The Losers

Abstract

In that “struggle for existence” which provided the basic metaphor of the economic, political, social, and biological thought of the bourgeois world, only the “fittest” would survive, their fitness certified not only by their survival but by their domination. The greater part of the world’s population therefore became the victims of those whose superiority, economic, technological, and therefore military, was unquestioned and seemed unchallengeable: the economies and states of northwestern and central Europe and the countries settled by its emigrants abroad, notably the United States. With the three major exceptions of India, Indonesia, and parts of North Africa few of them became or were formal colonies in the third quarter of the nineteenth century. (We may leave aside the areas of Anglo-Saxon settlement like Australia, New Zealand, and Canada which, though not yet formally independent, were clearly not treated like the areas inhabited by “natives,” a term in itself neutral, but which acquired a strong connotation of inferiority.) Admittedly these exceptions were not negligible: India alone accounted for 14 percent of the world’s population in 1871. Still, the political independence of the rest counted for little. Economically they were at the mercy of capitalism, insofar as they came within its reach. From a military point of view their inferiority was blatant.

An imitation of European customs, including the perilous art of borrowing, has been lately affected: but, in the hands of Eastern rulers, the civilisation of the West is unfruitful; and, instead of restoring a tottering state, appears to threaten it with speedier ruin.

Sir T. Erskine May (1877)¹

The Word of God gives no authority to the modern tenderness for human life.… It is necessary in all Eastern lands to establish a fear and awe of the Government. Then, and only then, are its benefits appreciated.

J. W. Kaye (1870)²