Imperial Conferences Research Articles

«БРИТАНСЬКИЙ КОНСЕНСУС»: ШЛЯХИ ТА МЕТОДИ ТРАНСФОРМАЦІЇ БРИТАНСЬКОЇ ІМПЕРІЇ

The article analyzes the main stages of the transformation of the British colonial administration, the process of transforming the system of relations between Great Britain and dependent countries that were part of the British Empire into the Commonwealth of Nations. The purpose of the research is to study the process of transformation of the British Empire, the formation of the Commonwealth of Nations and the role of official London in its formation and development. The methodological basis of the research are the principles of objectivity, historicism and systematicity with the application of general scientific methods of analysis, synthesis, generalization of logical and historical aspects, the study of phenomena in concrete-historical conditions, the transition from the concrete to the abstract and from the abstract to the concrete with the use of general scientific methods. The scientific novelty of the publication consists in a comprehensive analysis of the process of transformation of the British Empire into the Commonwealth of Nations, which convinces of the advantages of the peaceful transformation of multinational state entities over their spontaneous disintegration. Conclusions. A balanced and reasoned approach to the peculiarities of the state-territorial system in combination with stable traditions of democracy in the metropolis contributed to ensuring the asymmetry of the British imperial political body. Even at the end of the 19th century. at the first colonial and imperial conferences, the concept of the formation of all-imperial management structures - a common parliament, a common government, a common army, etc. was rejected. It was the lack of unification and asymmetry that formed the basis of the evolutionary processes that contributed to Great Britain in the 20th century to carry out the gradual formation of the "British Consensus" or "soft association" model.

Participation of the Ukrainian Social Democratic Union in the work of the general imperial congresses and conferences of the RSDLP in 1905–1907

The article finds out that after joining the RSDLP 2 (15) February 1905, USDU participated in the activities of the latter, as evidenced, in particular, the active work of its representatives in the imperial conferences and congresses of the Russian Social Democratic Party. The first forum with the participation of a representative of the Union was the Mensheviks All-Russia Conference of Party Officials in the spring of 1905. The latter acknowledged the achievements of the allies in working among the peasantry and ordered them, together with the Mensheviks Organization Committee, to convene a conference of agitators who worked in the given direction and to reprint in Russian popular publications already published in Ukrainian. The representative of the USDU, P. Tuchapskyi, took part in the Second All-Russian Congress of Menshevist (November 1905). The documentary materials of this forum testified to the continuation of the work of the unions in the villages of most of the Ukrainian provinces of the Russian Empire. The delegate of the Union considered it was necessary to carry out theoretical insights into the agrarian question and its discussion in the party press. Three representatives of the USDU were present at the 4th (unifying) congress of the RSDLP (April-May 1906). It was then that the process of association of the Union and the Kyiv District Organization had also been completed. The minutes of the forum testified that USDU representatives opposed the USDRP’s membership in the Russian Marxist Party. The union campaigned actively to increase its representation at the 5th Congress of the RSDLP in May-June 1907. Because of the events held at this forum, the union members formed one of the largest delegations, numbering twelve party members. The mentioned testified to transforming the USDU into one of the most influential communities in the Russian Marxist Party. At the same time, the participation of the organization in the Russian Social Democratic Party, the character of the activities of the organization, showed that it worked on a project that was presented to its creators as a «Russian socialist republic».

George Gavan Duffy and the Irish Free State on the International Stage, 1921–1923

This article examines the efforts made by George Gavan Duffy, signatory of the 1921 ‘Anglo-Irish Treaty’ and minister for foreign affairs in 1922, to promote the autonomy of the embryonic Irish Free State as a new member of the international community in the early 1920s. It examines his brief tenure as minister for foreign affairs and his subsequent efforts as an independent TD. Gavan Duffy was convinced that the new state could rapidly advance its autonomy through active engagement and cooperation with allies among the Dominions at regular meetings known as ‘imperial conferences’. This article argues that this strategy was not as obvious in 1922 as it would later appear with the benefit of hindsight. The Irish provisional government, whose relationship with Gavan Duffy was tense, proved unreceptive to his recommendations. This analysis concludes that although these recommendations were based on erroneous details, Gavan Duffy's instinct proved accurate.

