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This major new study considers the impact of the empire upon modern British political culture. The economic and cultural legacy of empire have received a great deal of attention, but historians have neglected the effects of empire upon the domestic British political scene. Dr Thompson explores economic, demographic, intellectual and military influences and he shows how parliamentary and party opinion interacted with imperial ideas and interests in the country at large.
List of contents
Contents
List of Figures, List of Tables
Preface
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Map
Introduction
1 Imperial Languages, Identities and Beliefs
Languages of imperialism
Imagining empire: the idea of a British world
Imperial reform
Dominion nationalism and imperial integration
Margins of empire: India and America
Conclusion
2 Mobilising Imperialists
The mainsprings of imperial politics
Extra-parliamentary agitation and empire
The Tariff Reform League
The Navy League
The Emigration Committee of the Royal Colonial Institute
The political status of imperial campaigns
Imperialism as a broad church
Conclusion
3 Propagating Imperialism
The imperialising of the British press
The new journalism and the old
The press and imperial agitation
The Imperial Press Conference (1909)
Conclusion
4 Imperial Trade: TariffReform 81
Joseph Chamberlain and the origins of tariff reform 81
The background to the campaign 83
Imperial preference and the economic unity of empire 85
The colonial perspective 90
India and imperial preference 97
Critics of preference: past and present 104
5 Imperial Security: Naval Supremacy and Defence Planning 110
Defending the Empire: the debate 110
The doctrine of sea power and the defence of empire 111
The size, distribution and composition of the Fleet 112
Colonial participation in imperial defence 119
Defence planning and the Committee of Imperial Defence 127
Conclusion 130
6 Populating the Empire: Overseas Migration 133
British overseas migration in the long nineteenth century 133
The benefits of empire migration 135
Voluntary effort versus state involvement 139
Migrant personality 141
Testing the suitability of migrants 152
Conclusion 154
7 The First World War and its Imperial Aftermath 157
The Empire at war 157
The Empire in the aftermath of the War 161
Imperialists in the Lloyd George Coalition 169
The Imperial War Cabinet and imperial foreign policy 171
The Washington naval treaty (1921-22) and
the Singapore strategy 175
Tariff reform redivivus, the Empire Marketing Board,
and the Empire Settlement Act 178
Conclusion 183
Conclusions 186
Biographical Appendix 196
Select Bibliography 202
Index
About the author
Andrew S. Thompson
Summary
This new study considers the impact of the empire upon modern British political culture. The economic and cultural legacy of empire have received a great deal of attention, but historians have neglected the effects of empire upon the domestic British political scene. Dr Thompson explores economic, demographic, intellectual and military influences and he shows how parliamentary and party opinion interacted with imperial ideas and interests in the country at large. This is a major new book which explores the ideology of key imperial campaigns, and their popular support. It makes a critical contribution to recent debates -- about the importance of empire to the nature and development of British national identities before and after the First World War.
