civilisation was made possible, and indeed inevitable, by the amazing
development of the material aspects of that civilisation during the
nineteenth century; by the progressive command over the forces of
nature which the advance of science had placed in the hands of man, by
the application of science to industry in the development of
manufacturing methods and of new modes of communication, and by the
intricate and flexible organisation of modern finance. These changes
were already in progress before 1878, and were already transforming the
face of the world. Since 1878 they have gone forward with such
accelerating speed that we have been unable to appreciate the
significance of the revolution they were effecting. We have been
carried off our feet; and have found it impossible to adjust our moral
and political ideas to the new conditions.
The great material achievements of the last two generations have been
mainly due to an intense concentration and specialisation of functions
among both men of thought and men of action. But the result of this has
been that there have been few to attempt the vitally important task of
appreciating the movement of our civilisation as a whole, and of
endeavouring to determine how far the political conceptions inherited
from an earlier age were valid in the new conditions. For under the
pressure of the great transformation political forces also have been
transformed, and in all countries political thought is baffled and
bewildered by the complexity of the problems by which it is faced. To
this in part we owe the dimness of vision which overtook us as we went
whirling together towards the great catastrophe. It is only in the
glare of a world-conflagration that we begin to perceive, in something
like their true proportions, the great forces and events which have
been shaping our destinies. In the future, if the huge soulless
mechanism which man has created is not to get out of hand and destroy
him, we must abandon that contempt for the philosopher and the
political thinker which we have latterly been too ready to express, and
we must recognise that the task of analysing and relating to one
another the achievements of the past and the problems of the present is
at least as important as the increase of our knowledge and of our
dangerous powers by intense and narrow concentration within very
limited fields of thought and work.
In the meantime we must observe (however briefly and inadequately), how
the dazzling advances of science and industry have affected the
conquest of the world by European civilisation, and why it has come
about that instead of leading to amity and happiness, they have brought
us to the most hideous catastrophe in human history.
Science and industry, in the first place, made the conquest and
organisation of the world easy. In the first stages of the expansion of
Europe the material superiority of the West had unquestionably afforded
the means whereby its political ideas and institutions could be made
operative in new fields. The invention of ocean-going ships, the use of
the mariner's compass, the discovery of the rotundity of the earth, the
development of firearms--these were the things which made possible the
creation of the first European empires; though these purely material
advantages could have led to no stable results unless they had been
wielded by peoples possessing a real political capacity. In the same
way the brilliant triumphs of modern engineering have alone rendered
possible the rapid conquest and organisation of huge undeveloped areas;
the deadly precision of Western weapons has made the Western peoples
irresistible; the wonderful progress of medical science has largely
overcome the barriers of disease which long excluded the white man from
great regions of the earth; and the methods of modern finance,
organising and making available the combined credit of whole
communities, have provided the means for vast enterprises which without
them could never have been undertaken.
Then, in the next place, science has found uses for many commodities
which were previously of little value, and many of which are mainly
produced in the undeveloped regions of the earth. Some of these, like
rubber, or nitrates, or mineral and vegetable oils, have rapidly become
quite indispensable materials, consumed by the industrial countries on
an immense scale. Accordingly, the more highly industrialised a country
is, the more dependent it must be upon supplies drawn from all parts of
the world; not only supplies of food for the maintenance of its teeming
population, but, even more, supplies of material for its industries.
The days when Europe, or even America, was self-sufficient are gone for
ever. And in order that these essential supplies may be available, it
has become necessary that all the regions which produce them should be
brought under efficient administration. The anarchy of primitive
barbarism cannot be allowed to stand in the way of access to these
vital necessities of the new world-economy. It is merely futile for
well-meaning sentimentalists to talk of the wickedness of invading the
inalienable rights of the primitive occupants of these lands: for good
or for ill, the world has become a single economic unit, and its
progress cannot be stopped out of consideration for the time-honoured
usages of uncivilised and backward tribes. Of course it is our duty to
ensure that these simple folks are justly treated, led gently into
civilisation, and protected from the iniquities of a mere ruthless
exploitation, such as, in some regions, we have been compelled to
witness. But Western civilisation has seized the reins of the world,
and it will not be denied. Its economic needs drive it to undertake the
organisation of the whole world. What we have to secure is that its
political principles shall be such as will ensure that its control will
be a benefit to its subjects as well as to itself. But the development
of scientific industry has made European control and civilised
administration inevitable throughout the world.
