Late nineteenth century imperialism can best be understood in terms of concerns over national weakness rather than as an assertion of national strength. Discuss.

University Degree Historical and Philosophical studies

European History (Paper 1)

Term Paper (Term 3)

The New Imperialism

‘Late nineteenth century imperialism can best be understood in terms of concerns over national weakness rather than as an assertion of national strength.’ Discuss.

Imperialism, as discussed in this essay, is defined as the process by which either formal empires or significant influences and control short of direct rule i.e. ‘informal’ empire came into being and/or were built, via diplomacy or conquest, such that the end result was the political (and often economic, social and cultural as well) dominance of one country over its empire. Late nineteenth century imperialism was the age of the “New Imperialism”, in the period 1860-1914, when exclusive claims to territory and effective control ‘proliferated more quickly than they had done since the eighteenth century and attracted an unusual degree of attention’ (Porter) When discussing the causes and motives behind countries building empires over the years 1860-1914, we must remember that “Any theory of imperialism grounded on a single decisive cause is too simple for the complicated reality of the African partition” (Robinson and Gallagher).

The first reason why imperialism can be seen understood as a matter of national weakness was because one of the motivating forces why countries built empires was due to defensive purposes, as a form of protecting and preserving their existing extended overseas interests, which were mainly economic, in the face of foreign threats. According to Anderson, “British expansion was essentially defensive…(it) aimed not at expanding British territory but at safeguarding Britain’s existing world position.” One example in which this was evident would be in the example of Egypt. The British took the Suez Canal in 1875, however it took them many years to formalize control over Sudan (1882). It was the local crisis of bankruptcy that pushed the British to formalize control; for fear that the French would take the Suez Canal and threaten British trade interests. From this example, we can see that original British economic and trade interests in the Suez Canal were threatened because of the possibility that economic competitor France would take over formal control of Egypt (this threat was exacerbated by the fact that Germany actually supported France), so to prevent this from happening, and to preserve British influence in the Suez, Britain formalized her control over Egypt.

Secondly, countries decided to colonize territories that had not been previously in their sphere of influence as a result of the one-upmanship game in Europe. Countries were afraid of rival powers gaining an advantage that might possibly threaten their interests through them acquiring more territories, thus they took colonise as well to even-out the supposed imbalance of power. According to Barraclough, “Obsessed by their own rivalries, none of the European powers was prepared to stand aside while others extended their territories, or to withdraw and leave a void into which a potential enemy might move.” Although there was an element of pride and national prestige in the game of colonization, the fundamental factor was the fear of threats from ‘potential enemies’. The context behind this would the animosity between the various European powers. France and Germany had long-standing bitterness between them as a result of the Franco-Prussian War of 1871 (in which Alsace-Lorraine was taken over by the Germans). France and Britain also had a long history of rivalry. Thus, countries colonized as a result of their fear that other countries would gain an advantage over them. One example of this would be the Robinson and Gallagher thesis that the ‘scramble for Africa’ began in Egypt. Most of the scramble for Africa began after 1882, immediately after Britain had occupied Egypt (1882), which sparked off compensatory claims by rival powers in Africa. According to Culpin and Henig, “There can be no doubt that the sudden entrance of Germany into the colonial arena injected a new element of rivalry and intensified the scramble to claim concessions and territories”. This view exemplifies the intense fear that the country would be threatened and disadvantaged by other countries’ advances in colonization.

This is a preview of the whole essay

Empire building was also a key tool that helped to protect each country’s global position and strategic-security. In the case of Germany, Seaman has this to say, Seaman: “In encouraging the French expansion in North Africa, Bismarck showed a profound sense of the urgent need, if peace was to be preserved, of diverting the European mind outwards, away from its interior conflicts”. The global power dynamics in Europe in the late nineteenth century was such that France felt aggrieved towards Germany because of the 1871 national disgrace (Alsace-Lorraine was lost). Britain felt very threatened by Germany because her army and economy was fast on the rise, and the fact that Britain’s excellent navy was scattered across the globe in an ‘imperial overstretch’ made Britain even more vulnerable. According to AJP Taylor, “His (Bismarck’s) overriding concern was that France should act as a great power in regions where she would not run against Germany.” Germany’s encouragement of French ambitions in Tunisia, on her exploitation of Egyptian issues in order to win French gratitude and prevent her rapprochement with Britain, was to divert French attentions away and outward, as well as to prevent an alliance between Britain and France. Britain, too, encouraged colonial ambitions in others (in Italy’s designs on Tripoli and Somaliland), also in hopes of retaining French goodwill. Bismarck himself said that, “My map of Africa lies in Europe”. Imperialism was the tool and instrument used to minimize the diplomatic and political vulnerability of the country.

