Counter-Currents
Rotonda de los Hombres Ilustres, Guadalajara, Mexico
1,230 words
Despite gaining currency, we are yet to understand the exasperation of the anti-colonialism movement. Frequently, activists denounce colonialism without giving just cause. Customarily, they revisit atrocities like the Amristar Massacre or discuss the tyrannical rule of King Leopold II of Belgium, but such occurrences can occur in independent states. For example, Nigeria and Uganda experienced defective leadership under Sani Abacha and Idi Amin as independent states.
However, reminding activists that postcolonial leaders can be more brutal than their colonial predecessors is a losing strategy, because they are uninterested in truth. Anti-colonialism is a political ploy to enslave white people to the greedy demands of activists by cultivating guilt about Western imperialism. Clearly, imperialism is expensive and often oppressive, but the imposition of Western rule produced favorable outcomes in several countries.
In India, for instance, the British abolished slavery and sati, the act of a widow immolating herself after the death of her husband. Also forgotten is the role of missionaries in opposing human sacrifice in colonial India. And for all the blistering critiques of Western colonialism, the truth is that European powers replaced autocratic regimes with more democratic administrations in many cases. After the defeat of the Asante by the British Empire in 1874, the Treaty of Fomena stipulated the abolition of human sacrifice, outlawed slavery in the Gold Coast, and recognized the independence of tributary states. In fact, Raymond Kelly argues that had it not be been for the intervention of the British in the 1900s, the Dinka would have been wiped out by the Nuer.
Critics are free to point out the flaws of Western colonialism, but according to William Easterly and Ross Levine in their paper “The European Origins of Development,” on average, the benefits of colonialism outweigh the costs. Furthermore, Feyrer and Sacerdote (2006) contend that the number of years spent as a colony is positively correlated with modern incomes across islands. Remember that Western Europe has been at the forefront of development for over 500 years; therefore, relatively backward countries would have benefited from the institutional capabilities of Europeans.
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However, in contrast, Daron Acemoglu, James Robinson, and Simon Johnson in a seminal 2002 paper posit that as a result of colonialism, regions that were relatively rich in 1500 are comparatively poorer today when compared to the West. Though the paper remains influential, critics have misinterpreted the findings. The argument is that Europeans established extractive institutions in regions where the environment was inhospitable to long-term settlement to reap short-term gains. Although the authors are not incorrect, their conclusion more broadly confirms the resource course. Economic literature suggests that an abundance of resources fails to stimulate innovation. Resource-rich countries are afforded several options to make money, so they are not pressured to innovate, hence marketing their assets could be a cheaper alternative. More resources can also create a perverse incentive for the political class to engage in rent-seeking activities.
Evidently, the countries identified as becoming relatively poorer are resource-rich, so one can surmise that maybe if colonists had discovered a surplus of gold and silver in North America, they would lack the motivation to create quality institutions. Another objection to this proposition is that “relative poverty” is a poor proxy for development. Relative to America, Mexico is poorer, yet objectively incomes are higher now than in 1500. Further, prior to colonialism, the Aztec and Inca empires already possessed extractive institutions, and continuing on this path would induce poverty, not wealth. The inclination to view wealth creation as a zero-sum game is the norm in history, and as economic pioneers Joel Mokyr and Deirdre McCloskey explain in countless books and articles, economic growth in the West accelerated after jettisoning the worldview of mercantilism.
Similarly, Joel Mokyr opines that this revolutionary change in how people perceived economic relations accounts for the success of North American colonies:
The economic success of the North American colonies (in contrast with those South of the Rio Grande) was due not just to the importation of institutions from their European counterparts in areas in which Europeans could settle but from the British-inspired Enlightenment principles that supported them. The American constitution differed a great deal from the British system and diverged further away from it in the decades after independence. What it owed to its western European roots was not only institutional adaptability and the ideas of secure property rights and the rule of law, but the deeper Enlightenment notions of economic freedom, the importance of maximum mobility of goods and factors within an economy, and the desirability of equal access and competition. The economic success of areas in the new world was in part determined by the degree to which Enlightenment principles had penetrated the mother country and in part by the ability of the mother countries to transfer them to their new world offshoots.
In addition, contrary to critics decrying the effects of colonialism, research reveals that the longer former colonial bureaucrats were available to guide African officials after a country’s independence, the more effective its government. Institutions created by Europeans in Africa were foreign to locals, hence for these bodies to be beneficial, Europeans had to transfer knowledge to locals; therefore, a longer duration of colonial rule resulted in capable bureaucracies staffed by competent locals.
