts of the earth and feel like complete masters there?
In addition, trade benefits were mainly received by the inhabitants of the metropolis, and they seemed to see in the empire only extra ballast. Thomas Macaulay complained that the British were not at all interested in India and that "this subject for most readers seems not only boring, but positively unpleasant." The peak of the British policy of conquest in the East in time (first half of the 19th century) coincided with the peak of anti-imperial sentiment in England, so it seems as if life in the British Isles flowed on its own, and in the East, where the main principle of British policy has already become "the defense of India " - by her own. The British had already become accustomed to the idea of \u200b\u200bthe inevitability of the loss of colonies and even the desirability of their falling away, as the economists of the Manchester School preached. However, there is no need to rush to conclusions, this apathy had a downside. Upon learning of the insidiousness and cruelty of the commander W. Hastings, English public opinion was at first indignant, but the anger passed quickly, and Hastings was acquitted by a parliamentary court. The British did not want to condemn him.
“Partly self-deception here is the result of ideas that have not been fully thought out, partly the phenomenon of mental aberration,” wrote J. Hobson. “This property is to reconcile the irreconcilable in the soul, at the same time to keep in the mind like behind an impenetrable bulkhead, antagonistic phenomena and feelings, perhaps I repeat, this is not hypocrisy; if the opposition of ideas and feelings were realized, the game would be lost; the key to success is unconsciousness. "
In fact, what Hobson is talking about is a typical structure of functional intracultural conflict when various groups inside the ethnos they behave in exactly the opposite way and the left hand does not seem to know what the right hand is doing, but the result turns out to be comfortable for the ethnos as a whole. In this sense, J. Fraund's statement that the British Empire will exist even in spite of "the stupidity of its rulers and the indifference of its children" is indicative. Here we are dealing with the expression of the contradictory internal attitudes of the British. The British mastered the entire globe, but at the same time they tried to abstract from everything that was non-English in it. Since such a course of action is practically impracticable, the colonization of voluntary will is associated with the establishment of certain relations and connections with the outside non-English world, the way out was not to notice the very existence of these connections. For the British of the British Isles, this meant overlooking the existence of an empire of their own. To act in it, to live in it, but not to see it. This continued until the middle of the 19th century, when it was no longer possible not to see the empire further.
Models of popular colonization are, in principle, non-ideological. They are associated with people's perception of the space they are assimilating and reflect a psychologically comfortable mode of action inherent in a particular culture. These are models of a person's action in the world, adaptation, including psychological, of a person to the world and his adaptation of the external environment in relation to his way of perceiving this environment. They can acquire an appropriate value justification after the fact, or they can do without it altogether.
A complex and multi-stage "drama" associated with the development of a new territory is the implementation of an intracultural conflict and provides the ethnos with the maximum possible psychological comfort in the process of achieving a certain goal. A "drama" played out in this way may seem too complicated, but it is much more comfortable than a straightforward action, when members of an ethnos would have to keep in their minds mutually exclusive attitudes and emotions (the ability for which Hobson assumed for the British). However, in the culture of the people there must be ideas that would justify the power of expansion. The British might, as it were, not notice the empire, but it is obvious that there was some powerful force that pushed them to create and preserve it. With all the psychological difficulties that British colonization brought with it, it is absolutely impossible to imagine that it had only utilitarian foundations.
And if so, then the opinion about the non-religious nature of the British Empire is erroneous and is due to the fact that until the 19th century the missionary movement was not a significant factor in British imperial expansion.
One can only be surprised that all researchers, with very rare exceptions, have denied her any ideological basis. "The idea of \u200b\u200ba universal Christian empire never took root in the British Isles," as one of the most famous German geopoliticians E. Obst wrote about it. But is it? If the mission was incredibly difficult psychologically, this does not mean that they did not want it. Not being able does not mean not wanting. And if the impetus for the creation of the empire was a powerful religious foundation, then it does not follow from anything that outwardly it will manifest itself in such a straightforward way. Imperial dominants received a rather bizarre expression in the minds of the British. It is to be expected that their religious foundations have a complex form.
Many looked at the British Empire as a "trade syndicate", but in its history there was not a single period in relation to which this definition would be valid. One can only say that the British Empire was also a "trade syndicate". It would be more correct to speak of "an inborn alliance between religion and trade in the late 16th and early 17th centuries, which had a profound impact on what was one day called the British Empire." And although unlike the Spanish and Portuguese Catholic preachers, Protestant missionaries were convinced that they did not need the state and its help, the influence of the clergy and its preaching was a powerful factor in creating public attitudes towards sea expansion. There was a close connection between religion and trade. Merchants and sailors believed that they were the instruments of Providence. "Sincere belief in divine predestination cannot be questioned by anyone who has studied the religious foundations of Elizabethan England ... The pious remarks found in the logbooks surprise the modern reader as something completely irrelevant ... But in XVII. century, these comments were an expression of the mood of the era. "
For example, when the East India Company was founded in 1600, its head Thomas Smith, known as a man of exemplary piety, was engaged in the selection of chaplains for it. He contacted Oxford and Cambridge for referrals. Candidates were required to deliver a test sermon on assigned Gospel words to company employees. These business people were experts in sermons, they discussed them with knowledge of the matter no worse than professional doctors of theology. The purpose of the mission was also in mind when selecting chaplains. The need to convert pagans to Protestantism was a recurring theme in English colonization debates.