It did not, however, necessarily follow from these premises that the
great European states which did not already possess extra-European
territories were bound to acquire such lands. So far as their purely
economic needs were concerned, it would have been enough that they
should have freedom of access, on equal terms with their neighbours, to
the sources of the supplies they required. It is quite possible, as
events have shown, for a European state to attain very great success in
the industrial sphere without possessing any political control over the
lands from which its raw materials are drawn, or to which its finished
products are sold. Norway has created an immense shipping industry
without owning a single port outside her own borders. The manufactures
of Switzerland are as thriving as these of any European country, though
Switzerland does not possess any colonies. Germany herself, the loudest
advocate of the necessity of political control as the basis of economic
prosperity, has found it possible to create a vast and very prosperous
industry, though her colonial possessions have been small, and have
contributed scarcely at all to her wealth. Her merchants and
capitalists have indeed found the most profitable fields for their
enterprises, not in their own colonies, which they have on the whole
tended to neglect, but in a far greater degree in South and Central
America, and in India and the other vast territories of the British
Empire, which have been open to them as freely as to British merchants.
All that the prosperity of European industry required was that the
sources of supply should be under efficient administration, and that
access to them should be open. And these conditions were fulfilled,
before the great rush began, over the greater part of the earth. If in
1878, when the European nations suddenly awoke to the importance of the
non-European world, they had been able to agree upon some simple
principle which would have secured equal treatment to all, how
different would have been the fate of Europe and the world! If it could
have been laid down, as a principle of international law, that in every
area whose administration was undertaken by a European state, the 'open
door' should be secured for the trade of all nations equally, and that
this rule should continue in force until the area concerned acquired
the status of a distinctly organised state controlling its own fiscal
system, the industrial communities would have felt secure, the little
states quite as fully as the big states. Moreover, since, under these
conditions, the annexation of territory by a European state would not
have threatened the creation of a monopoly, but would have meant the
assumption of a duty on behalf of civilisation, the acrimonies and
jealousies which have attended the process of partition would have been
largely conjured away. In 1878 such a solution would have presented few
difficulties. For at that date the only European state which controlled
large undeveloped areas was Britain; and Britain, as we have seen, had
on her own account arrived at this solution, and had administered, as
she still administers, all those regions of her Empire which do not
possess self-governing rights in the spirit of the principle we have
suggested.
Why was it that this solution, or some solution on these lines, was not
then adopted, and had no chance of being adopted? It was because the
European states, and first and foremost among them Germany, were still
dominated by a political theory which forbade their taking such a view.
We may call this theory the Doctrine of Power. It is the doctrine that
the highest duty of every state is to aim at the extension of its own
power, and that before this duty every other consideration must give
way. The Doctrine of Power has never received a more unflinching
expression than it received from the German Treitschke, whose influence
was at its height during the years of the great rush for extra-European
possessions. The advocate of the Doctrine of Power is not, and cannot
be, satisfied with equality of opportunity; he demands supremacy, he
demands monopoly, he demands the means to injure and destroy his
rivals. It would not be just to say that this doctrine was influential
only in Germany; it was in some degree potent everywhere, especially in
this period, which was the period par excellence of 'imperialism' in
the bad sense of the term. But it is certainly true that no state has
ever been so completely dominated by it as Germany; and no state less
than Britain. It was in the light of this doctrine that the demands of
the new scientific industry were interpreted. Hag-ridden by this
conception, when the statesmen of Europe awoke to the importance of the
non-European world, it was not primarily the economic needs of their
countries that they thought of, for these were, on the whole, not
inadequately met: what struck their imagination was that, in paying no
attention to the outer world, they had missed great opportunities of
increasing their power. This oversight, they resolved, must be
rectified before it was too late.
For when the peoples of Western and Central Europe, no longer engrossed
by the problems of Nationalism and Liberalism, cast their eyes over the
world, lo! the scale of things seemed to have changed. Just as, in the
fifteenth century, civilisation had suddenly passed from the stage of
the city-state or the feudal principality to the stage of the great
nation-state, so now, while the European peoples were still struggling
to realise their nationhood, civilisation seemed to have stolen a march
upon them, and to have advanced once more, this time into the stage of
the world-state. For to the east of the European nations lay the vast
Russian Empire, stretching from Central Europe across Asia to the
Pacific; and in the west the American Republic extended from ocean to
ocean, across three thousand miles of territory; and between these and
around them spread the British Empire, sprawling over the whole face of
the globe, on every sea and in every continent. In contrast with these
giant empires, the nation-states of Europe felt themselves out of
scale, just as the Italian cities in the sixteenth century must have
felt themselves out of scale in comparison with the new nation-states
of Spain and France. To achieve the standard of the world-state, to
make their own nations the controlling factors in wide dominions which
should include territories and populations of varied types, became the
ambition of the most powerful European states. A new political ideal
had captivated the mind of Europe.