The above-explained factors largely explain how the weaknesses of the countries exacerbated by international threats and competition led them to colonize. There is also another area in which concerns over domestic, innate national problems led them to colonize in order to solve these problems and compensate for these weaknesses.

Firstly, as a result of social-domestic fears, countries turned to colonial exploits to defuse and distract citizens away from these problems. Culpin and Henig said, “As governments sought to foster and to increase nationalist sentiments, colonial exploits provided one means of cementing and intensifying them.” In the case of Germany, Bismarck used colonial expansion to keep the ancient regime in power, distracting the nationalist-liberalist from their liberalist aims. Porter (quoting Wehler’s arguments), says of colonialism, “It was essentially an aggressive policy, consciously adopted and adapted by a ruling elite and designed to manipulate domestic opinion, to mobilise mass support and to divert outwards both liberal or socialist discontents and other pressures for change.” Bismarck originally swore not to pursue a colonial policy, claiming in 1868, “All the advantages claimed or the mother country are for the most part illusory”. However, the increasing popularity of the socialists would have added pressure on Bismarck to use colonialism to rally people around the flag and the concept of nationalism and national pride. Thus, imperialism was also employed as a by-product of domestic weaknesses, and was used to counteract domestic political weaknesses.

Finally, the last reason why imperialism was the result of a concern for national weakness is because it was motivated by economic concerns. The fear of economic disadvantage and vulnerability spurred many great powers to start colonizing. According to Porter, “The importance of economic interests and calculation in the expansion of European influence and control over the extra-European world is undeniable.” The severe economic downturn in the 1880-1890s was a big blow to industrializing countries such as Britain. Great European powers, especially France and Germany, including the United States, who were amongst Britain’s largest and most valuable existing markets, were becoming more and more protectionist, imposing tariffs and quotas on trade. According to Hobsbawm, “Technological development now relied on raw materials which, for reasons for climate or the hazards of geology, were to be found exclusively or profusely in remote places.” Examples include gold and precious materials in South Africa. Hobson’s theory of surplus capital also asserts that there was a vast amount of surplus capital seeking profitable outlets (because most of Europe’s masses were poor), resulting in its owners investing outside Europe, and then to call on their governments to protect these investments by conquering and administering the territories involved. Examples of companies that had their interests outside Europe include Quaker (who go her raw material from West Africa and South America). Thus, in order to preserve economic interests, and to prevent themselves from becoming economically weak, European powers decided to colonize and exploit the economic advantages of colonies. It was this concern for economic weakness that motivated imperialism. Porter says, “Answers to these questions (why European powers decided to colonize) depend on a recognition that diplomatic exchanges often dealt in material coin, and that prestige had its economic buttresses.” In line with this theory, the pre-requisite for the assertion of national strength was making up for the country’s economic weaknesses, because economic strength was synonymous with national strength. One qualification we have to make however is that economic impetuses were largely confined to Britain – France and Germany’s motives for imperialism were largely political.

However, imperialism can also be seen as a way of projecting national prestige, and pride in the face of no direct threat whatsoever and borne out willing and purely through the competitive instinct. The African partition, according to AJP Taylor, was a result of ‘the struggle for mastery in Europe’. This struggle to project national prestige could firstly be borne out of the new popular nationalism of unification. Italy and Germany were new countries, and nationalism became a tool that assisted the nation-building process. Imperialism could have been the natural by-product of nationalism assisting the nation-building process, and the appealing idea of a ‘nation in arms’. For example, the significant and debilitating failure of Italy in 1896 at Adowa (Abyssinia), spurred Italy on to redeem itself and her national pride through Eritrea and Somalia. According to Roberts, “Questions of prestige, irrational though they might be, received new emphasis when more people identified themselves with the nation.” Furthermore, the idea of a mass electorate voting added pressure onto the government to translate this idea of popular nationalism into national prestige. Von Bulow’s comment that “Germany demands ‘her place in the sun’” exemplifies this increasingly common idea. Bismarck himself, although he was originally against the idea of colonialism, changed his stand, remarking in 1884 that: “Nowadays, no Government is strong enough to stand the reproach of having sacrificed its own national interests as a favour to a friendly Power.” Roberts says: “To him (Bismarck) they were moves in an essentially European game; East Africa (Germany got Tanganyika) gave him a chance to show that he could be a nuisance to Great Britain”. The British and Germans also had a long-standing grudge – the Germans were continuously resentful of the fact that the British had an excellent navy, and Britain was also resentful of the fact that Germany’s economy was fast on the rise. This history of feuds and mutual dislike motivated countries to assert themselves over each other.