БРИТАНСЬКИЙ “ІМПЕРСЬКИЙ ФЕДЕРАЛІЗМ” У ВІЗІЯХ КАНАДСЬКИХ “ЛОЯЛІСТІВ” КІНЦЯ XIX СТ.

The article is devoted to the vision of the Canadian political elites of British “imperial federalism” concept, which resonated with the British Empire in the second half of the nineteenth century. This concept appeared in the circles of British politicians and public figures and, in the long run, should become a federal alliance between the colonies and the United Kingdom. Canada, which at that time was a full-fledged state entity, offered its own vision on this issue. The Canadian political elites, most of whom were supporters of a close relationship with the United Kingdom (the so-called “loyalists”), expressed broad support for the British Crown and a close alliance with Britain. In this article the author draws attention to the concept of “imperial federalism” and its origins, highlights the views of Canada’s major political figures who have expressed their thoughts about the imperial federation, and focuses on discussions about the vision of the future alliance of Canadian politicians. Separately analyzed are the colonial conferences of the late nineteenth century, which became the platform for solving colonial problems. They gave the opportunity to the Canadian “loyalists” to express their own position on the activity mechanism of the Imperial Federation in the future. The emergence of the idea of federalization of the British colonial system in the second half of the nineteenth century became a reaction to the outdated colonial system of the United Kingdom, which required updating and optimization of its work. This idea was geopolitical in its nature, because it was the result of the loss of a dominant position in the world colonial system by the United Kingdom and a desire to reclaim its former positions. The Canadian Loyalists’ vision of the concept of British “imperial federalism” is a clear example of Canadian politicians’ attitudes toward Britain at the end of the 19th century. It was to endorse the British idea by making its own adjustments to the future imperial federal system of the British Empire. The very concept of “imperial federalism” did not find its realization throughout the political debate, and its alternative was the imperial conferences that were held throughout the XX century. It was imperial conferences that served as a platform for solving common colonial problems and facilitated closer ties between the Metropolia and the colonies.

第一次世界大戦期における連合国・帝国会議とイギリスの通商政策構想 : 1916年連合国経済会議と1917年戦時帝国閣議・会議

第一次世界大戦期における連合国・帝国会議とイギリスの通商政策構想 : 1916年連合国経済会議と1917年戦時帝国閣議・会議

Kennetta Hammond Perry. London Is the Place for Me: Black Britons, Citizenship, and the Politics of Race.

The idea and practice of subjecthood in the British Empire was simultaneously expansive and restrictive. During the Don Pacifico Affair in 1850, the British foreign secretary, Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston, famously declared that “a British subject, in whatever land he may be, shall feel confident that the watchful eye and the strong arm of England, will protect him against injustice and wrong” (Commons, 25 June 1850, Parl. Debs., cxii, col. 444). The Canadian prime minister, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, told the 1911 Imperial Conference that “a British subject anywhere is a British subject everywhere” (Maurice Olivier, Imperial Conferences, Part I [1954], 86). These liberal ideas of subjecthood form the basis of what Kennetta Hammond Perry terms the myth of British antiracism in her insightful and deeply researched London Is the Place for Me: Black Britons, Citizenship, and the Politics of Race. Despite the rhetorical appeals to liberty and freedom proclaimed by Palmerston and Laurier, restrictions on the free movement of non-white British subjects have had a long history. Canadian governments imposed a head tax on Chinese immigrants beginning in 1885 and refused entry to Indian migrants (all of whom were British subjects) who arrived in Vancouver on the Komagata Maru in 1914; the Natal Immigration Restriction Act (1897) imposed a diction test on immigrants as a transparent means of restricting non-white British subjects; and Indian migrant laborers (before and after the official end of indentured labor in the British Empire in 1917) faced a wide array of discriminatory mobility restrictions. Thus, while the more inclusive and racially inflected postwar definition of British citizenship developed through the 1948 British Nationality Act and the Commonwealth Immigrants Act (1962) marked a decisive shift in British domestic politics, it fit within a longer lineage of racially demarcated imperial citizenship politics. The latter history has been the subject of excellent studies such as Sukanya Banerjee’s Becoming Imperial Citizens: Indians in the Late-Victorian Empire (2010).

