Britain's Legacy of Empire
All empires need to justify themselves. Even if you take the cynical view that they principally exist to extract resources and make money, eventually people need to buy into them to keep them going. The trouble with building elaborate mythologies to make sense of something that exists is that eventually the thing you built the mythology to justify1 stops existing and it’s not so easy to dispose of myths.
By the nineteenth-century (at the latest) Britain was justifying its empire as a force for spreading civilisation and Christianity, much like all the other European powers. The ideas that were used were satirised by Kipling in his widely misinterpreted poem White Man’s Burden which was written for the American invasion of the Philippines (yes, America is not Britain, but its lack of subtlety makes it easier to use as an example). Kipling’s poem is a satirical call for the white man to civilise those he colonises, it claims that these efforts will result in nothing but blame for the coloniser “Take up the White Man's burden— / And reap his old reward: / The blame of those ye better, / The hate of those ye guard” and the ultimate futility of the whole project anyway “And when your goal is nearest / The end for others sought, / Watch Sloth and heathen Folly / Bring all your hopes to nought.” The attitude that the poem was satirising was a real one, and one that can all too easily be forgotten: Brits and Americans really thought that their imperialist projects could make the world a better place; it’s all too easy to ascribe money making and power politics as the sole motives of empire, but it’s impossible to sustain an empire without a solid myth behind it — you need to be able to convince hundreds of thousands of your own country men to further the cause of empire, possibly to the point of laying down their lives, and you need to co-opt natives to help you out which might be possible in the short term with cash, but ultimately needs something a bit more inspiring. There are a million ways to justify empire and the logic of each myth matters enormously to how agents of that empire will act.2
Once Britain’s empire vanished, the mythology that had built up behind it continued, indeed it was even strengthened because no one had to worry about actually ruling India or actually keeping ethnic groups that hated each other from fighting it out.3 Now, at last, the mission of spreading civilisation and democracy could exist in a vacuum. Unlike most former empires, Britain left behind a powerful heir once she left the world stage. Not only did America break free from Britain’s rule in a manner that made her more British than the British, after the Second World War she also took over many of the naval bases that had allowed the British Empire to function as payment for Britain’s war debts. The existence of America meant that a world empire continued to exist and it shared many of the characteristics of the British Empire — most importantly, its maritime strength and liberal values. When Rome fell in the West, the ideas and myths which motivated the Empire continued to exist, but they didn’t have an instantiation to grip on to.4 The American Empire that replaced the British actually provided an even stronger instantiation of liberal values for Brits to grab onto.
The legacy of this process for Britain has been something of a disaster. Americans don’t respect Britain, why should they, but Britain’s leaders can’t help but bow down to the superiority of the President. The result is that Britain doesn’t consider herself to really have a national interest apart from advancing the cause of liberalism around the globe. Often this is merely a rhetorical concern, Brexiteers trumpet the cause of “Global Britain” while Remainers worry about our “international reputation.” Sometimes it leads to major disasters such as joining the American invasion of Iraq. I suspect that this attitude explains why Britain underinvests in its navy and overinvests in its army — an army is more useful as an auxiliary force for projecting American power, whereas a navy would merely protect our island from hostile forces, hardly a worthy goal. A big part of Britain’s subservience to America is the assumption that being the good imperial subjects we are, America will look after our interests. This is obviously not the case. Britain spent decades fighting a guerrilla war in Northern Ireland without a penny of help from America whereas a single (major) attack on America resulted in Britain embroiling herself in a Middle Eastern quagmire for two decades.
Alas, this will probably not change for a long time, and when it does it will be for a bad reason. But perhaps we can make some small steps towards abandoning some of our more deranged global pretentions. A country devoted to a futile mission that it does not have the resources to achieve will eventually pay the price for its pride. We should focus more on narrow issues like security and trade and less on attempting to help the Americans achieve their grandiose aims.
Not necessarily in an intentional way.
C. Browning Ordinary Men, 1992
With some obvious exceptions.
The Eastern Empire was too far and the Holy Roman Empire was never strong enough to really claim the mantle (well maybe briefly under Charlemagne).