It's worth noting that "India" did not exist at the time, which made it possible for the British to take over by using these divisions. Perhaps the very existence of India is the most important legacy of the British in the region.
The weak and divided will always be taken advantage of. That's a historical constant. From the Renaissance onward Europe (yes, it was heavily divided but somehow that seemed to have fostered competition and progress) was unstoppable and miles ahead of everyone else. I think that's key and it's really interesting to study the causes of that. What we've seen starting in the second half of the 19th century is the world trying to catch up.
Energies are better used to build a prosperous and well-governed country rather than dwelling on who took what from whom in the past (everyone took whatever they could from everyone else).
Not a fan of revisionist theories and unsubstantiated fan fictions, but your idea of India being a British creation is utterly misinformed, India is a very old political entity and had been United under multiple nations states & empires throughout its recorded history.
> Not a fan of revisionist theories and unsubstantiated fan fictions
I can understand that Indians feel a degree of humiliation at having been colonised by a comparatively rather small island nation, but bitterness an burying one's head in the sand is not going to change history. Trying to shutdown discussion by basically insulting others won't, either.
If what is now India had been a single, unified political entity it would have been much more difficult, if not impossible, for the British to take over the way they did. We can look at China as an example of that: While it was in a state of 'decay' that allowed a level of colonisation and land grab it was still an single, unified country that was able to resist complete takeover.
Note that I'm not making any judgment or attempt at justifying anything. I am just pointing out that what happened is what happened everywhere throughout history. The particularity of the period is perhaps what I mentioned in my previous comment: Europe's advance that allowed it to essentially subjugate the world. It is much more useful to learn from the past (and to learn from others) than to stay in the past.
> Energies are better used to build a prosperous and well-governed country rather than dwelling on who took what from whom in the past (everyone took whatever they could from everyone else).
Fair enough, but in today's age of liberal democracies, we can maybe take lessons from the past and use that to inform decisions that our countries take in the future. Perhaps a population better educated on the atrocities of colonialism may be less willing to support unjustified wars and exploitative projects in the future.
Yes, in today's age of liberal democracies, we can take lessons from the past, like the value of free speech, innocent until proven guilty, not being deprived freedom without due process of law / habeas corpus, abolishment of debtors prisons, private property / not being deprived of property without due process of law, etc.
It seems like we have a lot of infringements of basic and fundamental rights in which we are forgetting history and how we got here. However, I haven't seen a significant effort to revive colonialism. So perhaps this isn't the highest priority example of where we need to learn from history at the moment?
Even America's expeditionary wars don't have the intention of changing the lines on maps. The only nation that has done that recently that I'm aware of is Russia. Trying to fly today's wars and examples of exploitation of peoples under the flag of colonialism seems rather forced to me. Why not just say "bad stuff" and tie that to colonialism?
Great Britain was also responsible for ending the slave trade. Slavery was a constant in human society for millennia, but it was the British that outlawed it and spent 60 years and many lives enforcing its ban throughout much of the world.
Great Britain literally enslaved innumerable colonies. Global activism pressured them to declare their own slavery illegal, though they could’ve also just listened to the people they enslaved. And you say that the slaves should be praising their slavers for deciding to stop slaving them? Amazing.
They couldn't have given two-hoots for "global activism". It was the most powerful empire in the world and it made considerable money from slavery. They were pressured into it by British people, many of whom had moral objections to slavery. They didn't just "stop slaving people". They forced much of the world to "stop slaving people" too.
Furthermore, they didn't "enslave colonies". They established colonies. They conquered nations and territories. And they shipped slaves, a minority of whom were captured by British slavers, but most of whom they bought from Arab and African slavers.
> Furthermore, they didn't "enslave colonies". They established colonies.
They established two kind of colonies - one which exploited man power and natural resources, and the other was territorial and treated as a natural extension of their own kingdom (after they conquered and replaced the orginal habitants with their own citizens). All the Asian and African colonies fall into the former category where as all the "white mans land" - Australia, New Zealand, Canada, USA - falls into the latter category. (I know some Americans would debate that they were in the exploitive category too, but as an indian I'd disagree).
By that logic, an alternative history where Hitler committed Jewish genocide and then stopped in the middle of it and decided not to, would also be praiseworthy?
I don’t know where your argument is going, other than that hey they stopped doing this bad thing. My original comment was about how colonies got nothing in return from the colonizer. You chose to state a tangential point, that the slavers stopped slaving.
No, because Hitler was responsible for the Holocaust. What you are doing is equivalent to condemning Germany, the nation, including the people who had nothing to do with the Holocaust and fought against it.
