Critique of Modern Civilisation

Abstract

British rule in India was a relationship of economic and political domination between an imperial power and its colony. It was based on conquest, consolidated after several wars and followed economic policies designed to serve British interests. Both the parties knew it was unequal, exploitative and based on force. As such it raised moral questions and needed justification. Their self-respect, sense of morality and morale required the British to convince themselves that they were right to rule over India. In order to ensure its orderly and continued existence and secure the co-operation and support of the Indians without whom they simply could not run the country, they also needed to convince their subjects that British rule was in their ‘real’ interest. It was, of course, possible for them to justify it to themselves in one way and to their subjects in another. However, they knew that such a strategy was open to the charge of inconsistency, even hypocrisy, and inherently precarious.