The idea of national prestige was especially important for France. For France, the objective of imperialism was largely to “dispute with England the mastery of the seas, to affirm before the world the presence, the grandeur, the expansion of France’ (quoted by Anderson). The bitter defeat in 1871 and the loss of Alsace-Lorraine in the Franco-Prussian war was a bitter pill to swallow, and from this originated France’s concept of revanche. According to Taylor, “The French wanted compensation – something to show that they had rights in Egypt and should be paid for surrendering them”. In Europe there was limited room for political manoeuvring and reassertion of national prestige, with Germany too strong to tackle on her own. This, coupled France’s imperial past, pride in the revolutionary and Napoleonic legacies, her republican search for ‘respectability’, coupled with her intense desire for redress and compensation in defeat by Germany, as well as French naval resentment at British maritime superiority, made France turn to colonies ‘only when they could nothing else’. (Taylor) Porter quotes the ‘diplomatic historians’: “Not only did the French share the common preoccupation with enhancing national standing both for reasons of self-esteem and in the eyes of others, but they interpreted it above all in terms of influence and possessions abroad.” This was because revanche was unrealizable or not worth the price to be paid (a massive world war as a result of the tangled alliances). Thus France turned to colonies, social progress and economic expansion for French achievement. This attitude of aggressive and assertive action was seen particularly in the French army, when they expanded into West Africa purely out of their own military initiative and without consulting the government. According to Roberts: “The French army, formed of a selected number of conscripts serving five years, was still digesting the lessons of 1870. Its morale had recovered far too well, in that its officers and instructors were turning to a doctrine of offensive warfare at all costs.”

In essence, “It (Imperialism) expressed a resulting psychological reaction (to the European wars of the 19th century), an ardent desire to maintain or recover national prestige” (Hayes). As a result, amongst the major European countries developed this common habit of mind, which was sensitive to (possible) slights, intolerable of loss and defeat, and reluctant to admit any advantage to others.

Secondly, another reason that would have motivated the European colonial powers to assert their national strength is precisely because of the relative superiority of the European powers. The capitalist societies of the west were technically more advanced, and the advent of technology such as the global telegraph, railway and shipping networks, cheaper transport and lower marketing costs made it even easier for “imperialism of benevolence”, which promulgated the merits of European ways, and some Europeans actually believed that transmission of their culture was universally advantageous. The self righteous and ethnocentricity of the Europeans is summarized by Porter: “Non-european societies were widely seen as poor, ignorant, backward and unprogressive, if not corrupt and degraded, the more so as Europe’s own material wealth and technological sophistication rapidly grew.” As a result of this disparity of wealth, Europeans could have started to develop this superiority complex. This superiority complex generated that way of thinking known as ‘the White Man’s burden’, a condescending and idealistic term coined by Rudyard Kipling. According to Porter: “Two of the powerful urges to intervene beyond Europe and to influence or control both people and territory were the religious – the desire to convert non-Christians to Christianity – and the humanitarian – the wish to better the circumstances of non-Europeans.” The time of new imperialism was a time during which Europe was ascendant due to industrialisation. She was rich, powerful and very advanced in civilisation compared to the rest of the world. This provided the motivation for her to assert her strength – it made Europe proud and self-righteous. However, Porter admits that: “Rather than providing the spur to action, cultural self-confidence was no less likely to be the consequence of successful imperial assertion…” Appeals to the values of one’s own culture or civilisation could provide additional rhetoric, which were both politically and psychologically useful in justifying European expansionism.

In conclusion, what sums up the question of whether European imperialism was a result of the assertion of national strengths or because of concerns for national weakness could be that both mutually reinforced each other, creating a synergy that resulted in concrete annexation of territory. Perhaps the truth could be found in the fact that the renewed assertion of national strength was merely ballast to pessimism, a defence against domestic doubts. We must also remember that different nations would have had different priorities – France for example, because of her bitter disgrace in Alsace-Lorraine, would place greater emphasis on regaining back her national prestige, never mind whether or not it would undermine her national strength. Germany however, would probably have been more cautious, because of her fear of upsetting the existing balance of power in Europe.