The British Empire and Commonwealth

The British Empire and Commonwealth PDF Author: Martin Kitchen
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1349248304
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 205

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Book Description
From its modest to its recent disappearance, the British Empire was an extraordinary and paradoxical entity. North America, Africa, South and Southeast Asia and Australasia and innumerable small islands and territories have been fundamentally shaped - economically, socially and politically - by a nation whose imperial drive came from a bewildering mixture of rapacity and moral zeal, of high-mindedness and viciousness, of strategic cunning and feckless neglect. Martin Kitchen has written a fascinating, crisp, informative account of the rise and fall of the British Empire, concentrating on the 19th and 20th centuries but giving the background of the 'First British Empire', which was lost with the creating of the United States of America. His book is of particular value in relating the importance of the Empire to Britain's success as the only genuinely world power in the Victorian era and to Britain's ability to win the two great wars of the 20th century.

The Rise, Decline and Future of the British Commonwealth

The Rise, Decline and Future of the British Commonwealth PDF Author: K. Srinivasan
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230248438
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 198

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Book Description
Written by a senior Indian diplomat who has until recently also served as Commonwealth Deputy Secretary-General, this book provides a unique and far-reaching exploration of the British Commonwealth, and its impact since the second World War on the process of Britain adjusting to a world without Empire. Whither the Commonwealth now? What is its record of achievement; what are the benefits of membership to countries in terms of collective political influence, trade, investment, aid, travel and education? Can any practical good be envisaged for this nearly moribund post-colonial organization? Britain, which brought the association into being and is central to it, would have to play a key part in determining its future. But in coming to such decisions, the British Government faces great problems of perception, both from the Monarchy and the British public.

The Commonwealth in the World

The Commonwealth in the World PDF Author: John Donald Bruce Miller
Publisher: Cambridge : Harvard University Press
ISBN:
Category : Africa, Sub-Saharan
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
In the present proliferation of blocs, alliances and pacts, the Commonwealth remains unique. Britainâe(tm)s old Colonial Empire has grown into a free, loose grouping of equal sovereign states, each respecting to the full of the othersâe(tm) independence. J. D. B. Miller examines the political structure of the Commonwealth and the international status of its members, and forecasts the circumstances in which it can me expected to endure. He contends that the commonwealth is âeoea concert of convenienceâe to which each member belongs for reasons of interest rather than of sentiment. The countries of the Commonwealth find profit in the means of consultation and economic cooperation which it offers, and in the political field confine their discussions to the larger issues on which there is a measure of common interest. The Commonwealth in the World is one of the few works which deals conveniently with these matters in a single volume. As an Australian, Miller views his subject with the necessary detachment; and his writing is as spirited as his judgments are sound.

The Britannic Vision

The Britannic Vision PDF Author: W. David McIntyre
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN: 9780230227811
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Shows the role of historians in making 'Dominion' status, which combined autonomy with unity and provided the peaceful route by which Canada, Australia and New Zealand gained their independence within the British Commmonwealth of Nations, while South Africa, the Irish Free State and India, also Dominions, chose to become republics.

Commonwealth History in the Twenty-First Century

Commonwealth History in the Twenty-First Century PDF Author: Saul Dubow
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030417883
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 348

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Book Description
This edited collection draws together new historical writing on the Commonwealth. It features the work of younger scholars, as well as established academics, and highlights themes such as law and sovereignty, republicanism and the monarchy, French engagement with the Commonwealth, the anti-apartheid struggle, race and immigration, memory and commemoration, and banking. The volume focusses less on the Commonwealth as an institution than on the relevance and meaning of the Commonwealth to its member countries and peoples. By adopting oblique, de-centred, approaches to Commonwealth history, unusual or overlooked connections are brought to the fore while old problems are looked at from fresh vantage points – be this turning points like the relationship between ‘old’ and `new’ Commonwealth members from 1949, or the distinctive roles of major figures like Jawaharlal Nehru or Jan Smuts. The volume thereby aims to refresh interest in Commonwealth history as a field of comparative international history.

A Short History of the British Commonwealth ...

A Short History of the British Commonwealth ... PDF Author: Ramsay Muir
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 860

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The British Commonwealth and the World

The British Commonwealth and the World PDF Author: Frederick Blagden Mailm
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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The Empire's New Clothes

The Empire's New Clothes PDF Author: Philip Murphy
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190935006
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
In the wake of Brexit, the Commonwealth has been identified as an important body for future British trade and diplomacy, but few know what it actually does. How is it organized and what has held it together for so long? How important is the Queen's role as Head of the Commonwealth? Most importantly, why has it had such a troubled recent past, and is it realistic to imagine that its fortunes might be reversed?In The Empire's New Clothes,? Murphy strips away the gilded self-image of the Commonwealth to reveal an irrelevant institution afflicted by imperial amnesia. He offers a personal perspective on this complex and poorly understood institution, and asks if it can ever escape from the shadow of the British Empire to become an organization based on shared values, rather than a shared history.

Unfinished Empire

Unfinished Empire PDF Author: John Darwin
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
ISBN: 1620400391
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 497

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Book Description
John Darwin's After Tamerlane, a sweeping six-hundred-year history of empires around the globe, marked him as a historian of "massive erudition" and narrative mastery. In Unfinished Empire, he marshals his gifts to deliver a monumental one-volume history of Britain's imperium-a work that is sure to stand as the most authoritative, most compelling treatment of the subject for a generation. Darwin unfurls the British Empire's beginnings and decline and its extraordinary range of forms of rule, from settler colonies to island enclaves, from the princely states of India to ramshackle trading posts. His penetrating analysis offers a corrective to those who portray the empire as either naked exploitation or a grand "civilizing mission." Far from ever having a "master plan," the British Empire was controlled by a range of interests often at loggerheads with one another and was as much driven on by others' weaknesses as by its own strength. It shows, too, that the empire was never stable: to govern was a violent process, inevitably creating wars and rebellions. Unfinished Empire is a remarkable, nuanced history of the most complex polity the world has ever known, and a serious attempt to describe the diverse, contradictory ways-from the military to the cultural-in which empires really function. This is essential reading for any lover of sweeping history, or anyone wishing to understand how the modern world came into being.

The Bases of a World Commonwealth

The Bases of a World Commonwealth PDF Author: Charles Bungay Fawcett
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : International cooperation
Languages : en
Pages : 188

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Book Description