The British Imperial Establishment, Post Imperial Era, and the ‘Churchillian’ World View, 1945-2016. (Adjustments & Challenges in Contemporary British Diplomatic Strategy)

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said about
it.”3 Thomas Hobbes in the ‘Leviathan’ placed acquisition
and
acquisitiveness as the first principal cause of conflict:

“So
that in the nature of man we find three principle causes of
quarrel. First, competition; secondly,
diffidence; thirdly, glory. The
first maketh man invade for gain; the second, for safety; and the
third,
for reputation.”4

It is
also worth adding to what has been said that imperialism or
colonialism is not a question of different
political systems opposing each other
such as Capitalism versus Communism as the Marxists argue nor the cause
of the
“march of progress towards the independence and equal dignity of all people”5,
as Mr. Nehru and Dr. Sockarno used to say. It is simply one aspect or
example,”
of the immemorial conflict in the history of mankind between reality and the
ideal,
between the world as it is, with some states and peoples having more power
than others, and the world as it
might be, with all states and people equal.”6 This
is, at bottom,
the clash between Kratos and Ethos which has existed since the
beginning of recorded history. The unusual
thing about such struggle is that it
does not seem to have begun on the plane of international relations, but
on the
plane of individual experience and aspiration. “The demand for equality, as de
Toqueville
pointed out, is in the last resort irresistible; once people begin to feel
that they are equal human beings
and have a right to be treated as such, it takes
immense power, or force, to compel them to be satisfied with
their inequality.
From that point on, imperialism – the international from of inequality –
becomes
intolerable, not only to the subject peoples, but to people within the imperialist
state
itself.”7 Our subsequent studies will reveal that de Toqueville’s
statement is
not far from the truth.

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