Attitudes towards imperialism 1890-1914

Question 1

The land of hope and glory by A.C Benson

Answer 1

• This was a patriotic song written in 1902
• It suggests a desire for the already large empire to expand even further
• Shows that the British feel they are allowing freedom to their colonies
• Describes the empire as victorious
• Speaks of the empire in a very positive way using words such as “brightness”

Question 2

Views about attitudes to empire

Answer 2

• The British press were very happy to report everything no matter whether it was a triumph or a setback
• The expansion of empire contributed to a change in how Britain viewed the outside world, in particular the new people and races brought under British rule
• All manner of stereotypes and judgements were blithely made towards these new races
• Anyone involved in empire became national heroes, mainly as a result of the press
• People loved reading imperial stories in the popular press
• There were rapidly evolving forms of racism

Question 3

Support for empire

Conservative, liberals, and labour

Answer 3

• It was widely supported at all levels of society with varying degrees of ardour and the public displays of support for empire which greeted the second Anglo-Boer war in 1899 and helped the conservatives win an impressive victory in the 1900 “Khaki election”
• The main political parties had different conceptions of empire, however
• The liberals looked beyond the conservative support for good government and white rule for its own sake
• They aimed at the education and improvement of the colonies and their people, with the objective of ultimate self-rule
• Nevertheless, even they were reluctant to bring an end to empire
• Both the liberals and the growing labour party at the beginning of the 20th century generally preferred freedom through empire rather than freedom from empire
• The real imperialists were mostly conservatives and on the radical right of the party
• During the years of conservative ascendency between 1895 and 1905, the supporters of the prime minister, Lord Salisbury, embraced the imperialist cause
• They argued in favour of the creation of a stronger and more closely united empire
• This not only meant support for territorial expansion but also support for schemes that would bind the empire together in trade and government
• It was believed that the correct policies could benefit British society and turn the empire into an economic superpower

Question 4

Support for Empire

Moral reasons

Answer 4

• The empire was sometimes justified on moral grounds as a “responsibility”, even a burden that God had placed on the British in order to bring stability and order to the world
• Salisbury was an imperialist and believed European, preferably British, rule to be indispensable for the advancement of other peoples he believed to be less developed
• he had no hesitation in imposing this rule by force, as he did in the Sudan from 1896 to 1899

Question 5

Support for Empire

High imperialist ideas

Answer 5

• the most fervent imperialists viewed the Empire as a sort of racial duty
• Lord Curzon proclaimed, “there has never been anything so great in the world’s history than the British empire, so great an instrument for the good of humanity”
• Lord Alfred Milner argued that every white man of British birth should feel equally at home in every state of the empire
• These high imperialists wanted a stronger empire, but an empire ruled by white people
• They believed that service in the colonies made men stronger
• This attitude relegated non-white peoples of the empire to the ranks of subjects (citizens with rights but not capable of controlling their own destinies)
• Joseph Chamberlain, the colonial secretary, was another high imperialist
• He believed that there was a “national crisis” (because of the industrial and military of other European powers) which only the empire could solve
• A reorganised empire would enable industrial recovery and employment whilst generating wealth to fund social reforms such as pensions and strengthen the moral fibre of the British people
• He believed in educating the public about the values of empire as he saw its promised benefits as a way of winning the loyalty of the working class
• Chamberlain tried to forward the imperialists’ desires for a union between Britain and the colonies of settlement for the purpose of defence and trade, but his ideas proved too unrealistic to win widespread support

Question 6

Support for the Empire

Economic

Answer 6

• Most imperialists argued for the economic benefits of empire
• Some (including chamberlain) sought “colonial development” beyond the Dominions and India and favoured the policy of imperial preference (Tariff reform)
• Others, such as Lord Meath, a diplomat, spoke in more social terms and argued that state-organised emigration and colonisation were essential to check the expansion of British sites and simultaneously strengthen the empire
• Pro-imperial ideas among the political elite tended to be both paternalistic and mechanistic

