British Scholar: Webster - Rise of the British Empire

The Debate on the Rise of the British Empire
Anthony Webster (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006) 224 pages

Reviewed by: Brett Bennett, University of Texas at Austin

Imperialism as a general topic of study recently became popular again, due in part to the geopolitical
conflicts and struggles in the Middle East and Africa. Consequently, the exuberance to study all things
related to empire spilt over into the field of British imperial history. Due to the field’s revived popularity,
Anthony Webster wrote The Debate On The Rise of The British Empire to explain to students the recent
and past historical debates and explanations surrounding the rise of the British Empire. Webster dedicates
much of the book to describing major economic and political theories, which informed each subsequent
generation of British imperial scholarship. Moreover, the book also looks forward in trying to ascertain
future topics and themes in the field of British imperial history. In the end, Webster produces a work that
provides an excellent overview of the paradigms and problems that arise when studying the British Empire.

To understand modern interpretations of British imperialism, the book chronologically traces the
development and explains the major theories used to explain the causes of British imperialism. Webster
attempts to understand the cultural atmosphere and particular historical events that influenced each
subsequent generation of imperial historians to view British imperialism with different terms. Chapters
revolve around a key “school” of British imperial thought, such as “Metropole, periphery and informal
empire: the Robinson and Gallagher controversy of the 1950s and after” or “Cultural explanations of
British imperialism: religions, race, gender and class.” The book provides an excellent chronological
overview of the major works of British imperial history, from John Seeley’s The Expansion of England, John
Hobson’s Imperialism, Ronald Robinson and Jack Gallagher’s “The Imperialism of Free Trade” and Africa
and the Victorians, to P.J. Cain and A.G. Hopkins’ British Imperialism 1688-2000. The survey explains how
famous general theories of imperialism from Vladimir Lenin to Joseph Schumpeter influenced new historical
and political theories on the causes of British imperialism. The book devotes a number of chapters to the
rise of new interpretations of British imperial history involving area studies, Orientalism, and cultural, social,
and anthropological methodologies. Webster provides a balanced view of the criticisms and merits of each
particular theory of imperialism, although he describes the classic theories of British imperialism with the
most lucidity and command. If Webster leans strongly in one direction, he seems to favor an economic
and political explanation of British imperialism along the lines of Cain and Hopkins’ gentlemanly capitalism
thesis, although he realizes its limitations. Finally, the book looks ahead to the next generation of ideas
and terms that historians might use to understand the British Empire. He singles out P.J. Cain and A.G.
Hopkins’ emphasis on “globalism” and “global international order” as two of the most important ideas
shaping current and future British imperial history.

The book’s main strength comes from Webster’s incorporation of recent scholarship, such as David
Armitage’s Ideological Origins of the British Empire, Linda Colley’s Captives, David Cannadine’s
Ornamentalism, and P.J. Cain and A.G. Hopkins’ revised work on gentlemanly capitalism, British
Imperialism 1688-2000. These works remained outside the scope of the Oxford History of the British
Empire due to the latter’s earlier publication dates. Additionally, by incorporating Armitage’s thesis,
Webster effectively traces the intellectual origins of British imperial thought back to the thirteenth century,
with the attempted unification of England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland by King Edward I of England. This
inclusion dates the origins of British imperial thought nearly three centuries prior to the work of other
scholars and, therefore, represents a major new inspiration for investigating the imperial era.

The book excellently places past theorists of imperialism into their social contexts. This methodology
follows upon the heels of major British imperial historians, such as John Darwin, Wm. Roger Louis, and P.J.
Cain, who employ social histories of imperial theorists and historians to explain why past theorists and
historians offered differing explanations about the mechanism and origins of British imperialism. With that
said, the book provides an excellent intellectual and social history of the development of British imperial
historiography. Any undergraduate or graduate student interested in a quick yet in-depth analysis of the
personalities, ideas, and historical events that combined to create the field of modern British imperial
history should read this book.

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