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Colony and Empire: The Capitalist Transformation of the American West

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The history that people are told and retold about the early American West is not always true. Pre-existing and inaccurate ideas of the West are implanted into people's skulls by Hollywood, foggy-minded teachers, and misled scholars. American pride can even shield people from the truth or lead them in a more ideal direction of what they want the history of the West to be instead of what it actually is. William Robbins recognizes this in his book Colony and Empire: The Capitalist Transformation of the American West and attempts to pull back the layers of romance and myth surrounding the West. In doing so, he reveals the true forces that shaped and carved the West into what it is today.

Robbins examines how previous authors have portrayed the progress and industrialization of the West. He builds his arguments up with harsh realities that knock down the pretty and gentle stories of other authors. He opens the book by defaming the myth that a few good men and elbow grease built the nation from the ground up. He shows how settlers only played a part in shaping the destiny of the frontier.

Arrell Morgan Gibson is one of the many victimized by Robbins's criticism. Gibson is attacked for his books that, according to Robbins, portray the West as a world of romantic heroes that was built solely on the power of goodness and righteousness. Throughout the book, Robbins makes it clear to the reader just how disgustingly far from reality these interpretations are. Many of his cited sources are referred to in order to criticize them rather than to support his own ideas.

Robbins looks at the history of decreasing manual labor as machines take over. This serves as a vital topic as Robbins discusses industrialization and changes in capitalism. These changes serve as Robbins's main thesis and were often fueled and influenced by foreign investors with interests of their own. One chapter focuses on the yearning for personal wealth and prosperity yet shady examples of this can be found throughout. It is a surprising look at who really had power in the West. This book is a compilation of drawn-out explanations of factors in an equation that equal what the American West is today. Vast amounts of land produce resources. Resources reap wealth and greed. Wealth and greed feeds capitalism. Capitalism supplies industrialization and mobility. Mobility multiplies technological progress and the quality of living. None of these things are magical or precious like many of the stories that are used to explain history today. Pointing this out takes up most of the pages in Robbins's book.

Robbins successfully accomplishes what he set out to do with this book. Unfortunately, Robbins's writing style rubs off as bossy and angry. This is because every chapter is just a new angle to disprove what others have written. His battle, however, is legitimate and noble. There is simply no way to criticize all of the kid-friendly works of history without looking like a jackass. The book serves as an educationally valuable resource for those wanting to learn more about the West. All in all, however, the book would provide little entertainment for readers that lack a pre-existing interest in the subject.

William G. Robbins, in "Colony & Empire: The Capitalist Transformation of the American West" dispels the myths of exceptionalism in the West. His approach is to demonstrate that the Turnerian theory of the American frontier is outdated and inaccurate. Robbins is extremely successful in providing evidence that the traditional history of the West is flawed and based in legend.

Robbins demonstrates that the West was strongly influenced by wage labor and capitalist ideals and motives. He does, however, attribute many other changes in the region to capitalistic causes. Even though he demonstrates that previous historians were wrong in their historiography, he fails to support the claim that capitalism was the primary catalyst in this transformation of the West.

The book was originally written as a series of independent essays. This shows and detracts greatly from the flow of the narrative. Robbins is exceedingly redundant, bogging down the reader.

Overall, Colony & Empire has some very good research behind it and some very good history throughout. An overly aggressive label of capitalism as the motive force and extreme redundancy, however, makes the reader work very hard in order to find the good stuff. This book could easily be re-edited and get 4+ stars.