However, despite the significant public interest in preaching issues, in reality the English mission was extremely weak. Let's try to understand the reason for this by referring to the history of the formation of the concept of the British Empire.
It is important to note that in order to understand the value basis of a particular empire, we must turn to its origin, to that value dominant that gave it an impulse. To this one could argue that this initial impulse could be perceived by a number of subsequent statesmen as an anachronism. But new trends often threatened to fatally destroy the logic of empire building. And this logic persisted at times not because of the personal value orientations of specific statesmen, but because of their "sixth sense" - a sense of the integrity and consistency of imperial construction.
As for the English understanding of the word "empire", as it developed at the beginning of the 16th century, here we are in for great surprises.
"Between 1500 and 1650, some fundamentally important concepts changed their meaning and entered public use. These are the concepts of" country "," community "," empire "and" nation. "The change in the meanings of words took place mainly in the 16th century. the four words began to be understood as synonyms, acquiring a meaning that, with minor changes, they retained in the future and which was completely different from that adopted in the previous time. They began to mean "the sovereign people of England." Accordingly, the meaning of the word "people" changed.
The word "country" (country), the original meaning of which was "county" - an administrative unit, became synonymous with the word "nation" and already in the first third of the 16th century acquired a connection with the concept of "patrie". In Thomas Eliot's Dictionary (1538), the word "patrie" was translated as "a countaye". The word "commonwealth" in the meaning of "community" has come to be used interchangeably with the terms "country" and "nation".
The concept of "nation" also begins to be closely linked with the concept of "empire". In medieval political thought, "empire" was closely associated with royal dignity. The concept of "empire" was at the heart of the concept of "emperor". The emperor had sovereign authority within his kingdom in all secular affairs. This meaning was radically changed in the Act of 1533, in which the concept of "empire" was extended to spiritual matters and was used in the meaning of "political unity", "self-governing state free from any foreign rulers", "sovereign national state ".
At the same time, the existence of England as a "nation" was directly related to the concept of "representative government". Representation of the English people as a "nation" symbolically elevated its position as an elite that had the right and was called to become the new aristocracy.
Here it is extremely important for us to make the following observations. "Representative governance" in its certain interpretation can be viewed as a "mode of action", an attribute inherent in a full-fledged human community, and not as a political goal. At the same time, since the concepts of "nation", "community", "empire" are actually synonymous during this period, but "representative management" as a "mode of action" should be considered as inherent in all of them. The "Anglican Church" should also be included in the same series of concepts. It is also characterized by the attribute "representative management" - which was expressed in the specificity of the missionary practice of the British. Moreover, this mode of action in the minds of the British leads to a rise above the entire surrounding world and logically develops into the attribute of the "image of us". At an early stage, it was interpreted as religious superiority, then as both imperial superiority ("the world's best system of managing peoples") and national superiority. Then it came to be understood as social superiority. But each of these cases is more complicated than it seems at first glance. So the famous British nationalism, which affected the whole of Europe, in fact, was far from what is usually understood by this concept, which was a very complex psychological complex.
In the XVI century, the connection of the Protestant faith with England was closely fixed, both with a sovereign political union and with an empire. In Richard Hucker's Laws of Church Politics, we read: "Everyone who is a member of the community (commonwealth) is a member of the Church of England." In 1559, the future Bishop of London, Jean Eyomer, proclaimed that God is English and called on his compatriots to thank Him seven times a day that they were born English and not Italians, French or Germans. John Fox wrote in The Book of Martyrs that to be English means to be a true Christian: the English people are the chosen people, singled out among other nations, preferred by God. The strength and glory of England is essential for the Kingdom of God. The triumph of Protestantism was a national triumph. The identification of the Reformation with "Englishness" led to the proclamation of Rome as a national enemy and the exclusion of Catholics from the English nation. Bishop Latimer was the first to speak about the "God of England", and Archbishop Craimer linked doctrinal issues with the problem of national independence of England and her national interests.
So the nationalism of that time was not defined in ethnic terms. It was defined in terms of religious and political. He was associated with the ideas of self-government and Protestantism. These last two concepts were also directly related to the concept of "empire", that is, self-government in religious matters.