Liberal, Liminal and Lost: India’s First Diplomats and the Narrative of Foreign Policy

ABSTRACTIndian historiography has largely overlooked the contribution of Indian Liberals in the pre-independence era. It is worse in Indian diplomatic history where studies on pre-independence are few and far between. Responding to this double excision, this article traces the emergence of a new Indian narrative of foreign policy around the issues of equality and justice in the immediate aftermath of the First World War. Anchoring their argumentativeness in diplomatic finesse, Indian Liberals such as Satyendra Prasanno Sinha, V. S. Srinivasa Sastri and Tej Bahadur Sapru relentlessly campaigned for racial equality and predominance of the rights of people over the rights of states at the Imperial Conferences. In the articulation of these views, South Africa, a country where ideas about the status of Indians and Indian civilisation were most contested, emerged as the singular foreign policy ‘other’ around which India’s foreign policy narrative was constructed.

PREREQUISITES OF ADOPTION AND CONTENT OF WESTMINSTER STATUTE OF 1931: ESTABLISHMENT OF BRITISH COMMONWEALTH OF NATIONS

The prerequisites of adoption, content and consequences of Westminster Statute adoption are regarded. The agendas and work of the Imperial Conferences of 1926 and 1930 are analyzed. The peculiarities of domestic and foreign policy of Great Britain in the 20-30 s of the XX th century are revealed.

Learning about empire and the imperial education conferences in the early twentieth century: creating cohesion or demonstrating difference?

Despite the exponential spread of the British Empire by the late nineteenth century, there remained in England a continued indifference to “the Empire”. In 1883, J.R. Seeley, Regius Professor of Modern History in the University of Cambridge, had expressed concern because ‘we think of Great Britain too much and of Greater Britain too little’. People had to rethink their understandings of nation and empire, he suggested, and steps had to be taken to modify what he saw as a ‘defective constitution’. Seeley’s lecture series had prompted debate about ‘the imperial question’, but the ‘anomalous political arrangements’ and the reluctance of the people to think imperially persisted. Insularity was not exclusive to the people in Britain, however. Because of their preoccupation with their own local affairs, it was suggested, there had been little opportunity for people from other parts of the empire to devote much time to the larger questions of imperial and common citizenship.

Who Cut the Apron Strings and When? Adopting the Statute of Westminster inNew Zealand in 1947

New Zealand’s ‘independence’ from the United Kingdom can be seen as a process with a number of key steps, including Dominion Status in 1907, the various Imperial Conferences post World War I, the Statute of Westminster 1931, its adoption in New Zealand in 1947, and the New Zealand Constitution Act in 1986.Central in this process was the Statute of Westminster. But of all the Dominions, New Zealand was the last to adopt the Statute in 1947. This article takes a fresh look at the archival records to ask why. The conventional thesis is of ‘reluctance to cut the apron strings’. It is indeed the case that in the late 1920s and leading to the 1931 passage by the UK parliament of the Statute,New Zealand did not want to change its constitutional arrangements. But in 1931 the UK Parliament passed the Statute anyway. For New Zealand, this was a fundamental breach of the convention that the UK parliament would not legislate for a Dominion without its ‘advice and consent’. The breach of that convention caused anger in Wellington, but was hushed up to avoid political trouble in Westminster. It also caused a significant legal problem that needed the UK Parliament to fix - and this could not be done until 1947.

The Unofficial Commonwealth Relations Conferences, 1933–59: Precursors of the Tri-sector Commonwealth

One of the unique features of the Commonwealth as an international association is the width and depth of its non-political manifestations. At recent Commonwealth conferences political and official consultations have been held in parallel with large civil society, business and youth forums and, in some cases, inter-faith dialogues. Growing collaboration between the political, civil society and business elements gives rise to the notion of the ‘tri-sector Commonwealth’. The concept of an ‘association of peoples’ as well as one of nations, does, however, have a long pedigree. Between 1933 and 1959 a series of Unofficial Commonwealth Relations Conferences, organised by Chatham House and its overseas affiliates, were held at roughly five-yearly intervals to analyse the implications of the most recent Imperial Conferences. Politicians and civil servants joined with lawyers, academics, editors, military men, agriculturalists and trade unionists. In contrast to the political Commonwealth, women had a part in the unofficial conferences. And among more than 400 participants at Toronto 1933, Lapstone 1938, London 1945, Bigwin 1949, Lahore 1954 and Palmerston North 1959 were fifty-five academic historians and other writers of history, who included most of the leading authorities on the Commonwealth of the 1930s and 1940s.