Question 7

Support for the Empire

Societies and organisations

Answer 7

• Many imperial activists were members of societies like the Royal Colonial Institute, founded in 1870 to provide a meeting place for those interested in colonial and Indian affairs
• Such societies proliferated in the early 20th century
• The Victoria league, founded in 1901, was a non-political organisation founded by women to promote a closer union between different parts of the then British empire through hospitality, fundraising, friendship, and education
• The Round Table movement was founded in 1909 on an idea of Lord Milner, to promote a closer union between Britain and its self-governing colonies and in 1910 and 1911, Round Table groups were formed in South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada
• Another pro-imperialist group was the Empire Day movement, which followed the lead of Lord Meath in 1896, although Empire Day was not celebrated until 1902 and only officially recognised by parliament in 1916
• The idea of a day of festivities was intended to reinforce imperial identity and celebrate the image of a motherly Queen Victoria, Empress of India
• The movement was part of the imperialists’ drive to educate the British public about the empire
• Journalists, such as Leopold Amery, also helped represent certain ideals of the Empire to British people as they emphasised the “imperial family” and propagating imperialist values with little reference to the realities of colonial rule
• Although many people celebrated Empire Day, this may not actually show support for empire as they may have just participated as a chance to socialise and enjoy the luxury if a day off work

Question 8

Challenges and criticisms of empire

Why ardent imperialists failed to win much support in the years up to 1914

Answer 8

• Most Britons were complacent with assuming that they were destined to rule the world
• Most Britons believed that the glories of the British way of life were generously bestowed upon the grateful millions
• However, others disagreed and the period of 1880 to 1920 was marked by considerable socialist antagonism towards imperial expansion
• This was balanced by the desire to improve the colonies rather than exploit them
• As popularity of the empire grew during the Boer war, a substantial number of socialists grudgingly agreed to accept imperialism whilst other socialists attempted to promote a new brand of imperialism which was a cooperative commonwealth model rather than the exploitive capitalist model

Question 9

Reasons for criticism of the empire

Imperial expansion took place in order to benefit the rich

Answer 9

• One of the strongest critics of empire was John A Hobson, an economist who wrote “imperialism” in 1902
• His view, catalysed by the Second Anglo-Boer war, was that imperial expansion had been driven by a search for new markets and new opportunities for the rich capitalists of Britain to make profits through investment
• Extremely anti-Semitic in his views, Hobson believed that a small political clique of Jewish financers made use of their supposed political influence, elite connections, and press conspiracy to shape imperial policy to benefit men, “most of whom are foreigners by origin, whose trade is finance, and whose trade interests are not chiefly British”
• His racist view was that the Second Anglo-Boer war was fought to secure the gold resources of South Africa for those he called “Jew-Imperialist” entrepreneurs and mining interests
• Therefore, he concluded, imperial expansion was a capitalist plot
• Hobson’s views did not signal the total rejection of empire, but they did provoke debate and fed into socialist anti-imperialism, although they had little immediate impact on policies

Question 10

Reasons for criticism of the empire

The conduct of war

Answer 10

• Other critics of empire emerged in the aftermath of the second Anglo-Boer war, although initial concerns were more to do with the conduct of war than a direct challenge to the concept of empire
• Reports from the welfare campaigner Emily Hobhouse, which led to a government enquiry into the conditions of the British concentration camps during the Second Anglo-Boers war, helped decrease the powerful status of imperialism and its supposed civilising mission

Question 11

Other figures to challenge the imperialist ideal

Answer 11

• Wilfrid Scawen Blunt (1840-1922) a diplomat and poet who, in imitation of the pro-imperialist poet Rudyard Kipling, wrote the line in 1899 “the white man’s burden. The Lord is the burden of his cash”
• Herbert Spencer (1820-1903), an influential philosopher who criticised the Victorian enthusiasm for colonial acquisitions of colonies, but also created the term “survival of the fittest” which was used to support Social Darwinism
• Frederic Harrison (1831-1923), a radical left-wing lawyer and historian who believed imperialism to be unethical
• William Digby (1849-1904) a writer and propagandist who had served in India and set up the Indian political and General Agency in London in order to raise awareness about Indian grievances in the British parliament and press in 1888
• Walter Crane (1845-1915), an arts and crafts designer, children’s book writer and socialist who used his design skills to produce anti-war illustrations in order to encourage those on the left to embrace anti-imperialism