Thus, we see that the British Empire had a religious background, comparable in its intensity to the Russian Empire. Indeed, that central idea underlying any empire always has a religious origin, and no matter how it manifests itself outwardly, it can be expressed in the words of the prophet Isaiah: "God with us, understand, peoples, and obey, because with us God "(Isaiah 7, 1819). Another thing is that sometimes over time this foundation is forgotten, and the consequences that follow from it are perceived as independent phenomena. It is necessary to understand in what complexes the initial religious and value foundations can pour out, to recognize them in the historical reality of another time and to understand what influence these complexes have on the action of the people in subsequent eras.
After what we have said about the religious complexes of the British, it is easy to understand why the preaching of Protestantism in its English version was difficult. After all, English Protestantism was closely intertwined with the concept of "nation", "national church". The British Empire carried with it the idea of \u200b\u200ba self-governing nation. This is why, apparently, English merchants, nationalists and mercantilists, showed considerable knowledge of theology. However, it was only in the 19th century that ideas appeared that made it possible to extend the concept of a national church to other peoples. The rejection of "eclesiocentrism" was proclaimed, that is, from the establishment of "institutional churches of the Western type" around the world. G. Venn and R. Anderson developed the concept of a self-governing church. The idea was the need for a separate autonomous structure for each indigenous church organization. One of the main goals of missionary activity must be defined in terms of a "church growing". However, this strategy essentially meant "growing" a nation rather than a church, which in turn created new problems.
The latter circumstance should have caused a certain transfer of concepts and accents. Indeed, it was at this time in the minds of the British that the idea that they everywhere carry with them the idea of \u200b\u200bfree government and representative bodies, "which in general correlated with the concept of a self-governing church, is becoming more and more clearly manifested. However, at this time, there is an increase in racist attitudes, which is almost not it was before. So the word "nigger" was used to refer to Indians only with the 40-ies of the XIX century. The English historian, claiming that the British in India "indizirovalis", said, "Unlike the first conquerors." Indeed, the desire to pass To other peoples it implied a psychological contact with them, but immediately a psychological barrier made itself felt, and after it there was a feeling that “Westernization is a dangerous occupation. Perhaps the non-Europeans were not at all potential English gentlemen who were only delayed in their development, but a race alien in their very essence. "
"Representative self-government" was perceived as the goal of imperial action ... The goal of action (value dominant) was proclaimed that until now was a condition of action, an attribute of a person, without which a person simply was not a full-fledged person. The transfer of this paradigm to the category of goals led to its erosion and threatened the very paradigm of the empire in the minds of the British. The recognition of new goals could not happen painlessly, it required a change in the "image of us". Therefore, this goal was simultaneously declared and rejected as a practical goal. John Morley, Secretary of State for Indian Affairs, declared in 1908: “If my existence as an official and even bodily were continued by fate 20 times more than what is actually possible, then at the end of such a long career I would become to argue that India's parliamentary system is not at all the goal that I have in mind. "
The way out of the psychological impasse is the formation of the ideology of the New Imperialism, which was based on the idea of \u200b\u200ba nation. In it, the attribute of "representative self-government" refers only to the British, who were recognized as people for the most part until now there was no such straightforwardness. British nationalism as an ideology developed as a reaction to the eternal psychological complexes of the British as colonialists.
The creation of the Great British Empire in Asia came to be seen as a romantic feat of courage rather than a business venture. In his speech at the Crystal Palace on June 24, 1872, Benjamin Disraeli said: "The British are proud of their huge country and want to achieve even greater expansion; the British belong to an imperial country and want to create an empire." Disraeli said what had already happened before him, he simply stated a fact. Reflection of the middle of the 19th century on this apparently existing fact is the works of Charles Dilk, J. Fraund, J. Seeley, which set out the history of the British Empire and describe its geography in such a way that it turns out that the word is spoken. A cross between the history of the empire and the legend of the empire is being created. From that moment on, the empire was perceived as an integrity and a given.
It was at this time in the British Isles that "imperialism finally becomes the philosophy of history" and for some it turns into a real cult. In parallel with this process, another was going on, which began not in the British Isles, but in British India. There the ideology of "burden white man ", which played a major role in the modification of the English ethnic picture of the world.
In India, a kind of cult of "warlike energy, harsh both in relation to oneself and in relation to others, seeking beauty in courage, justice only in strength" developed. For the founders of British India, the empire was a means of moral self-education. This type of person was praised and romanticized in imperial literature. India was seen as a "paradise for courageous people" who stoically endure all difficulties and dangers.
Associated with the ideology of the "white man's burden", on the one hand, was the doctrine of the civilizing mission of the British, their vocation to spread the art of free government throughout the world (and in this section, this ideology approaches imperial celibacy), and on the other hand, the belief in genetic the supremacy of the British race, leading to primitive nationalism. Moreover, these two components were sometimes so closely intertwined that there was no line between them, they smoothly flowed into one another. Their opposite was more understandable in theory than visible in practice.
