“Cotton Shadow” of the Great Game (1880s — Early 20th Century)

Abstract

The article analyzes the interconnection between the political and economic interests of Britain in the context of the Great Game in the 1880s — early 20th century and the strengthening of the British participation in making and development of the Russian cotton industry. Archival sources, materials of parliamentary reports, the British press, publications of British and Russian participants in the events, all of them, provide legitimate basis to detect the peculiarities of the links between Britain’s economic and political interests during this period. The “cotton shadow” of the Great Game turned out to be a phenomenon that allows even at the statistical level to reveal the prevailing importance of economic interests over purely political assessments of the likely Russian threat to Britain in Central and East Asia and partially overshadow them.