Question 12

Conclusions of anti-imperialism

Answer 12

• However, for the most part, the voice of the anti-imperialists was hidden beneath a broad swathe of imperial support, if not exuberance
• While the liberals were in power in the years from 1906 to 1914, imperialism declined as a political topic
• The liberals preferred to disassociate themselves from colonial conflict and the excessive imperialism of the right-wing conservatives, but the continuation of empire was not questioned

Question 13

Reasons for the rise in interest in Empire in the late 19th century

Answer 13

• A vibrant popular culture emerged in the late 19th century which celebrated Britain’s imperial glory
• Popular enthusiasm for empire was the product of a range of factors from the spread of education and greater literacy to the emergence of mass politics, following the widening of the Franchise in 1867 and 1884
• Organised entertainment, particularly in the flourishing music halls, and the spread of advertisement aimed at mass markets, were also responsible for the rise in interest
• Magazines and popular press found that “imperialism sold” meaning they would write stories or articles about empire

Question 14

Alfred Harmsworth

Answer 14

• Owners of the Daily Mail and Daily Mirror
• “old style newspapers served the news raw, Harmsworth served it cooked”
• He saw the opportunity in producing a more popular form of journalism as most people could now read
• He pioneered the production of an entirely new form of cheap, populist newspaper n 1896 with the Daily Mail
• The paper was deliberately aimed at the lower-middle class market and sold at a low retail price
• During the second Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902, it was selling over a million copies a day, filling its pages with stories of the war and damming the Boers and Kruger whilst praising the Heroism of the British troops
• In the early 20th century, the Mail turned its vitriol against the Germans, who were portrayed as posing a military threat to the empire
• The mail also serialised a number of patriotic books such as Erskine Childers “the Riddle of the sands” (1903) and captain Curties’ “when England Slept” (1909)

Question 15

Popular press

Answer 15

• The years between 1890 and 1914 were something of a “golden age” of newspaper publication
• This was as technical advances in printing and the emergence of the professional journalist enabled print to respond to demand and reach out to a new mass audience of the new population who could read

Question 16

What does Kipling’s “the white man’s burden” show about imperial attitudes?

Answer 16

• The indigenous people are described as a burden to the white British people
• White people are described as the best breed
• White British people should be sent to the colonies to help the indigenous people who need this help
• The colonies are not seen as beneficial and its Britain’s duty to help them
• The British are trying to make it seem as if they don’t want to do this, but they feel they have to try and improve (educate) the non-white inferior people
• The British are bringing the indigenous people to civilisation and are attempting to say this is their moral duty
• This idea of the colonies being the “white man’s burden” allows the British to justify their imperial actions

Question 17

Literature

Answer 17

• The celebrated and popular writer Rudyard Kipling did much to shape the attitudes of the British public towards empire in the years before 1914
• He could often be critical of imperial administrators, but he had an almost religious belief in empire and the superiority of the British race and filled his work with references to Britain’s “higher goals”
• The works of Kipling, the books of Samuel Baker and G.A Henty’s tales of military campaigns proved to be Victorian bestsellers
• More subtle encouragement for imperialism featured in women’s writing, particularly in romantic fiction
• British India proved perhaps the most popular setting as Anglo-India love stories proliferated from the 1890s, not least those of Maud Diver for whom British romance and heroism in the subcontinent formed the mainstay of her fiction