The embodiment of the merged contradictions was the figure of Cecil Rhodes, a figure of the African empire and friend of R. Kipling. For him, the meaning of the British Empire consisted in the blessing that it renders to mankind, turning peoples to civilization, but his conviction was also unshakable that the British should derive all possible benefit from this circumstance for themselves. Rhodes famously said: "Pure philanthropy is very good, but philanthropy plus five percent per annum is even better." Philosophical views of S. Rhodes are described in one of his biographies: if God exists, then there must be divine goals in history. They are, most likely, human evolution towards the creation of a more perfect type of people. Since, Rhodes believed that the breed of people with the best chances in evolution is the Anglo-Saxon race, he concluded that in order to serve the Divine purpose, one should strive to establish the dominance of the Anglo-Saxon race. If Rhodes could seriously think so, then Lord Rosebery's words that the British Empire is "the world's greatest agency for good that has ever seen the light" should not be considered ordinary hypocrisy.
The ideology of the "white man's burden" actually tried on various components of the English imperial complex: national superiority, selfless service to the religious idea, the imposition of the art of free self-government throughout the world, and the romance of world conquest. This is a new interpretation of imperial ideology, where again the religious, national, imperial and social components appear in unity. The paradigm of "representative self-government" is again taking the place not of values \u200b\u200b- "the goal of action" (the goal of action is now to draw the world into the English orbit), but "a mode of action," namely, a way of conquering the world. This ideologeme finds its expression in the mandate system (applied in practice after the First World War). By the second half of the 19th century, the British Empire saw a transition from indirect (retaining significant elements of autonomy of colonial administration to direct (centralized control). But by the beginning of the 20th century, protectorate rule became the dominant principle of British imperial practice. This was a serious modification of the English picture of the world.
But how are English colonization and British imperial ideology related to each other? It seems that the life of the colonies flows by itself, and ideology is nothing more than a head invention. However, if you look closely, the correlation is strong enough. Let us try to give a description of the "image of us" in the British picture of the world, which would fit into the model of English popular colonization, and would be consistent with various interpretations of the British Empire, which was an essential fragment of the English picture of the world as a whole.
So, the main subject of action in the English model of colonization is a kind of "society", "community" (whatever, religious or commercial). Each of them, in one way or another, perceived the religious and value foundations of the British Empire (and, as we have seen, this applies in full measure to the trading communities). But since in the British ideologeme of empire the concepts of "community" and "empire" are synonymous, then - in this context - these communities themselves turned into mini-empires. It is no coincidence that the East India Company was called "a state within a state"; it is no coincidence that Lord Curzon called India an empire within an empire. Each "community", which ultimately took shape not for any historical reasons, but because this mode of action is most comfortable for the British (this is the "image of the collective" in the British picture of the world), and each of them became more and more self-contained, abstracting from both the native population and the metropolis. And each of them, in one way or another, played within itself the "community - empire" alternative. It started from the ideologeme "community", "privileged (aristocratic) community", "community of white people" and passed on to the concept of "empire of aristocrats."
A structure of interconnected mini-empires was created. The unity of this structure, until the end of the 19th century, practically dropped out of the consciousness of the British; it was not fundamentally important. The subjects of the action were "mini-empires" (whether they were agricultural settlements, trading posts or, later, missionary centers), and their underlying ideological rationale ensured their mobility and, consequently, the strength of British expansion.
Between these "mini-empires" and the "center", which called itself the British Empire, there was a constant insurmountable contradiction: the "center" sought to bring its colonies ("mini-empires") to a "common denominator", and the colonies, self-sufficient in their inner feeling, opposed unification, rebelled against the center, legally separated from the metropolis. However, although the separation of the United States caused a significant shock in Britain and the emergence of the anti-imperial ideology of "Little England", it did not for a moment slow down the pace of real empire building, as a result of which the so-called "second empire" emerged. The colonial system itself, the structure of "mini-empires" had, in essence, only propaganda significance. In a sense, the Russian geopolitician I. Vernadsky is right when he wrote about the British Empire that “in terms of its internal structure and the nature of its people, this country can easily do without this or that colony, none of which is united with it into one whole , and each lives its own special life. The composition of the British possessions is rather an aggregate of many political bodies than one indissoluble integrity. Tear off each of them and the metropolis will exist with almost the same strength. Over time, it will even acquire new possessions and the old loss of almost will not be noticeable to her. "
The British imperial building process is in many ways different from the Russian one. In Russia it is impossible to imagine even the very idea of \u200b\u200ban uprising of the Russian population of some outskirts against the center. Russian colonization leads to the expansion of the Russian state territory: the Russian colony, being formed outside the boundaries of Russian territory, stimulated the movement of the border. The British have a colony, initially under British jurisdiction, to seek to withdraw from it. But this path led to the creation of a kind of "meta-empire", united not so much legally as through linguistic and value unity. The words of the French researcher of colonial problems P. Leroy Beaulieu are quite suitable for British colonization that: “colonization is the extensive force of the people, this is its ability to reproduce, the ability to expand and spread across the land, this is the subordination of the world or its vast part to its language, its morals , their ideals and their laws. " Ultimately, this is an attempt to bring the world in line with the ideal that is inherent in a given nation.