Finally, we can never forget the phenomenal role played by missionaries in ensuring that colonial administrations delivered high-quality public services in the developing world. As recounted by Robert Woodberry and Timothy Shah in the article “The Pioneering Protestants,” missionaries were instrumental in allowing marginalized groups to access education:
Protestant missionaries lobbied so effectively that, for instance, British-run India had government-funded schools by 1813, twenty years before England did. Moreover, because the souls of all humans had equal value in the spiritual economy of the missionaries, they often provided the only formal education open to women and marginalized groups such as slaves, blacks in South Africa, or members of “untouchable” castes in India.
Additionally, reviewing the impact of Christianity in Africa in a classic article, Emory Ross wrote: “Christian missions have been almost everywhere the introducer of western medical, surgical, and public health methods, and the pioneer trainer of Africans in these skills.”
The evidence explored in this piece does not suggest that we revert to colonialism, but rather that Western colonialism requires an impartial assessment. Moreover, opponents of the school of anti-colonialism do not object to activists revisiting past horrors; however, in doing so, they should clearly state the values affirmed by the movement. Observers know that they are against Western imperialism in the developing world, but are we to assume that they endorse the pre-colonial imperialism of the developing world and its regressive features? Anti-Western sentiments are popular, though based on the evidence, it is obvious that Western colonialism had progressive features, and on average represented superior governance compared to pre-colonial empires.
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13 comments
In my readings of history and viewing of historical films, etc. I note that while there is standard speech about the Assyrian Empire, the Babylonian Empire, the Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Mughal Empire, the Inca Empire, it is only in reference to the expansion of European that we find the ideological trigger-terms imperialism and colonialism.
All the others were apparently as natural as spring rains, with ours alone being driven by vile ideological crime.
Like all the other isms and phobias, every time we use these words, we re-infect ourselves with the anti-White animus living spitefully inside them all.
No one talks about Tamerlane in European or American schools. Portuguese, Italian and Spanish kings must have looked on in dread at coping with these Steppe Tyrants and desperately sponsored naval exploration as a countermeasure to being overrun by hordes of Asian cavalry. Had we not sent out ships we’d have been genocided. No doubt in my estimation. Columbus was our messiah.
Imperialism, colonialism, racism are catch words produced by the propaganda machine of another empire, more genocidal, more uncivilized, and more psychotic than everything that the World ever seen. Strange that it usually doesn’t make it to the Empire list.
The most toxic Empire that existed silenced everyone for one hundred years using these three words while exterminating everything in sight.
The strange power of simple words backed by huge vaults of gold, large enough to buy every pen and word on market.
This is all very well and good and in all likelihood true, but the fact of the matter is that the anti-colonialist sentiment does not care about prosperity or wealth, but rather independence and sovereignty. Anti-colonialists do not reject the fact that post-colonial rulers are often harsher than colonial rulers because they’re “uninterested in truth”, but rather because this is irrelevant. The relevant distinction is not tyrant/leader but countryman/foreigner.
This seems to be the most relevant fact. The african and south american natives created nothing of substance or value in a modern sense. I read here recently a post that linked to an article or statement from pro-aztec empire activists claiming that they had libraries and free schools for everyone and medical care. I thought I was reading about los angeles at the moment, but they were claiming the spanish ruined all of these wonderful native institutions with their raping colonialism.
This theme repeats itself with the hawaiians now claiming the US illegally took hawaii from the natives too. Is it all leading to the USA being apportioned to the natives that today claim not ownership so much as heritability? Ownership being a western white concept, I think they simply want control without having to pay for it either by funds or blood.
I am all for divvying up the USA based on single races for spaces. If only it could be done sooner rather than later.
In addition to ignoring Mr. Jeelvy’s vital point about local tyrant versus outsider/foreigner, Lipton Matthews once again chooses to focus on the economic and social aspects of history rather than demographics. It is to his benefit as a black, of course, to ignore the demographic makeup which ultimately influenced different countries’ trajectories. Yes, America did have the benefit of “the importation of institutions from their European counterpoints,” but much more importantly, the natives in America – the most warlike and migratory Indian tribes – were killed/conquered.
The morality of such – which most denouncers of colonialism use to straw-man arguments – is not of particular importance here. South of the Rio Grande, in comparison, the local tribes worked with the Spanish to fight the Aztecs who had previously conquered and slaughtered them. Then the Spanish proceeded to massively miscegenate with the Indios. In north America, this miscegenation was much rarer, occurring primarily among the early (and heavily French) fur trappers. The English who took over western America were primarily married settlers.
So totally aside from institutions or purported modes of thought, the main and most vital difference in outcomes depended on the racial makeup of a given colony’s people. Where there were primarily White European people, regardless of whether they were northern or southern, the colonies were far more successful. Where there were primarily Indios, Africans, and frequent miscegenation, the colonies were less advanced and had to rely more on what Matthews terms “extractive institutions.” Compare formerly successful and prosperous Argentina (with a heavily Spanish and Italian immigrant population compared to its Indian and black immigrants today) with Brazil.
