By Karuna Mantena
Alibis of Empire provides a singular account of the origins, substance, and afterlife of overdue imperial ideology. Karuna Mantena demanding situations the concept Victorian empire used to be essentially legitimated via liberal notions of development and civilization. actually, because the British Empire received its farthest succeed in, its ideology was once being dramatically remodeled via a self-conscious rejection of the liberal version. The cave in of liberal imperialism enabled a brand new culturalism that under pressure the risks and problems of attempting to "civilize" local peoples. And, hand in hand with this shift in pondering used to be a shift in perform towards versions of oblique rule. As Mantena exhibits, the paintings of Victorian felony pupil Henry Maine used to be on the heart of those momentous alterations. Alibis of Empire examines how Maine's sociotheoretic version of "traditional" society laid the foundation for the culturalist good judgment of overdue empire. In charting the circulation from liberal idealism, via culturalist clarification, to retroactive alibi inside of nineteenth-century British imperial ideology, Alibis of Empire finds a outstanding and pervasive dynamic of contemporary empire.
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Extra resources for Alibis of Empire: Henry Maine and the Ends of Liberal Imperialism
Example text
It is essentially an absolute government, founded, not on consent, but on conquest. It does not represent the native principles of life or of government, and it can never do so until it represents heathenism and barbarism. 88 The corollary to the unabashed assertion of superiority, for Stephen, was unapologetic authoritarian rule in the colonies. ” Despite the brashness of his rhetoric, Stephen was not merely a jingoistic defender of empire. Stephen thought of himself as articulating a more robust and consistent utilitarian liberalism.
84 As criticism of the bill mounted in both Britain and India, it became increasingly clear that what was at stake was less the status of British Indians per se than the fundamental philosophy of British rule in India. 85 The question, according to Ripon, was not about the particular provisions supported by the Ilbert Bill, 40 C H A P T E R O N E but the principles upon which India is to be governed. Is she to be ruled for the benefit of the Indian people of all races, classes, and creeds, or in the sole interest of a small body of Europeans?
The fact of rebellion provoked a sense of disillusionment in the progressive ideals of abolition, and the burden of responsibility was placed squarely on the shoulders of freed Jamaican slaves who seemingly failed to take advantage of the benefits of emancipation. 80 The reform and improvement of native customs and morals seemed not only be limited in effect but also potentially dangerous to the stability of CRISIS OF LIBERAL IMPERIALISM 39 empire. Thus the reactions to the events of Morant Bay, like responses to the Indian Rebellion, heralded a deepening sense of racial and cultural difference between rulers and ruled, on the one hand, and a distancing from the universalist and assimilationist ideals of liberal imperialism, on the other.