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Some historians directly attribute the collapse of the British Empire to the liberalization of international trade. Thus, D. Lieven writes: "Empire makes economic sense in zones of protectionism and closed trade associations ... After 1945, the world economy, dominated by the United States, made free trade a reality and in this sense had a hand in the abolition of empires." Other authors, like R. Cameron, are more cautious about the reasons for the collapse of empires. They point out that the cause of the loss of control of the colonies by the European powers was "their own post-war weakness, the growing strength of national independence movements and the ambivalent position of the United States." Under these conditions, "the imperialist powers increasingly came to the understanding that it is better to voluntarily surrender control than to take the costs and risks of war." In particular, Great Britain began preparing the colonies for self-government, and then was forced to yield to the independence movement. However, the economic aspect of the problem is practically ignored in the publication on economic history.
Meanwhile, the collapse of the colonial empires, and especially the British Empire, had, in addition to political, and significant economic prerequisites. However, these prerequisites did not boil down to the fact that free trade was replacing protectionism. If we consider the problem in a long-term aspect, it becomes obvious that the British foreign trade regime during the collapse of the empire was much more protectionist than at the final stage of its formation. Import duties on manufactured goods were abolished by Great Britain in 1860 and did not apply until 1932. Great Britain, in the period before World War I, sought the adoption of free trade by other countries as well. However, developed countries have resisted this idea. Import duties in the United States began to rise immediately after the North's victory in civil war, and in the countries of continental Europe - from the end of the 70s of the XIX century. Trade liberalization in underdeveloped countries has had the greatest success. In addition to the British colonies, the countries of Latin America, the Ottoman Empire, China, Thailand also pledged to import British goods duty-free or impose duties on them at low rates. As a result, by the beginning of the XX century. "The third world was an ocean of liberalism without islands of protectionism."
At the same time, the British dominions (Canada, Australia, New Zealand) pursued a protectionist policy. As a result, British goods in some cases found it more difficult to get into their markets than into the markets of many underdeveloped countries outside the British Empire. Thus, in Canada, since 1887, the rates of import duties on industrial goods averaged 25-35% of their customs value. British merchandise has been given a 25 per cent discount on these duties since 1898, i.e. in fact, they were taxed at rates ranging from 18.75% to 26.25%. Meanwhile, the rates of import duties in underdeveloped countries in most cases did not exceed 5%. Thus, Great Britain provided access for its goods to the markets of underdeveloped countries, even if they were not subject to its sovereignty. Accordingly, the goal of the empire's expansion was not at all the formation of "closed trade associations". Strategic considerations played an important role. As for the economic aspect of the problem, the British authorities sought to expand the sphere of their legal control and avoid new countries falling into the sphere of protectionism of other states. Agitation for an imperial customs union began to develop only in the 1880s. However, this union was never fully created.
The level of tariff protectionism of Western European countries and the United States in the period from 1875 (the eve of the division of Africa between the European powers) to 1950 (the first stage of the collapse of the colonial empires) is shown in Table. 16. The data in the table are in no way consistent with the hypothesis that this disintegration was a consequence of the liberalization of international trade initiated by the United States. It is true that in the postwar years, the US import regime was substantially liberalized, and their share in British exports increased. However, customs barriers in most of the developed countries of Western Europe in 1950 dropped only compared to the peak of protectionism during the Great Depression. Compared to 1913, they either increased or decreased insignificantly (with the exception of Denmark and Sweden).
The trade regimes of Western European countries in 1950, when decolonization began, were much less liberal than in 1875, when the British Empire was actively building. Meanwhile, after World War II, the share of the continental six countries in UK foreign trade was higher than that of the United States, and increased despite protectionist barriers. Thus, trade liberalization was more a consequence than a reason for the increased interest of developed countries in mutual trade. This interest should be explained rather by the fact that as the level of economic development increases, the importance of the intra-sectoral division of labor increases. “The more developed a country is industrially, the more specific gravity in the structure of its production in science and technology-intensive industries, the higher should be the share of intra-industry trade in its external turnover. " Accordingly, geographically, this trade is concentrated on other highly developed countries that have sufficient potential for intra-sectoral trade.