Matthews may choose to focus on “past horrors” of colonialism. I would direct his attention to the vast record of both pre and post colonial ‘horrors’ committed by the natives, quite absent their White colonizers. And Matthews generally ignores the economic benefits and infrastructure which European colonizers provided. I believe the majority of railroads and automotive roads extant in India and Africa today, most of which are in extraordinarily poor repair, was paid for and engineered by European people.
As usual, Lipton Matthews claims to believe in an “impartial assessment,” but his views are heavily colored by his own racial ancestry and experience.
They have even less consistency than that. For all the goody-goody leftist Whites denouncing colonialism (and stretching the truth about it), not a single one will denounce population replacement migration into White countries. They’ll argue that the Third World belonged to the people inhabiting it, but they’d be scandalized by anyone saying that Whites should have countries of their own.
“Western man towers over the rest of the world in ways so large as to be almost inexpressible. It’s Western exploration, science, and conquest that have revealed the world to itself. Other races feel like subjects of Western power long after colonialism, imperialism, and slavery have disappeared.
The charge of racism puzzles whites who feel not hostility, but only baffled good will, because they don’t grasp what it really means: humiliation. The white man presents an image of superiority even when he isn’t conscious of it. And, superiority excites envy. Destroying white civilization is the inmost desire of the league of designated victims we call minorities.”
The late great Joe Sobran.
I personally see overpopulation within the ‘third world’ — which term would rile the ‘woke’ crowd, but everyone knows exactly what is being named — is the biggest problem facing the planet. It is entirely the cause of climate change, and most immigration. Too many people demanding too many products and incessantly higher living standards. And I see missionary activity as a primary pillar of overpopulation, since they are crusaders, sending and distributing money, food, clothes, etc. to every ‘poor starving baby and their family’ on earth. And it cannot be criticized because everyone actually does want to help other people, but we really have to find a way to rein it in. I think that even Dr. Schweitzer said something to that end.
One other ‘colonial’ reminder: England rounded up much of its ‘poorer’ population and sent them to the colonies — in America and the Caribbean — as ‘indentured servants’. Over half died in the shipping process, and others were worked to death, since White people, even then, were considered smarter and of better ‘fiber’, and thus, of whom more work could be expected. I am now wondering that if I trace my 65% Irish and 30% Scots ancestry, could I get reparations for the mistreatment of my direct ancestors?
Apropos of the Amritsar massacre:
The order was given by a White Englishman, Colonel Reginald Dyer, but it was dutifully executed by a force comprising wholly of locals. Not one of these natives bat an eye during the whole bloody affair. Not one of them felt agonized enough to redirect his gun towards Dyer and blow his brains out. Punjabis and Gurkhas loyal to the White man shamelessly slaughtered fellow Punjabis. Furthermore, some sections of the local population even lauded Dyer for restoring order.
Interestingly, the descendants of those loyalists still roam the corridors of power in the Indian Punjab…and compete with each other on the issue of ‘patriotism’ and ‘anti-imperialism’.
As for Western Colonialism, well, when Alexander died on his way home and his successors began to fight among themselves thereby crippling the Hellenistic influence, Europe had Romans to succeed the Macedonians and Greek as the vanguard of the continent.
However, when the Englishmen and Frenchmen returned to Europe in utter exhaustion after their colonial campaigns in Africa and Asia, the continent had been in ruins after two devastating civil wars. Europe had already been executed at Nuremberg. And the executioners were to control the narrative from then on.
Excerpted from a recent Anthony Esolen column:
Charles James Napier, one of the noblest of the British soldier-governors of India, friendly to Indians among the troops and a sharp critic of British arrogance, was once confronted by Hindus who insisted upon suttee: burning the widow on the funeral pyre of her husband.
“Be it so,” said Napier. “This burning of widows is your custom; prepare the funeral pile. But my nation has also a custom. When men burn women alive we hang them, and confiscate all their property. My carpenters shall therefore erect gibbets on which to hang all concerned when the widow is consumed. Let us all act according to national customs.”
Western colonialism (not to be confused with the Leninist notion of Imperialism) left an enduring demographic legacy in the Americas and Oceania: elsewhere, in South Asia, Indochina and Africa, it came and went in a few hundred years (nothing compared to the millennia available to history in those places).
If that was so terrible, then why is the ongoing Islamic and Sub-Saharan influx into Europe held to be good? For are not the Sharia and No-Go Zones spreading from Western Europe’s great metropolises colonies in the purest original sense of the word?
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