These powerful motives were reinforced by others which arose from the
development of affairs within Europe itself. In the first place, the
leading European states had by 1878 definitely abandoned that tendency
towards free trade which had seemed to be increasing in strength during
the previous generation; and, largely in the hope of combating the
overwhelming mercantile and industrial supremacy of Britain, had
adopted the fiscal policy of protection. The ideal of the protectionist
creed is national self-sufficiency in the economic sphere. But, as we
have seen, economic self-sufficiency was no longer attainable in the
conditions of modern industry by any European state. Only by large
foreign annexations, especially in the tropical regions, did it seem
possible of achievement. But when a protectionist state begins to
acquire territory, the anticipation that it will use its power to
exclude or destroy the trade of its rivals must drive other states to
safeguard themselves by still further annexations. It was, indeed, this
fear which mainly drove Britain, in spite of, or perhaps because of,
her free trade theories, into a series of large annexations in regions
where her trade had been hitherto predominant.
Again, the most perturbing feature of the relations between the
European powers also contributed to produce an eagerness for colonial
possessions. Europe had entered upon the era of huge national armies;
the example of Prussia, and the rancours which had been created by her
policy, had set all the nations arming themselves. They had learned to
measure their strength by their available man-power, and in two ways
the desire to increase the reserve of military manhood formed a motive
for colonisation. In the first place, the surplus manhood of a nation
was lost to it if it was allowed to pass under an alien flag by
emigration. Those continental states from which emigration took place
on a large scale began to aspire after the possession of colonies of
their own, where their emigrants could still be kept under control, and
remain subject to the obligations of service. Germany, the state which
beyond all others measures its strength by its fighting man-power, was
most affected by this motive, which formed the chief theme of the
colonial school among her politicians and journalists, and continued to
be so even when the stream of her emigrants had dwindled to very small
proportions. In a less degree, Italy was influenced by the same motive.
In the second place, conquered subjects even of backward races might be
made useful for the purposes of war. This motive appealed most strongly
to France. Her home population was stationary. She lived in constant
dread of a new onslaught from her formidable neighbour; and she watched
with alarm the rapid increase of that neighbour's population, and the
incessant increases in the numbers of his armies. At a later date
Germany also began to be attracted by the possibility of drilling and
arming, among the negroes of Central Africa, or the Turks of Asia
Minor, forces which might aid her to dominate the world.
Thus the political situation in Europe had a very direct influence upon
the colonising activity of this period. The dominant fact of European
politics during this generation was the supreme prestige and influence
of Germany, who, not content with an unquestioned military superiority
to any other power, had buttressed herself by the formation (1879 and
1882) of the most formidable standing alliance that has ever existed in
European history, and completely dominated European politics. France,
having been hurled from the leadership of Europe in 1870, dreaded
nothing so much as the outbreak of a new European war, in which she
must be inevitably involved, and in which she might be utterly ruined.
She strove to find a compensation for her wounded pride in colonial
adventures, and therefore became, during the first part of the period,
the most active of the powers in this field. She was encouraged to
adopt this policy by Bismarck, partly in the hope that she might thus
forget Alsace, partly in order that she might be kept on bad terms with
Britain, whose interests seemed to be continually threatened by her
colonising activity. But she hesitated to take a very definite line in
regard to territories that lay close to Europe and might involve
European complications.
Bismarck himself took little interest in colonial questions, except in
so far as they could be used as a means of alienating the other powers
from one another, and so securing the European supremacy of Germany. He
therefore at first made no attempt to use the dominant position of
Germany as a means of acquiring extra-European dominions. But the
younger generation in Germany was far from sharing this view. It was
determined to win for Germany a world-empire, and in 1884 and the
following years--rather late in the day, when most of the more
desirable territories were already occupied--it forced Bismarck to
annex large areas. After Bismarck's fall, in 1890, this party got the
upper hand in German politics, and the creation of a great world-empire
became, as we shall see, the supreme aim of William II. and his
advisers. The formidable and threatening power of Germany began to be
systematically employed not merely for the maintenance of supremacy in
Europe, which could be secured by peaceful means, but for the
acquisition of a commanding position in the outer world; and since this
could only be attained by violence, the world being now almost
completely partitioned, the new policy made Germany the source of
unrest and apprehension, as she had earlier been, and still continued
to be, the main cause of the burden of military preparation in Europe.
