Documents in Imperial History - Böcker

This first volume of a projected four-volume set details the impressive record of eight hundred years of English (later British) imperial rule. The editors have assembled the earliest documentary evidence necessary for a fundamental understanding of the priorities, devices, and frustrations in the British imperial experience. The documents balance the ideas, policies, and actions emanating from England with those evolving in the various colonies. This juxtaposition emphasizes the similarity of the problems experienced by the individual colonies. The documents also illustrate the relationship between constitutional developments and ideas in Britain, in individual colonies, and in the empire as a whole.

This collection of documents presents an enlightening picture of the colonial government of the British Commonwealth during the Second British Empire. Using numerous original documents, with preference given to those not previously published or readily available, the editors have delineated the major themes of the period from 1763 to 1840.

The sixth volume in Greenwood's ongoing series, this book is the first of three fine volumes to cover the twentieth century and the last stages in decolonization of the British Empire. It is concerned with the original five Dominions, the apparently inappropriate association of the Irish Free State with those Dominions, and the similarly anomalous status of India, the first non-European dependency and the first republic to secure full membership in the Commonwealth and to make it a multiracial association. The book documents the evolution of, changes in, and rise and fall of that Commonwealth association; the shifts in the balance of powers within the Canadian and Australian federations; the fulfillment of union in South Africa and Ireland; the coherence emerging in New Zealand; the bankruptcy in Newfoundland; and the separation of India and Pakistan. Two forthcoming volumes will deal with the colonies, protectorates, and mandates in the twentieth century.

The penultimate volume in this documentary series covers the first part of the 20th century processes of decolonization within the British Empire, concluding with the independence of Ceylon, the first of the non-European-settled colonies. It also illustrates constitutional developments in the West Indies (particularly Jamaica, Trinidad, and British Guiana), Mauritius and Seychelles, Hong Kong, Fiji, the Western Pacific, Gibraltar, the Falklands, and West, East, and Central-Southern Africa, as well as advance and retreat in Malta and Cyprus. There is a section on Egypt and on the mandates of Palestine, Transjordania, and Mesopotamia.An introductory section demonstrates the changes both in attitudes to and the dimensions of colonial rule during the period from the deep freeze of trusteeship to partnership. The concluding date saw, in addition to Ceylon's full membership in the Commonwealth, the speedy replacement of an abortive union of Malaya by a federation, a failed initiative in Cyprus, and what proved to be abortive reform in Hong Kong and Fiji, treaty revision in Egypt, a policy change in the Sudan, the surrender of the Palestine mandate, and the establishment of Israel. By 1948, though doubts remained about a closer association of the colonies, protectorates, and mandates in West, East, and Central Africa, there was optimism about a possible federation of the Caribbean.

This volume--the fifth in a series providing key documents for the constitutional history of the British Empire and Commonwealth from the twelfth century to the twentieth--deals with those dependencies of the Crown where for various reasons it was considered premature to concede fully representative, let alone responsible, government, and also with Ireland where the union with Britain made in 1800 was coming under increasing strain. It covers the years from 1840 to 1900, in parallel with the companion volume IV which dealt with the four main settler colonies. The documents in this volume illustrate the ways in which Britain attempted to devise forms of government it was thought would be, at least in the short term, more suitable for dependencies which had few British settlers who might successfully operate a representative system--and where the majority of indigenous peoples needed protection against such a minority. There was, however, a desire that such colonies should be as self-governing and self-sufficient as possible, but a commitment to trusteeship operated against any rule-of-thumb concession of the sort of constitutions granted contemporaneously to settler colonies.The first section of this volume focuses on British imperial authority and the means whereby it attempted to exercise supervision over the scattered parts of the dependent empire (the so-called British settlements; protectorates under extra-territorial jurisdiction; the use of chartered companies). India is the subject of the second section: documents are here included illustrating the transfer of power from a chartered company back to the Crown and the hesitant moves toward quasi-representation on the Indian councils. A third section is concerned with the collapse of the old representative system in the West Indian colonies and the experiment with a responsive government in Jamaica. The fourth section shows what happened to the original Crown colonies and to new ones acquired in this period, together with adjacent spheres of influence and protectorates. There is then a section dealing with a group of special cases--the Ionian Islands, Cyprus, and Egypt, while the final section deals with the unique problems of Ireland and the attempts made to devolve a measure of internal self-government on John Bull's other Island to appease growing nationalist and inter-sectarian tensions.