Imperialism is the policy of expanding the influence and power of a nation-state beyond its borders. This is typically achieved by a process of colonization – taking political and economic control of a foreign country or territory, usually through use of military force preceding occupation. However, there are also ‘softer’ forms of imperialism. The USA, for instance, has been accused of practising cultural and economic imperialism, achieving dominant positions in foreign territories by astute manipulation of its wealth (as represented, for instance, by large companies) and cultural reach (epitomized by Hollywood and the music industry).
The good, the bad and the ugly
Imperialism has a long and not always noble history. Any consideration of world history abounds in tales of empire and few areas have been untouched. We may look to the empires that dominated life in ancient China, India and Japan, or the vast dominions of the Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, the Assyrians, Persians and Mongols, the Byzantines and Ottomans, and the Incas and Aztecs in South America. Not to mention the plethora of empires that stretched across Sub-Saharan Africa prior to the period of European colonization, which eventually saw the British rule an empire bigger than any before or since. In certain lights, history looks like nothing more than a narrative of conquest and colonization.
The modern world is most obviously defined by the period of European empire building that began in the 15th century with colonization first of the New World, and subsequently of India and the East Indies. The so-called ‘Scramble for Africa’ in the late 19th century then divided that vast continent into spheres of European interest. In the 20th century, an unseemly jostle for international influence between the great European states culminated in the First World War, before the expansionist ambitions of, in particular, inter-war Germany brought about the Second World War, while post-Second World War Russian expansionism precipitated the Cold War. So imperialism has dictated the course of international politics.
There have been broadly four major justifications for imperialism. Firstly, there are arguments of an economic nature – that the colonizing country requires (or at least, desires) the resources of another country. Then there are strategic justifications – usually that an empire is required to protect the colonizing country’s security. The Soviet Union, for instance, oversaw the Eastern Bloc in the twentieth century at least in part to have a succession of buffer states between itself and its Western enemies. Thirdly, empire has been seen as an expression of the natural order of the world, in which some societies are inherently dominant over others. Julius Caesar exemplifies the idea when he is said to have coolly recorded: ‘I came, I saw, I conquered.’
Map of the British Empire, 1914
Finally, there is justification on moral grounds – for example, that the colonized people are being liberated from unjust rule or are being introduced to a better way of life.
The post-Second World War period saw the European empires recede from Africa and Asia, while the collapse of the Soviet Union seemed to confirm the arrival of what is sometimes called the ‘post-colonial age’. Nonetheless, there are those who still see imperialism in action – from Russia’s annexation of the Crimea to the West’s economic and logistical support for particular regimes abroad, and even China’s ‘soft imperialism’ as it heavily invests in Africa’s economic development. But few world leaders now openly espouse imperialist ideology.