imperialism

[WaterShake]

imperialism

Is imperialism beneficial, or detrimental to the nations involved? Read on for further information.

Imperialism can be summarised as the belief that nations should be enabled to "conquer" those "weaker" than themselves. Imperialism usually takes the form of an empire, based upon domination and subordination. Empires such as the Roman Empire, French Empire and the British Empire are all examples of such.

The English economist John Atkinson Hobson (July 6th 1858 - April 1 1940) once stated "It is desirable that the earth should be peopled, governed and developed, as far as possible, by the races which can do this work best, i.e by the races of highest "social efficiency". This idea can be loosely linked to "The White Man's Burden".

Imperialism can be stated to be beneficial to the countries involved, as it can offer many learning experiences. I'm sure most of you will be familiar with the phrase (of origin within England), "What have the Romans ever done for us?. This phrase is largely sarcastic, the Romans were massively beneficial to the earlier days of England's history. The Romans brought with them their advanced technology, their skills of road building and aqueduct production. They brought a new, evolved social hierarchy and taught new farming techniques. In short, Roman imperialism was largely beneficial to England.

Furthermore, imperialism is often justified on the fundamental concept of "terra nullius" (a Latin expression with the rough English translation of "empty land".). Australia can be seen as an example of this. The British justified the colonisation of Australia on the basis that the land was "empty of inhabitants" and thus, rightly theres for the taking.
However, despite these claims, some 350 000 indigenous people lived there, they were subject to much suffering throughout the oppression.

Unfortunately, oppression and poor treatment of the indigenous races seems to an ugly, but unavoidable side effect of colonisation. The indigenous citizens can be forced to abandon their old ways of life, without justification. They are often exploited by the invading forces and their national output no longer serves to benefit their nation.

Cultural repression is somewhat common. Cultural traditions can be eradicated, historic languages abolished and new religious ideas are often imposed. It is for these reasons, and the tendency for suffering amongst indigenous people, that imperialism is rejected by many, largely on moral grounds. As such the term of imperialism is often used in international propaganda as a pejorative for expansionist and aggressive foreign policy. Some state that any benefits of imperialism, can be gained via a less extreme convention.

So NG: Do you think imperialism beneficial, or detrimental to the nations involved?

[Armour]

I dont really think it should be out there.
I mean a country is a country with its culture.
Can you imagine what would happen to earth if Hitler managed to take over the world, kill everyone and make everyone a blue eyed blonde German.

[WeHaveFreshCookies]

Imperialism can't be defined as good or bad. There are good and bad things that come with it. Although it could be argued that imperialism still exists today, but in a different form, could it not?

Interesting thoughts that you have here. But I think you'll get a better response in The Politics Forum.

I would respond more in-depth, but honestly, I'm too god damned tired to think very much.

[WaterShake]

At 8/30/10 02:46 AM, Armour wrote: I dont really think it should be out there.
I mean a country is a country with its culture.

Granted, this tends to be the first argument raised against imperialism. A country should never impose itself upon another. The culture shock tends to be too much and the indigenous people tend to look at it negatively.

Similar (but not necessarily direct) examples of this can be seen when looking at the way the indigenous population of Iraq viewed the allied soldiers during the time of occupation. Furthermore, look at the British colonisation of India and how it ended. Ghandi led a wide scale revolt against the British and was supported by thousands.

Can you imagine what would happen to earth if Hitler managed to take over the world, kill everyone and make everyone a blue eyed blonde German.

But I think Hitler is a slightly extreme example to draw. Not all rulers would behave as fanatically as him. s imperialism can help to bring new knowledge and technology to developing nations. Surely they are better off with this knowledge?

[sgtstreb]

I thought Newgrounds had a politics thread?

Just wondering. Is it broked?

[WaterShake]

At 8/30/10 03:27 AM, sgtstreb wrote: I thought Newgrounds had a politics thread?

It does :)

Just wondering. Is it broked?

No it's fine.

Now that i've attempted to answer your questions, let's tackle the implied question "why did you post this here as apposed to the politics forum".

It seems clear that the line between general discussion and political discussion is hazy at the best of times. If we look at the current volume of discussion regarding ACTA, you'll see a large section of the conversation has taken place within this very forum, general. Why?

Because these threads tend to talk more about the social implications of such policies, as apposed to the treaties or concepts themselves.

As such, I think that a thread discussing the moral benefits and weaknesses of imperialism is also more suited to the general forum, than politics.

[Duffi]

At 8/30/10 02:43 AM, WaterShake wrote: Furthermore, imperialism is often justified on the fundamental concept of "terra nullius" (a Latin expression with the rough English translation of "empty land".)