It should be noted that, according to A. Meisels, back in 1913, most of the industrial exports of the continental countries of Western Europe and the United States were sent to other developed countries (Great Britain, in whose industrial exports the share of these countries was less than a third, was an exception). Thus, its role as a leader in world trade, a generator of global demand, an intermediary between Europe and other continents hampered the natural transition to a more intensive exchange of goods with more developed countries, which began to grow as the technological level of the economy increased.
Great Britain itself in the post-war period was one of the most protectionist developed countries. Despite the abandonment of political power over the colonies, she still continued to need privileged relations with them, using for this not only trade preferences, but also currency levers.
BRITISH EMPIRE(British Empire) - the largest empire in the history of mankind, in the period between the First and Second World Wars, it occupied up to a quarter of the entire earth's land.
The composition of the empire, ruled from the metropolis - Great Britain - was complex. It included dominions, colonies, protectorates and mandated (after the First World War) territories.
Dominions are countries with a large number of immigrants from Europe that have achieved relatively broad rights of self-government. North America, and later Australia and New Zealand, were the main destinations for emigration from Britain. A number of North American possessions in the second half. 18th century declared independence and formed the United States, and in the 19th century. Canada, Australia and New Zealand have gradually pushed for increased self-government. At the imperial conference in 1926, it was decided to call them not colonies, but dominions with the status of self-government, although in fact Canada received these rights in 1867, the Australian Union in 1901, New Zealand in 1907, the Union of South Africa in 1919, Newfoundland in 1917 (entered into Canada), Ireland (without the northern part - Ulster, which remained part of Great Britain) achieved similar rights in 1921.
In the colonies there were approx. 50 - the vast majority of the population of the British Empire lived. Among them, along with relatively small ones (such as the islands of the West Indies), there were also such large ones as the island of Ceylon. Each colony was governed by a governor-general, who was appointed by the Ministry of Colonial Affairs. The governor appointed a legislative council composed of senior officials and representatives of the local population. The largest colonial possession - India - officially became part of the British Empire in 1858 (before that, for a century and a half, it was controlled by the British East India Company). Since 1876, the British monarch (then - Queen Victoria) began to be called the Emperor of India, and the Governor General of India - the Viceroy. Viceroy's salary at the beginning of the 20th century several times higher than the salary of the Prime Minister of Great Britain.
The nature of the government of the protectorates and their degree of dependence on London were different. The degree of independence allowed by London of the local feudal or tribal elite is also different. The system in which this elite was given a significant role was called indirect control - in contrast to direct controlcarried out by appointed officials.
The territories under the mandate - the former parts of the German and Ottoman empires - were transferred by the League of Nations to the control of Great Britain after the First World War on the basis of the so-called. mandate.
The English conquests began in the 13th century. from the invasion of Ireland, and the creation of overseas possessions - from 1583, the capture of Newfoundland, which became the first stronghold of Great Britain for conquests in the New World. The path to British colonization of America was opened by the defeat of the huge Spanish fleet - the Invincible Armada in 1588, the weakening of the sea power of Spain, and then Portugal, and the transformation of England into a powerful naval power. In 1607, the first English colony in North America (Virginia) was founded and the first English settlement on the American continent, Jamestown, was laid. In the 17th century. British colonies arose in a number of areas east. coast of the North. America; New Amsterdam, recaptured from the Dutch, was renamed New York.
The penetration into India began almost simultaneously. In 1600, a group of London merchants founded the East India Company. By 1640, she had created a network of her trading posts not only in India, but also in Southeast Asia and the Far East. In 1690, the company began building the city of Kolkata. One of the results of the import of English manufactured goods was the ruin of a number of local cultural crafts.
The British Empire experienced its first crisis, having lost 13 of its colonies as a result of the war of the British settlers in North America for independence (1775-1783). However, after the recognition of the independence of the United States (1783), tens of thousands of colonists moved to Canada, and the British presence there strengthened.
British penetration into the coastal regions of New Zealand and Australia and the islands of the Pacific Ocean soon intensified. In 1788, the first English appeared in Australia. settlement - Port Jackson (future Sydney). The Congress of Vienna of 1814-1815, summing up the Napoleonic wars, secured the Cape Colony (South Africa), Malta, Ceylon, and other territories seized at the end of the war for Great Britain. 18 - early. 19th century By mid. 19th century basically completed the conquest of India, the colonization of Australia was carried out, in 1840 the English. colonialists appeared in New Zealand. The port of Singapore was founded in 1819. In the middle. 19th century Unequal treaties were imposed on China, and a number of Chinese ports were open to the British. trade, Great Britain seized Xianggang (Hong Kong).