The De-Colonisation of the Australian States

While Australia's colonial links with the United Kingdom were largely terminated by the Imperial Conferences of the 1920s and the Statute of Westminster 1931, the Australian States remained 'self-governing colonial dependencies of the British Crown' until the Australia Acts 1986 came into force. The States deliberately retained their links with the United Kingdom as a counter-balance to Commonwealth power. They believed that the British Government was politically disinterested in State matters and acted merely as the formal channel of communication in State matters. This belief was proved to be incorrect in the 1970s when the British Government exercised independent discretion in relation to the appointment and removal of State Governors, State petitions to the Privy Council and reserved State Bills. The States were spurred on by this revelation to seek to terminate their residual links with the United Kingdom, but only if they could directly advise the Queen. This paper describes the struggle for the decolonisation of the Australian States. It then discusses two important issues that arise as a result of this process of decolonisation. The first is the fundamental question of with whom sovereignty lies in Australia now that the Westminster Parliament no longer exercises legislative sovereignty over Australia. The second issue is the effect of decolonisation on the status of the Queen in Australia. Is there only one Crown with respect to Australia, or is Her Majesty the Queen of each State?

The Politics of Empire and the Architecture of Identity: Public Architecture in New Zealand 1900-1918

During the period from 1900 to 1918 new governmental buildings were constructed throughout New Zealand as part of a campaign to provide accommodation for government departments. Post offices, court houses and departmental buildings appeared in provincial towns as well as in major cities, almost all products of the government's architectural office, led by John Campbell. The exuberant Imperial Baroque style adopted for these buildings reflects a new national confidence but also follows closely the precedent of British public building of the period. Auckland's former Chief Post Office (1908-11) for example, is closely modelled on Sir Henry Tanner's Central Post Office in London (1907).
 The extent and consistency of the Government's building programme was intended to promote a sense of national unity although its dependence on British models seems to confirm Hurst Seager's argument that New Zealand had yet to develop a distinctive architectural style. The use of the Imperial Baroque style, culminating in Campbell's design for Parliament Buildings of 1911, reflected New Zealand's strong sense of identification with the British Empire, also expressed through the contributions of its politicians at Imperial Conferences from 1897 to 1911. Unlike their counterparts from Canada and Australia, New Zealand politicians argued for stronger imperial bonds as a way of ensuring greater influence over imperial policies. This paper will argue that in fact, New Zealand public architecture of the period 1900-18 reflects a clear sense of national identity but one that is defined in terms of Britishness and conceived within the larger framework of the security provided by imperial solidarity.

Diplomatic Apprenticeship: Pre-Independence Origins of Indian Diplomacy and Its Relevance for the Post-Independence Foreign Policy

Over the decades of the Indian struggle for independence from Britain Indians had an opportunity, unique in length and scope among peoples emerging from colonial rule, to engage in nascent diplomatic activity. With an organized and articulate movement for independence in place by the 1880's, a sophisticated leadership that engaged in frequent international travel, opportunities afforded to Indians for many years prior to 1947 to work in various departments of the British Indian Civil Service that touched on matters of an international character, and with Indians attending sessions of the League of Nations and Imperial (Commonwealth) Conferences, a variety of means were available to them to gain experience at the international level over an extended period prior to independence. As a result, India emerged from colonial rule with both a reservoir of diplomatic talent and an incipient orientation for its diplomacy, including a range of general foreign policy goals. It was thereby better prepared than perhaps any other country which acquired its independence after World War II to take a prominent place on the global stage quickly and forcefully, and to influence the diplomacy of other countries that were in time to constitute the Third World. It is the purpose of this study, first to set out the nature of Indian participation in both unofficial and official diplomatic activity prior to independence and, then, to examine the implications of this experience for post-independence Indian foreign policy.