Some people in the British Empire took part in the slave trade, and those people should be condemned. Some other people didn't. They fought against it and when they were in power they stopped it and expended considerable resources stopping others from doing it. Those people are praiseworthy, even though they were part of the British Empire.
No, I think oddly you’re the one making that argument.
I’m saying Nazis+Hitler should be condemned, never mentioned Germany. Similarly, I said Great Britain, both the monarchy and their colonial companies and the government resulting, which is what the article talks about as well. Never mentioned the citizens that fought back shouldn’t be acknowledged.
But it wasn’t just ordinary citizens who fought slavery. It was Members of Parliament and the aristocracy. It was Prime Ministers and military leaders. The Royal Navy lost 5000 men fighting slavers. Their West Africa Squadron captured over a thousand slaver ships and freed hundreds of thousands of slaves. They spent a significant portion of Britain’s national income fighting slavery every year for 6 decades. No country in modern history has spent as much on a purely moral venture that was against its national self interest.
Your replies are a classic case of “moving goalposts”, which only aim to further the notion that Britain must be praised for their anti-slavery efforts. Simultaneously downplaying slavery and modern colonialism, you are pursuing this argument without acknowledging the concept that the enslaved see the world differently than their /glorious/ enslavers. Anyways, since you fail to address the original discussion, I’ll end this thread as it will gain me nothing.
You are probably being downvoted by the proclaimed nationalists of my country, but what you say is quite true - modern India came into existence on 15th August 1947, when we got our independence from the British. After the Mughal empire's 200-300 year rule weakened in India, it disintegrated into many kingdoms that kept fighting each other (as has always happened in our history). This is why the imperialist-capitalist East India Company could easily conquer these kingdoms. (They weren't alone - the french and the portuguese too vied with them, but British ended up with the major pie in hand).
Today, we can certainly draw upon the culture and history of all these various kingdoms and take pride in our multicultural society and the rich history it provides. But to go beyond that is just egoistical, and like you rightly said, will leave you stuck in the past rather than giving important to your present state and the future you desire.
> It's worth noting that "India" did not exist at the time, which made it possible for the British to take over by using these divisions.
Citation needed. What exactly did not exist? What do you mean by "India" here?
The people, the culture, languages etc have all existed for many many years before the British even thought of setting foot in India.
As for the land that we call India today:
Babur (the Founder of Mughal Empire in the 1500s) described "Hindustan" as follows:
“The country of Hindustan is extensive, full of men and full of produce. On the east, south and even on the west, it ends at its great enclosing ocean (muhit-daryasigah). On the north it has mountains which connect with those of Hindukush, Kafiristan and Kashmir. North-west of it lie Kabul, Ghazni and Qandahar. Delhi is held to be the capital of the whole of Hindustan.”
In case you don't know, Hindustan is the Persian name of India at the time. And in the above quote he is describing Himalayas, and the seas that surround India in East, West and South. Thats pretty much the entire modern day India + Pakistan described by a Persian guy in 1500s. The british landed in India a good 100 years after that
As for being "weak and divided", I believe you are implying that India was ruled by many kingdoms and thus wasn't a unified entity. At the time the British landed, Mughal Empire was the prominent power and controlled almost all of modern day India. Before the Mughal Empire, there were other Empires that controlled almost all of Modern day India + Pakistan. One such empire is the Maurya Empire which reigned from 322 - 185 BC.
Also the British company that came to India was literally named after India and was the East *India* company that was founded in 1600s. Not to mention naming other places after India when they were no where near India like the West Indies or like referring to North American Natives as "Indians"
So please elaborate on what exactly did not exist?
> Perhaps the very existence of India is the most important legacy of the British in the region.
I see this article as an attempt to correct such blatant revisionisms of history. India existed long before the British came. They enslaved, and looted India. And to say that existence of India is their legacy is slap in the face of thousands who died in search of freedom and an Identity and to not be a slave. Would you go around saying the Nazis put Jews on the world map? If not, then don't say the same about India and the British. The British were an occupying force and their biggest achievement in India is that they didn't kill the natives like they did in Australia or America. And they didn't do that because it was more profiting to put enslave the local population than to kill it.
The weak and divided will always be taken advantage of. That's a historical constant. From the Renaissance onward Europe (yes, it was heavily divided but somehow that seemed to have fostered competition and progress) was unstoppable and miles ahead of everyone else. I think that's key and it's really interesting to study the causes of that. What we've seen starting in the second half of the 19th century is the world trying to catch up.
Energies are better used to build a prosperous and well-governed country rather than dwelling on who took what from whom in the past (everyone took whatever they could from everyone else).