During the period of the "colonial division of the world" (the last quarter of the 19th century) Great Britain seized Cyprus, established control over Egypt and the Suez Canal, completed the conquest of Burma, and established the fact. protectorate over Afghanistan, conquered vast territories in Tropical and South Africa: Nigeria, Gold Coast (now - Ghana), Sierra Leone, South. and North. Rhodesia (Zimbabwe and Zambia), Bechuanaland (Botswana), Basutoland (Lesotho), Swaziland, Uganda, Kenya. After the bloody Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902), it seized the Boer republics Transvaal (the official name is the Republic of South Africa) and the Orange Free State and united them with its colonies - Cape and Natal, created the Union of South Africa (1910).
More and more new conquests and a gigantic expansion of the empire became possible not only thanks to military and naval power and not only thanks to skillful diplomacy, but also because of the widespread confidence in Great Britain that British influence was beneficial for the peoples of other countries. The idea of \u200b\u200bBritish messianism has taken deep roots - and not only in the minds of the ruling strata of the population. The names of those who spread British influence, from "pioneers" - missionaries, travelers, migrants, merchants - to such "empire-builders" as Cecil Rhodes, were surrounded by an aura of reverence and romance. Those who, for example, Rudyard Kipling, poeticized colonial politics, also gained immense popularity.
As a result of mass emigration in the 19th century. from Great Britain to Canada, New Zealand, Australia and the Union of South Africa, these countries created a multimillion "white", mainly English-speaking population, and the role of these countries in the world economy and politics became more and more significant. Their independence in domestic and foreign policy was strengthened by the decisions of the Imperial Conference (1926) and the Westminster Statute (1931), according to which the union of the metropolis and the dominions was called the "British Commonwealth of Nations". Their economic ties were strengthened by the creation of sterling blocs in 1931 and the Ottawa Agreements (1932) on imperial preferences.
As a result of the First World War, which was fought and because of the desire of the European powers to redistribute colonial possessions, Great Britain received a League of Nations mandate to control parts of the disintegrated German and Ottoman empires (Palestine, Iran, Transjordan, Tanganyika, part of Cameroon and part of Togo). The Union of South Africa received a mandate to govern South-West Africa (now Namibia), Australia - to part of New Guinea and the adjacent islands of Oceania, New Zealand - to the West. Samoa.
The anti-colonial war, which intensified in various parts of the British Empire during the First World War and especially after its end, forced Great Britain in 1919 to recognize the independence of Afghanistan. In 1922 the independence of Egypt was recognized, in 1930 the English was terminated. a mandate to govern Iraq, although both countries remained in the realm of British rule.
The apparent collapse of the British Empire came after World War II. And although Churchill proclaimed that he did not become prime minister of the British Empire in order to preside over its liquidation, he still, at least during his second premiership, had to find himself in this role. In the first post-war years, many attempts were made to preserve the British Empire both by maneuvering and by colonial wars (in Malaya, Kenya, and other countries), but all of them failed. In 1947 Great Britain was forced to grant independence to its largest colonial possession: India. At the same time, the country was divided regionally into two parts: India and Pakistan. Independence was proclaimed by Transjordan (1946), Burma and Ceylon (1948). In 1947, Gen. The UN Assembly decided to end the British. mandate for Palestine and the creation on its territory of two states: Jewish and Arab. In 1956, the independence of Sudan was proclaimed, in 1957 - of Malaya. The first of the British possessions in Tropical Africa became (1957) the independent state of the Gold Coast, taking the name Ghana. In 1960, British Prime Minister H. McMillan, in a speech in Cape Town, essentially acknowledged the inevitability of further anti-colonial deeds, calling it "the wind of change."
1960 went down in history as the "Year of Africa": 17 African countries proclaimed their independence, among them the largest British possession - Nigeria - and British Somaliland, which united with the Italian-ruled part of Somalia to create the Republic of Somalia. Then, listing only the most important milestones: 1961 - Sierra Leone, Kuwait, Tanganyika, 1962 - Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Uganda; 1963 - Zanzibar (in 1964, having united with Tanganyika, formed the Republic of Tanzania), Kenya, 1964 - Nyasaland (became the Republic of Malawi), Northern Rhodesia (became the Republic of Zambia), Malta; 1965 - Gambia, Maldives; 1966 - Brit. Guiana (became the Republic of Guyana), Basutoland (Lesotho), Barbados; 1967 - Aden (Yemen); 1968 - Mauritius, Swaziland; 1970 - Tonga, 1970 - Fiji; 1980 - Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe); 1990 - Namibia; 1997 - Hong Kong became part of China. In 1960, the Union of South Africa proclaimed itself the Republic of South Africa and then withdrew from the Commonwealth, but after the elimination of the apartheid (apartheid) regime and the transfer of power to the black majority (1994), it was again admitted to it.
