Colonialism and Development: Britain and its Tropical Colonies, 1850-1960 [Paperback]

Michael A. Havinden (Editor), David Meredith (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0415123089 | ISBN-13: 978-0415123082 | Publication Date: January 26, 1996 | Edition: New edition

British colonial rule of the tropics is the critical background to contemporary development issues. This study of Britain's economic and political relationship with its tropical colonies provides detailed analyses of trade and policy. The considerations of past successes and failures elucidate current opportunities and developments. No other book covers this broad topic with such detail and clarity.

Editorial Reviews

Review

`As a clear and accessible synthesis of wide-ranging material, this book will be a useful introductory text for undergraduates, and a valuable point of reference for specialist in the field. - Jrnl of Imperial & Commonwealth History

`The book provides an excellent summary of recent research as well as supplying insights from new archival material. - Economic History Review

`The statistics are fascinating, the comparisons illuminating, and the whole work has a firm chronological framework which carries the story across the great economic watersheds of the modern colonial century. - History Today

About the Author

Michael Havinden is Senior Lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Exeter. David Meredith is Senior Lecturer in Economic History at the University of South Wales. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 436 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; New edition edition (January 26, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415123089
• ISBN-13: 978-0415123082
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,353,933 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very nicely done, June 26, 2008

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Autodidact - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Colonialism and Development: Britain and its Tropical Colonies, 1850-1960 (Paperback)

This is a rare book that combines solid detailed factual research with good storytelling. Be aware that its focus is economic development, including where relevant discussions of trade and trade policy, and fiscal impact. There is little to no discussion of politics, political thought or political evolution except insofar as they directly bear on the setting of colonial policy.

Now what we need is a book that is just like this one, but about the French colonies.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb account of the iniquities of empire, July 31, 2001

By 

William Podmore (London United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Colonialism and Development: Britain and its Tropical Colonies, 1850-1960 (Hardcover)

This fascinating and scholarly study provides the hard evidence that the British Empire was a disaster for those whom it ruled. For instance, Benjamin Kidd, in 'The Control of the Tropics', wrote that the inhabitants of the tropics had no right to their resources; he held that they must be developed for the general good of the world. In fact they were developed, when they were, only for the general good of the british ruling class, as grasping a bunch of villains as the world has ever seen.

Havinden and Meredith conclude, "Throughout this book we have shown that colonialism and development were largely contradictory and that this produced a gap between the dreams (or myths) of developing the 'great estate' and the economic realities. The structural imbalances in the economies of the British colonies which were apparent by the end of the colonial era were the direct result of the pursuit of the Chamberlain aim of buttressing the British economy with a 'great estate' in the tropics. In the end the Chamberlain dream was abandoned along with formal colonial rule but its persistence over the previous seventy years bequeathed the now ex-colonies a legacy which would continue to inhibit their economic development in the years to come." They wrote, "The Colonial Office's development philosophy still depended upon the belief that once the state had provided a framework ordered government and a basic infrastructure, private entrepreneurs and private capital could be relied upon to initiate and carry out a steady programme of economic advance. ... the development problem was not as simple as this." Pre-1914, "the incomes of most of the inhabitants of the tropical colonies remained pitifully small and their standard of living abysmally low." As now, disgusting levels of wealth fed off vilely low poverty.

Sir Henry Moore, Assistant Secretary at the Colonial Office, wrote in 1939 that, "any proposals for the creation of secondary industry in the Colonial Empire are received with a marked lack of enthusiasm, if not with suspicion. The reason for this, I suggest, appears to me to be found in the more or less unwritten rule that any proposals, whether in the field of industry or tariffs, which give rise to any conflict of economic interest, should be approached from the standpoint that United Kingdom trade interests must rank first, Dominion trade interests second, and those of the Colonial Empire last." For 'trade interests', read fat cats. Plus ca change - yet.