Among the other powers which participated in the great partition,
Russia continued her pressure in two of the three directions which she
had earlier followed-south-eastwards in Central Asia, eastwards towards
China. In both directions her activity aroused the nervous fears of
Britain, while her pressure upon China helped to bring Japan into the
ranks of the militant and aggressive powers. But Russia took no
interest in the more distant quarters of the world. Nor did Austria,
though during these years her old ambition to expand south-eastwards at
the expense of Turkey and the Balkan peoples revived under German
encouragement. Italy, having but recently achieved national unity and
taken her place among the Great Powers, felt that she could not be left
out of the running, now that extra-European possessions had come to
appear an almost essential mark of greatness among states; and,
disappointed of Tunis, she endeavoured to find compensation on the
shores of the Red Sea. Spain and Portugal, in the midst of all these
eager rivalries, were tempted to furbish up their old and half-dormant
claims. Even the United States of America joined in the rush during the
fevered period of the 'nineties.
Lastly, Britain, the oldest and the most fully endowed of all the
colonising powers, was drawn, half unwilling, into the competition; and
having an immense start over her rivals, actually acquired more new
territory than any of them. She was, indeed, like the other states,
passing through an 'imperialist' phase in these years. The value
attached by other countries to oversea possessions awakened among the
British people a new pride in their far-spread dominions. Disraeli, who
was in the ascendant when the period opened, had forgotten his old
opinion of the uselessness of colonies, and had become a prophet of
Empire. An Imperial Federation Society was founded in 1878. The old
unwillingness to assume new responsibilities died out, or diminished;
and the rapid annexations of other states, especially France, in
regions where British influence had hitherto been supreme, and whose
chieftains had often begged in vain for British protection, aroused
some irritation. The ebullient energy of the colonists themselves,
especially in South Africa and Australia, demanded a forward policy.
Above all, the fact that the European powers, now so eager for colonial
possessions, had all adopted the protectionist policy aroused a fear
lest British traders should find themselves shut out from lands whose
trade had hitherto been almost wholly in their hands; and the militant
and aggressive temper sometimes shown by the agents of these powers
awakened some nervousness regarding the safety of the existing British
possessions. Hence Britain, after a period of hesitancy, became as
active as any of the other states in annexation. Throughout this period
her main rival was France, whose new claims seemed to come in conflict
with her own in almost every quarter of the globe. This rivalry
produced acute friction, which grew in intensity until it reached its
culminating point in the crisis of Fashoda in 1898, and was not removed
until the settlement of 1904 solved all the outstanding difficulties.
It would be quite untrue to say that Britain deliberately endeavoured
to prevent or to check the rapid colonial expansion of France. The
truth is that British trading interests had been predominant in many of
the regions where the French were most active, and that the
protectionist policy which France had adopted stimulated into a new
life the ancient rivalry of these neighbour and sister nations. Towards
the colonial ambitions of Germany, and still more of Italy, Britain was
far more complaisant.
It is difficult to give in a brief space a clear summary of the
extremely complicated events and intrigues of this vitally important
period. But perhaps it will be easiest if we consider in turn the
regions in which the strenuous rivalries of the powers displayed
themselves. The most important was Africa, which lay invitingly near to
Europe, and was the only large region of the world which was still for
the most part unoccupied. Here all the competitors, save Russia, Japan,
and America, played a part. Western Asia formed a second field, in
which three powers only, Russia, Germany, and Britain, were immediately
concerned. The Far East, where the vast Empire of China seemed to be
falling into decrepitude, afforded the most vexed problems of the
period. Finally, the Pacific Islands were the scene of an active though
less intense rivalry.
It is a curious fact that Africa, the continent whose outline was the
first outside of Europe itself to be fully mapped out by the European
peoples, was actually the last to be effectively brought under the
influence of European civilisation. This was because the coasts of
Africa are for the most part inhospitable; its vast interior plateau is
almost everywhere shut off either by belts of desert land, or by swampy
and malarious regions along the coast; even its great rivers do not
readily tempt the explorer inland, because their course is often
interrupted by falls or rapids not far from their mouths, where they
descend from the interior plateau to the coastal plain; and its
inhabitants, warlike and difficult to deal with, are also peoples of
few and simple wants, who have little to offer to the trader. Hence
eight generations of European mariners had circumnavigated the
continent without seriously attempting to penetrate its central mass;
and apart from the Anglo-Dutch settlements at the Southern extremity,
the French empire in Algeria in the north, a few trading centres on the
West Coast, and some half-derelict Portuguese stations in Angola and
Mozambique, the whole continent remained available for European
exploitation in 1878.