By the end of the last century, the Commonwealth itself also underwent fundamental changes. After the proclamation of independence by India, Pakistan and Ceylon (since 1972 - Sri Lanka) and their entry into the Commonwealth (1948), it became a union not only of the metropolis and "old" dominions, but of all states that arose within the British Empire. From the name of the British Commonwealth of Nations, "British" was removed, and later it became customary to call it simply: "Commonwealth". Relations between the members of the Commonwealth also underwent many changes, up to military clashes (the largest - between India and Pakistan). However, the economic, cultural (and linguistic) ties that emerged over the generations of the British Empire kept the vast majority of these countries from leaving the Commonwealth. In the beginning. 21 c. it had 54 members: 3 in Europe, 13 in America, 8 in Asia, 19 in Africa. Mozambique was admitted to the Commonwealth, which was never part of the British Empire.
The population of the Commonwealth countries exceeds 2 billion people. An important legacy of the British Empire is the proliferation of of English language both in the countries that were part of this empire and beyond.
Relations between the British and Russian empires have always been difficult, often very unfriendly. The contradictions between the two largest empires led in the middle of the 19th century. to the Crimean War, then to a sharp aggravation in the struggle for influence in Central Asia. Great Britain did not allow Russia to reap the benefits of its victory over the Ottoman Empire in the war of 1877-1878. Great Britain supported Japan in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. In turn, Russia strongly sympathized with the South African Boer republics in their war against Great Britain in 1899-1902.
The end of the open rivalry came in 1907, when, in the face of the growing military power of Germany, Russia joined the Warm Concord (Entente) of Great Britain and France. In World War I, the Russian and British Empires fought together against the Triple Alliance of the German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires.
After the October Revolution in Russia, its relations with the British Empire worsened again ((1917)). For the Bolshevik Party, Great Britain was the main initiator in the history of the capitalist system, the bearer of the ideas of "rotten bourgeois liberalism" and the strangler of the peoples of the colonial and dependent countries. For the ruling circles and a significant part of British public opinion, the Soviet Union, asserting its ambitions, was a hotbed of ideas for overthrowing the power of the colonial metropolises around the world by various methods, including terrorism.
Even during World War II, when the USSR and the British Empire were allies, members of the anti-Hitler coalition, mutual distrust and suspicion did not disappear at all. Since the beginning of the Cold War, recriminations have become an integral part of the relationship. During the collapse of the British Empire, Soviet policy was aimed at supporting the forces that contributed to its collapse.
For a long time, the Russian pre-revolutionary literature (including historical) about the British Empire reflected the rivalry and contradictions of the two largest empires - the Russian and the British. In Soviet literature, attention was focused on British anti-Soviet actions, on anti-colonial movements, crisis phenomena in the British Empire and evidence of its collapse.
The imperial syndrome in the minds of many Britons (as well as residents of other former metropolises) can hardly be considered completely weathered. However, it should be recognized that in the years of the collapse of the British Empire, British historical science was gradually moving away from traditional colonialist views and seeking mutual understanding and cooperation with the emerging historical science of the countries that had proclaimed their independence. The turn of the 20th and 21st centuries. was marked by the preparation and publication of a number of fundamental studies on the history of the British Empire, including on the problems of the interaction of cultures of the peoples of the empire, on various aspects of decolonization and on the transformation of the empire into the Commonwealth. In 1998-1999, a five-volume Oxford History of the British Empire. M., 1991
Trukhanovsky V.G. Benjamin Disraeli or the story of one incredible career... M., 1993
Ostapenko G.S. British Conservatives and decolonization... M., 1995
Porter B. The Lions Share. A Short History of British Imperialism 1850–1995... Harlow, Essex, 1996
Davidson A.B. Cecil Rhodes - Empire Builder... Moscow - Smolensk, 1998
Oxford History of the British Empire... Vols. 1-5. Oxford, New York, 1998-1999
Hobsbawm E. Age of Empire... M., 1999
Empire and others: British Encounters with Indigenous people... Ed. by M. Daunton and R. Halpern. London, 1999
Boyce D.G. Decolonization and the British Empire 1775–1997... London, 1999
The Commonwealth in the 21st Century. Ed. by G. Mills and J Stremlau... Pretoria, 1999
Cultures of Empire. Colonizers in Britain and the Empire in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century... A Reader. Ed. by C. Hall. New York, 2000
Lloyd T. Empire. The History of the British Empire... London and New York, 2001
Royal Historical Society. Bibliography of Imperial, Colonial and Commonwealth History since 1600... Ed. by A. Porter. London, 2002
Heinlein F. British Government Policy and Decolonization 1945-1963... Scrutinising the Official Mind. London, 2002
Butler L.J. Britain and Empire. Adjusting to a Post-Imperial World... London, New York, 2002
Churchill W. World crisis. Autobiography. Speeches... M., 2003
Bedarida F. Churchill... M., 2003
James L. The Rise and Fall of the British Empire... London, 2004