A Cognitive Analysis of Japan's 1941 Decision for War

Previous studies have found that the cognitive performance of government decision-makers declines in crises that result in war. This decline has been attributed to crisis-produced stress which leads to simplification of information processing. The present study tested the disruptive stress hypothesis in the context of Japan's decision for war in 1941. Two content analysis techniques, integrative complexity coding (Schroder et al.,) and cognitive mapping (Axelrod, 1976) were used to analyze the translated records of statements by key Japanese policy-makers. Comparisons between statements made in the early and late periods of the 1941 crisis yielded only weak evidence of cognitive simplification. Interestingly, however, the social context in which statements were made significantly affected the complexity of cognitive performance: Statements made in Liaison conterences (in which policies were formulated) were significantly less complex than statements made in Imperial conferences (in which policies were presented to the Emperor for approval). Theoretical and methodological implications of the results were discussed.

Reviews

Australia. By Anthony Trollope. Edited by P. D. Edwards and R. B. Joyce. Queensland University Press, 1968. Pp. 792. Illustrated. $15. Martov. A Political Biography of a Russian Social Democrat. By Israel Getzler. Melbourne University Press 1967. Pp. viii + 246. $8.50. The Catholic Church in Australia. A Short History: 1788–1967. By Patrick O'Farrell. Nelson, Melbourne and Sydney, 1968. PP. x + 294. Illustrated. $1.75. Charles Perry, Bishop of Melbourne: The Challenges of a Colonial Episcopate, 1847–76. By A. de Q. Robin. University of Western Australia Press 1968. Pp. 229, illustrations and maps. $6.90. Russell Grimwade. By J. R. Poynter. Melbourne University Press, Melbourne 1967. Pp. xiv + 321. $8.35. ’The Eye and Ear’. The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital Centenary History. By Lyndsay Gardiner. Robertson and Mullens 1968. Pp. 114. Illustrated. $3.75. The Dawn of Australian Psychiatry. By John Bostock. Mervyn Archdall Medical Monograph Number 4. Australasian Medical Publishing Company, Sydney 1968. Pp. 219. $4.50. They Came for Sandalwood: A Study of the Sandalwood Trade in the South‐west Pacific 1830–1865. By Dorothy Shineberg. Melbourne University Press 1967. Pp. xiv + 299. $7.50. The Journal and Letters of Captain Charles Bishop on the North‐West Coast of America, in the Pacific and in New South Wales 1794–1799. Edited by Michael Roe. Cambridge University Press for the Hakluyt Society 1967. Pp. lvi + 342, frontispiece, maps. 42s. stg. Squatter, Selector and Storekeeper. A History of the Darling Downs 1859–93. By D. B. Waterson, Sydney University Press 1968. Pp. 310. $7.00. The Australian Dream. By Ian Turner. Sun Books, Melbourne 1968. Pp. xx + 358. $2.50. The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887–1911. A Study in Imperial Organization. By John Edward Kendle. Longmans, for the Royal Commonwealth Society, London 1967. Pp. xi + 264. 36s. stg. The Stock Exchange of Melbourne and the Victorian Economy 1852–1900. By A. R. Hall. Australian National University Press, Canberra 1968. Pp. xiii + 267. $7.95. Australians and the Gold Rush. California and Down Under 1849–1854. By Jay Monaghan. University of California Press, Berkeley & Los Angeles 1966. Pp. 317. $ U.S.6.50. ’Per Quale Iddio’: Machiavelli's Second Thoughts. By R. M. Crawford. Sydney University Press for the Australian Humanities Research Council, Sydney 1967. Pp. 24. 75c. Australia Since Federation: A Narrative and Critical Analysis. By Fred Alexander. Nelson, Melbourne 1967. Pp. xi + 352, illustrated. $4.95. Conscription in Australia. Edited by Roy Forward and Bob Reece. University of Queensland Press 1869. Pp. xii + 284, 24 tables. $4.50. The End of Sukarno: A Coup That Failed: A Purge That Ran Wild. By John Hughes. Angus and Robertson (U.K.), London 1968, Pp. x + 304. $4.95. The Tasmanians. The Story of a Doomed Race. By Robert Travers. Cassell, Melbourne 1968. Pp. 244. $4.50.