No. Imperialism will bring the greatest raises, but also the greatest falls. History repeats itself. Just look at the Manchu empire, Roman, Mongolian Horde, Great Britain, France, Prussia, post-prussia Germany, and also America. Why do you think China hates us? Great Britains imperialism definately helped with that.

Terra nullius is not a casus belli to treat the natives as animals or sub-humans, but I do believe that colonizing, or rather, westernizing other countries was a good thing to do back then. Such is also the case with Australia, and large parts of Asia.

[Quinny]

Just waiting for all the "Chinese" users to show up to see what they think.

[WaterShake]

At 8/30/10 06:53 AM, Duffi wrote:

At 8/30/10 02:43 AM, WaterShake wrote: Furthermore, imperialism is often justified on the fundamental concept of "terra nullius" (a Latin expression with the rough English translation of "empty land".)

No. Imperialism will bring the greatest raises, but also the greatest falls.

Well, that is largely true. But typically speaking, the benefits of the rises tend to more than equalise the disruption and damage of the falls.

Furthermore, there seems to be no reason why a well managed empire cannot be successful. It's true that almost all empires have eventually failed until now, but it only takes one black swan to prove not all swans are white.

History repeats itself. Just look at the Manchu empire, Roman, Mongolian Horde, Great Britain, France, Prussia, post-prussia Germany, and also America.

The majority of the empires you mention here met their end because of the irreparable damage or the financial strain of war. As we continue to progress into the age of global alliances, perhaps war will become defunct.

Why do you think China hates us? Great Britains imperialism definately helped with that.

Terra nullius is not a casus belli to treat the natives as animals or sub-humans

Indeed, but perhaps now, with the mistakes of the past behind us, we could successfully colonise other countries without unjustly oppressing the indigenous population.
, but I do believe that colonizing, or rather, westernizing other countries was a good thing to do back then. Such is also the case with Australia, and large parts of Asia.
I agree to an extent. Colonisation helps to spread both knowledge, wealth and technology. In some instances, 20 years as a subordinate nation allowed them to progress to a stage that would have taken them 200 as independent.

[TakeCr3dit]

At 8/30/10 07:01 AM, BobbaQ wrote: Just waiting for all the "Chinese" users to show up to see what they think.

You got a problem?

[DP]

Well look at how screwed up it made south Africa, Ireland, hell it made Napoleon sell Louisiana cheap to us and then his empire fell. All in all i think that there is a fine line between imperialism and just expansion or manifest destiny. Like if we try to take over mexico that is imperialism, but if we try to get more land by going to an uninhabited island that is adjacent to America's coast then that is just expansion.

[MiroDK]

At 8/30/10 01:06 PM, WaterShake wrote: I agree to an extent. Colonisation helps to spread both knowledge, wealth and technology. In some instances, 20 years as a subordinate nation allowed them to progress to a stage that would have taken them 200 as independent.

It depends on how the dominating empire manages it. If you look at Spain and Portugal, you'll see how they massacred most of the natives here. Same goes to the British, and later on, Americans. Most tribes and Empires who lived here far longer than the Europeans had vanished.

And how did they separate Asia and Africa between the empires of the time? They just took a map and started drawing borders and arguing who should have the bigger and better areas, mixing people which had a history of war, and separating people which lived together. Culturally, it was a really bad idea. Look at most conflicts in Africa and you'll see it comes all the way back to Neo-Colonization.

[WaterShake]

At 8/30/10 01:38 PM, DP36 wrote: Well look at how screwed up it made south Africa, Ireland, hell it made Napoleon sell Louisiana cheap to us and then his empire fell.

There will always be some instances in which the concept just doesn't work. There are many success stories as well, look at the ancient Roman Empire for instance.

All in all i think that there is a fine line between imperialism and just expansion or manifest destiny. Like if we try to take over mexico that is imperialism, but if we try to get more land by going to an uninhabited island that is adjacent to America's coast then that is just expansion.

I think this is a valid point. How would you classify colonisation of an island with a small tribal community. Is a small tribal community reason enough to stop the expansion of an overcrowded, underresourced nation? I think there are arguments both for and against this.

It's hard for me to assess many of the historical aspects of imperialism even now. I often think of revisionism is a good friend, especially the sort with Marxist tendencies (and of course, Marxist revisionism, but that's not so relevant here ironically), but I still find myself tangled whenever I put my fingers to the keys and think about it. Whether revisionism hurts my integrity now, I'm not sure. When I was in Sydney, I checked out the famous Circular Quay; anyone who's been there will know of the Aboriginal buskers that play Didgeridoos, and when I was listening to one, my Dad sort of sighed 'They historically weren't treated well... but if it wasn't us, someone else would've done it anyway.' He was probably right, but most of my rants on the topic don't usually bear it in mind, so yeah.