Question 18

Music

Answer 18

• Nationalist and imperialist themes were also to be found in music and could be heard up and down the country in music halls, concert halls and churches
• Such music was played at coronations, jubilees, pageants and exhibitions
• Imperial ballads, patriotic hymns, stirring choral works and military marches were performed by brass bands, church choirs and town choral societies and could be heard in town music halls
• Sir Arthur Sullivan worked with the librettist Sir William S. Gilbert, to create a series of operas which often conveyed a jingoistic and imperialist message in humorous ways
• The best known and most popular imperial composer was Edward Elgar who deliberately sought to stimulate his listeners’ emotions and create mental images, which captured the “nobility of empire”
• Elgar became a widely popular composer, writing an “Imperial March” for Queen Victoria’s diamond Jubilee in 1897, along with other songs
• Having received a copy of a poem by Cardinal Newman, he was inspired by Gordon’s resistance in Sudan to write the choral work “The Dream of Gerontius”
• He continued to compose and conduct imperial works until his death

Question 19

Youth and empire

Answer 19

• It was hard for children, except for the most deprived, to escape the imperialist messages spread through books, organisations and schools
• Increased literacy had produced a new market for books and comics and the young were read adventure stories with imperial themes
• Tales of the exotic and illustrations from British outputs were presented in E.J. Brett’s “Boys of the Empire” along with his other, short-lived comics such as the Boys of England and Young Men of Great Britain
• The Religious Tact Society produced both the Boy’s Own Paper and the Girl’s Own Paper, which secured a readership of between a quarter and half a million in the years 1890 to 1914
• These comics were read in schools and church halls across the country with their popularity based on their promotion and celebration of both military and missionary activity
• Robert Baden-Powell, himself a “hero” of the Second Anglo-Boer war, in imitation of the earlier Boy’s Brigade in 1883, established the Scout movement in 1908, followed by the Girl Guides in 1912
• The movement was organised almost like a military cadet force and was designed to train defenders of empire through competitive challenges bringing the chance to earn badges
• Scouting proved the most successful of all attempts to mobilise young people behind imperial themes and was popular in the dominions too
• Other youth organisations had a Christian dimension, for example, the Nonconformist Boys’ Life Brigade and Anglican Church Lads’ Brigade established in the 1890s
• An older church organisation, The Girls Friendly Society boasted over 200,000 members by 1914 as well as its own colonial emigration secretary, Ellen Joyce, who encouraged girls to consider emigration to improve themselves
• This history and geography books used in the state elementary schools also tended to emphasis the glories of empire, presented the explorers and missionaries who helped create it as heroes and depicted colonial people (indigenous) in racist and chauvinist terms
• Children of all classes celebrated Empire Day, while those in public schools took part in cadet corps and continued to be reminded of their imperial mission and duty
• Children were trained for empire, as well as racial and cultural dominance, in the early 20th century, with longstanding consequences for memories of the Empire in modern Britain

Question 20

Other representations

Answer 20

• Advertisers frequently used imperial connotations to sell their goods, which would suggest that the British public felt favourably disposed to empire
• The way the people of the empire were racially stereotyped in these materials generally reflected the Social Darwinist views of the time and fed into ideas of Britain as paternal rulers
• The empire was also represented in architecture and the imperial creations of Herbert Baker and Edwin Lutyens
• Lutyens designed both in Britain and the empire itself
• He was responsible for the Johannesburg Art Gallery from 1911 and the British pavilion at the international exhibition the same year
• In 1912, he was invited to help design New Delhi, as a home for the government of India. He travelled to India and mapped out his vast city plan developing buildings which connected Mughal and neo-classical elements
• One of the greatest representations of Empire was Queen Victoria’s extravagant Diamond Jubilee Celebration of 1897
• Representatives from all over the empire converged on London for a huge military display involving 50,000 troops
• This is sometimes looked back on as the zenith (high point) of colonial self confidence
• Similarly, King George V’s coronation was celebrated with a festival of empire at the Crystal Palace in London
• Here exhibitions of imperial products were displayed
• An intra-empire sports competition was held as part of the festival (which later became the commonwealth games) and military bands and a 500 voice choir performed
• Souvenir books and postcards as well as the media reports all helped convey the value of empire to the general public