The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887–1911: A Study in Imperial Organization. By <italic>John Edward Kendle</italic>. [Imperial Studies Series, Number 28.] (London: Longmans for the Royal Commonwealth Society. 1967. Pp. x, 264. 36<italic>s</italic>.)

The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887–1911: A Study in Imperial Organization. By John Edward Kendle. [Imperial Studies Series, Number 28.] (London: Longmans for the Royal Commonwealth Society. 1967. Pp. x, 264. 36s.) The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887–1911: A Study in Imperial Organization. By Kendle John Edward. [Imperial Studies Series, Number 28.] (London: Longmans for the Royal Commonwealth Society. 1967. Pp. x, 264. 36s.) H. Duncan Hall H. Duncan Hall Bethesda, Maryland Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 74, Issue 3, February 1969, Pages 999–1000, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/74.3.999 Published: 01 February 1969

The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887-1911: A Study in Imperial Organization

The Colonial and Imperial Conferences, 1887-1911: A Study in Imperial Organization

Defence and Development in Australian New Guinea

A T LEAST since the i83os, Australia's chief concern with New Guinea and the other islands of Melanesia has been strategic, arising from the fact that they lie across the northern and northeastern approaches to the mainland. The Commonwealth has considerable shipping, aviation, trading, mining, plantation and missionary interests in this region, but defence considerations are paramount. No Australian Government can be indifferent to any question concerning the political control of the Islands. This attitude was demonstrated early, when cries of anger and alarm were raised in the Australian Colonies at the appearance of the French in New Caledonia and the New Hebrides; and even more plainly when in i884 the British government failed to forestall the German declaration of a protectorate over what is now the Trust Territory of New Guinea. It is perhaps true that there has been something a little factitious and merely noisy in these and other agitations, but the ground of the concern is real enough. From the Australian point of view, the political patchwork of the Southwest Pacific is a disadvantage because it renders coordinated defence more difficult. From time to time it has been suggested that Australia should take over the territories controlled by the British High Commission for the Western Pacific, or at least the British Solomons Islands Protectorate and the British share in the condominium of the New Hebrides. The question of the New Hebrides was raised at successive Imperial Conferences. Since the French were not agreeable to partition, the United Kingdom contemplated ending the odious and unworkable condominium by withdrawing; but at the I937 Imperial Conference Australia proposed instead that she should take over British

Collaboration in the British Empire

THE Peter Le Neve Foster Lecture on “Empire Relations”, delivered by Viscount Bennett before the Royal Society of Arts on June 3 (J. Roy. Soc. Arts, 90, 613 ; 1942), gives a lucid survey of the development of the relations between the parts of the British Empire from the sixteenth century to the organization of the present Imperial Conference system in 1907, when these conferences became a fixed method of consultation between the self-governing Colonies and Great Britain and one another. Mainly from a constitutional point of view, Lord Bennett gives an account of the further development of the system and its limitations, notably its failure effectively to promote Imperial development on scientific lines. Imperial conferences since 1907 have been concerned with almost every conceivable subject, including communications, patents, development of Empire resources, research, timber reserves, wool production, etc., but while they have afforded an opportunity for representatives of all the nations of the Commonwealth to meet one another and discuss personally Empire problems in the light of their experience and special knowledge of their own communities, they have led to no agreement upon any adequate method for providing continuous consultation on matters of common concern. Urging the need for an earnest effort to make the story of the Empire better known to the youth of Great Britain, Lord Bennett stresses the importance of providing the means for adequate and continuous consultation. This is essential for common action by the Governments of the Empire to attain a common end, and he suggests that a member of each of the Governments of the Overseas Dominions might be resident in London. Regular meetings between the Prime Ministers or representatives of their several Governments, utilizing air transport and with a permanent secretariat, might provide a solution of the problem.