CapitalistImperialistPig

After Tamerlane: The Rise and Fall of Global Empires, 1400-2000 is John Darwin's account of how a somewhat backward fringe of Eurasian civilization came to dominate the world with global empires and how those empires collapsed. This is big picture history. Those colorful characters who do so much to give human scale and character to history are hardly present, because Darwin is far more interested in global features. It's a major loss, from my point of view. On the positive side, his mile high view of history makes clear a lot of trends and large scale phenomena that might remain obscured in a finer grained (and more human) history. I was especially interested in two central themes - the notion that European predominance was essentially accidental and the degree to which events, once underway, have their own momentum, beyond the control of any of the actors. Europe in the Fifteenth Century knew that it was on the outskirts of civilization, and so did the rest of the world...

If the Nineteenth Century was dominated by the increasing scope and power of Europe's colonial system, The Twentieth saw the destruction of the same. Decolonization is often equated with the end of colonial rule, but this is much too narrow. It is far more useful to think of it as the demolition of a Europe-centred imperial order in which territorial empire was interlocked with extraterritorial ‘rights’. The bases, enclaves, garrisons, gunboats, treaty ports and unequal treaties (as in Egypt or China) that littered the Afro-Asian world were as much the expression of this European imperialism as were the colonies and protectorates coloured red, blue, yellow or green on the old imperial maps. So was the assumption that intervention was justified by the general failure of non-European states to reach the civilizational standard that European visitors were entitled to expect. This imperial ‘order’ imagined a cultural hierarchy in which the progressive capabilities of North West Europe...

Or somebody like him. Achilles heel of Europe’s global primacy was the underdevelopment of the European states system. It was Europe’s sudden expansion on its Balkan doorstep, the brittle structure of its multinational empires, and the chaotic politics of its smallest states that turned a political murder into a general war. The European balance of power was unable to cope with the final collapse of Ottoman rule in the Balkans. To a shrewd insider just before the war, it seemed obvious enough that international peace must depend on the judgement and skill of statesmen and diplomats. Darwin, John (2010-08-08). After Tamerlane (p. 373). Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. Kindle Edition.

The wolves of European colonialism mainly managed to avoid general war among themselves while extending their empires over the rest of the world. By 1900, they were running out of other peoples' land to steal or otherwise colonize. So they turned, once again, on each other. The most vital prop of Europe’s primacy in Eurasia, and of the powerful position of the great European states in the Outer World beyond, had been their collective determination not to fight each other. It had been this and the Atlantic peace between Europe and the Americas that had allowed the rapid growth of international trade, the steady extension of European influence and authority, and the ironic achievement of the African partition. The reluctance of European governments to upset their continental balance of power and risk the social and political upheaval that a general war would bring had restrained their pursuit of national and imperial advantage. Darwin, John (2010-08-08). After Tamerlane (p. 370)....

After the calamitous wars of late Eighteenth Century the five major powers of Europe, Britain, France, Germany Prussia, Austria and Russia reached a sort of accord in the Treaty of Final Act of the Congress of Vienna of 1815. They would cooperate to prevent future continental wars and not have their foreign trade interfered with. Moreover, after 1815, a creeping generic liberalism spread over the continent. Naturally the treaty was not completely successful, and wars continued, but not on the scale of the religious, dynastic and Napoleonic wars of earlier times. Nor was the advance of liberalism especially rapid or steady. So what were the tenets of this mid-Nineteenth century liberalism. According to Constant: Modern societies, he suggested, were too complex to be ruled politically after the fashion of an ancient city state – the model to which many earlier writers (including Rousseau) had appealed. Diversity, pluralism and localism were the secret of stability and freedom. ...

for our times too. (‘No great commercial and manufacturing state in modern times . . .’ said Malthus, ‘has yet been known permanently to make higher profits than the average of the rest of Europe.’)1 Darwin, John (2010-08-08). After Tamerlane (p. 223). Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. Kindle Edition.

I had never fully appreciated the role of the warriors of the steppe in Eurasian history. While they were a recurring bad dream for the cultures they ravaged, they also created or destroyed many of the great empires of history. In the Sixteenth Century, for example, they ruled China (the Manchus), India (the Mughal empire), and the Ottoman empire. The founders of the Persian (Safanid) empire also seem to have some elements of Turkic roots. The Russian empire grew out of a vassal state of the Golden Horde. These frequently loose confederations of pastoral nomads were exceptionally capable at warfare, and vulnerable civilizations, Ming, Roman and other collapsed before them. The empires they built were not without their merits. Under the Mughals, Indian culture and economy flourished - at the cost of frequently brutal taxation. When their empire disintegrated, claims John Darwin: ...Humiliated by the Marathas, unable to staunch the haemorrhage of power to their provincial gover...

Despite the trouble I get into when I venture there, I continue to be fascinated by the remarkable history of India. Although Indian civilization is one of the oldest and most creative in the world, its very wealth, combined with its proximity to central Asia, have made it a repeated target for conquerors. Despite living under foreign and culturally alien invaders for most of the last 1100 years, it has managed remarkably well at preserving an independent, vibrant and exceptionally resilient civilization. I doubt that this can be said of any other nation. John Darwin considers the subject in his book After Tamerlane. One of the successor conquerors was Akbar, grandson of Babur. Here is one number that amazed me. Akbar’s ministers were able to apply their revenue system – collecting in cash perhaps one-half of the value of agricultural production86 – with remarkable uniformity across his territories.87 This great revenue stream was the real foundation of Mughal imperial power. ...

I'm reading a new book, The Empire Project: The Rise and Fall of the British World-System, 1830-1970 by John Darwin. An early quote: It was also the case that British expansion had no master-plan. It had almost always been true that colonial schemes or their commercial equivalents were devised not by governments but by private enthusiasts in search of wealth, virtue or religious redemption. Sometimes they dragged Whitehall in their wake, to get its protection, secure a monopoly or obtain a licence to rule through a charter or patent. By ‘insider-dealing’ in the political world, they might conscript Whitehall's resources for their colony-building. Sometimes Whitehall insisted on an imperial claim on its soldiers’ or sailors’ advice, or to appease a popular outcry. But, once entrenched at their beachhead, the ‘men on the spot’ were hard to restrain, awkward to manage and impossible to abandon. Darwin (2009-10-15). The Empire Project (p. 3). Cambridge University Press. Kindle E...