It was studying history that got me down on it. There was a point in my life when the sorts of things Lenin and some of his cohorts put forth on the First World War started to make more and more sense in my mind. This is where a degree of revisionism sets in possibly: it often seems to transpire, in my eyes, that life now can't be assessed without looking back to WWI. It's relevant, because, like they said, it was a reactionary war based on imperialist principles.

But even apart from the war, many issues have arisen since then stemmed from imperialist unaccounting. The idealist theory, pretty much adopted officially in the west, is modernization theory, which is definitely a very strong theory. It just has holes, and they can grow. It doesn't look out for specifics for instance: French Indo-China was a blob geographically, and standards for the people there fell dramatically (literacy rates dropped for instance as 'civilised' culture was pushed in as a necessity) - the way those holes can grow was proved by the Vietnam War. And Walt Rostow, possibly the father of global modernisation (mentioned on the Wiki), worked with Johnson's government in the '60s. Similarly, there's the signing off of the South Asian states after WWII. It was all hard to mediate on such terms. And of course, the resident butt monkeys of history - Korea, Burma (check out Orwell's journalist-essays 'A Hanging' and 'Shooting an Elephant', they're so vivid, hopeless, and relevant), and China still have... erm, related issues today, counter-revolutionary ones let's say.

I don't know, these things interest me. They bug me a lot too, and I struggle to look up at it as a result. Hence, revisionism. It's cuddly.

Finally, it's interesting that you brought up the White Man's Burden, since some see it now as something of a satirical phrase. Some take that thought back to 'the time' too. Kipling's famous poem in particular is sometimes seen as not genuinely being an honest work, but rather a deliberately cold and backward one. Neo-Colonialists in particular would likely take that line of thought, which is all still relevant now with TNCs in place, in modern history.

But I'll be quiet now. I'm not a politician, you'll have noticed.

I didn't use the c word, yay.

[TrevorW]

Scarab why must you kill my eyes with walls of texts ;/

[DarkMatter]

havn't you ever watched the original star wars?

I gotta be careful with that question lol..

At 8/30/10 03:39 PM, TrevorW wrote: Scarab why must you kill my eyes with walls of texts ;/

It could've been slightly worse. I considered adding 'the White Man's Burden is not so black-and-white'. I wasn't sure how that would be taken, I think there could've been multiple results.

Anyone having read my post here by the way, it's certainly not an exhaustive account of my sort of politics. In reality, it's not supposed to fill that sort of thing on the whole, but it's a blurring of various thoughts. I stay away from reality politics for, what I think to be, good reasons.

[MiroDK]

And not to mention the "Social Darwinism" which people had in mind when they colonizes Africa, saying that the people were savages and that them, Europeans, would bring civilization to them.

A solid proof of this being false is the Ethiopian nation which was very powerful and advanced and managed to maintain and independent nation.

[HooglyBoogly]

I personally think Imperialism is a great thing. It is how great nations flourish, and the whole "Not mixing cultures" thing is juvenile and needs to be done with already.

I mean if the USSA (United Socialist States of America) were to take over Mexico , YET let them keep MEXICAN rulers, no whites, would that be a huge issue?

That's how I think Imperialism should really be. Shit, perfect example would be Alexander the Great. He was all over the Middle East and Egypt and did exactly as I described. Only until his war mongering into India and present-day Afghanistan did things start to turn bad.

[DeltaEcho]

Even if you had the military might to conquer other nations you wouldn't succeed you might succeed at the beggining but you would start to have your problems and a fair bit of that would be the conquered nation the people aren't just going to sit by and let you take over one such example of this is during World War II the french resistance hitting convoys, stealing munitions and the like while on a large scale this isn't much it adds up. Another problem would be a supply line Hitler's problem was that his supply line for Russia was to long and he advanced to quickly he should have shored up his units in Europe first before moving on to Russia or taken it over entirely, another one of his problems was air superiority he had that to begin with but the Battle for Britian was the turning point for that.
All in all while Imperialism has happened it most likely won't succeed unless you get an absolutely genius leader and even then he will still have a problem with the people which is unlikely to be fixed.
So while I don't really think it is right or wrong I do think it is just not possible look at the odds of getting everything you need it's like picking random words in a random order and somehow hoping they will form a sentance that makes sense in other words very long odds.
My thoughts,
D.E.