The Fall of the Empire

In the marketplace for books and ideas,it became mandatory to heed that divide,to project on far too many undertakings the burden of analysing the post-9/11 condition. There is,of course,much about this troubling decade that still awaits analysis,but it is consolation to know that the one idea that gained alarming currency is now fading: the idea of empire.

The notion of a new,America-led age of empire took on many shades. Some,like the Canadian philosopher Michael Ignatieff,sought to rally the US to leadership of an “empire lite”,to the task of intervening and nation-building in territories as diverse as Kosovo and Afghanistan. However,another,more muscular idea of empire spread across the globe. In the bestselling and rather influential works of writers like the British historian Niall Ferguson,the British record in colonial administration was shown to be,on balance,of benefit to the occupied lands,and thus served up as a template for the desired American imperium.

In a book just out (The Ghosts of Empire: Britain’s Legacies in the Modern World),Kwasi Kwarteng,a young member of the British House of Commons,who is of Ghanaian origin,challenges that cheerful assessment of the British empire. Looking at Britain’s retreat from different territories,he argues that “British Empire was not merely undemocratic; it was anti-democratic”,and that “the anarchic individualism and paternalism which underpinned the British Empire led to messy outcomes”. That is: “Transitions from British rule to independence were difficult,because the Pax Britannica was itself transient and without firm foundation. The British Empire was nothing more than a series of improvisations conducted by men who shared a common culture,but who often had very different ideas about government and administration. There is very little unifying ideology in this imperial story. It was grand and colourful but it was highly opportunistic,dominated by individualism and pragmatism.”

With walk-on parts for familiar men of empire,like the Lawrence brothers,Younghusband,Kitchener and Curzon,this is history as revealed from the actions of the rulers. All that bound these men on the ground,as it were,was class,a public school background and a belief that they were masters of their own destinies,unfettered by considerations of lineage and family fortune. Other than that,empire was held by discrete,and often expedient,decisions of individuals. Seen thus,from the individual actions of the administrator,“without whom it would not have survived more than a few weeks”,the British record defies the magnificent claims of its apologists.

Kwarteng’s compressed telling of events is not free of controversy — in detailing the ad hoc nature of colonial administration,he often leaps into determining what may have been,had rational decisions based on the greater common good been taken. But this what-if game is played in a wider landscape — say,in the chaos of India’s Partition — that had itself been shaped by the “messy outcomes” of other acts of colonial pragmatism/opportunism.

Yet,as America continues to withdraw from its recently conquered lands,Afghanistan and Iraq,this innovative history of the British Empire provides a checklist to appraise the possibly opportunistic shortcuts of this past decade. Kwarteng reminds us that thankfully the danger of America heeding the call to empire has passed,but his book is still a reminder that a superpower’s legacy of intervention will be determined by outcomes that obtain after its eventual retreat.

mini.kapoor@expressindia.com