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Un-Imagining Markets: Chambers of Commerce, Globalisation and the Political Economy of the Commonwealth of Nations, 1945–1975

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Book cover Imagining Britain’s Economic Future, c.1800–1975

Abstract

This chapter draws on evidence from business associations and particularly chambers of commerce to chart the ‘un-imagining’ of the Commonwealth of Nations as a market in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It argues that this process of ‘un-imagining’ was inextricably linked to the erosion of any notion of the Commonwealth as a distinctive supra-national entity believed capable of some measure of economic governance against the backdrop of shifting patterns of economic globalisation. Thus, it seeks to emphasise the role of the state (broadly conceived) in the imagining and un-imagining of markets.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    I would like to thank participants at the 2013 Decolonisation Seminar at the National History Center in Washington, in the 2015 Imagining Markets Workshops in London and Exeter, and seminar audiences in London, Leeds and Canberra for feedback on earlier versions of this chapter.

  2. 2.

    B. Anderson, Imagined communities: reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism (London, 1991).

  3. 3.

    F. Cooper and R. Brubaker, ‘Identity’, in F. Cooper ed., Colonialism in question: theory, knowledge, history (Berkeley, CA, 2005), pp. 59–60 at p. 76.

  4. 4.

    D.C. North, ‘Institutions’, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 5 (1991), pp. 97–112 at p. 97.

  5. 5.

    For the usage of the term, see M.J. Daunton and F. Trentmann, ‘Worlds of political economy: knowledge, practices and contestation’, in M.J. Daunton and F. Trentmann eds., Worlds of political economy: knowledge and power in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (Basingstoke, 2004), pp. 1–23.

  6. 6.

    Especially given the minimisation of the role of political institutions in G. Magee and A. Thompson, Empire and globalisation: networks of people, goods and capital in the British World, c.1850–1914 (Cambridge, 2010).

  7. 7.

    W.D. McIntyre, The Commonwealth of Nations: origins and impact, 1869–1971 (Minneapolis, MN, 1977), pp. 182–197; P. Marshall, ‘The Balfour Formula and the evolution of the Commonwealth’, The Round Table, 90 (2001), pp. 541–553.

  8. 8.

    F. McKenzie, Redefining the bonds of Commonwealth, 1939–1948: the politics of preference (Basingstoke, 2002).

  9. 9.

    I.M. Drummond, Imperial economic policy, 1917–1939 (London, 1974); W.K. Hancock, Survey of British Commonwealth affairs: volume two, problems of economic policy, 1918–1939 (London, 1942); R.F. Holland, Britain and the Commonwealth alliance, 1918–1939 (London, 1981).

  10. 10.

    F. Trentmann, ‘The transformation of fiscal reform: reciprocity, modernization, and the fiscal debate within the business community in early twentieth century Britain’, Historical Journal, 39 (1996), pp. 1005–1048 and ‘Political culture and political economy: interest, ideology and free trade’, Review of International Political Economy, 5 (1998), pp. 217–251.

  11. 11.

    R.J. Bennett, The local voice: the history of Chambers of Commerce in Britain, Ireland, and revolutionary America, 1760–2011 (Oxford, 2011).

  12. 12.

    A.R. Ilersic, Parliament of commerce: the story of the Association of British Chambers of Commerce, 1860–1960 (London, 1960).

  13. 13.

    A. Dilley, ‘The politics of commerce: the Congress of Chambers of Commerce of the Empire, 1886–1914’, SAGE Open, 3 (2013), pp. 1–12; London Metropolitan Archives (LMA hereafter), CLC/B/082/MS18283/001 (Federation of Commonwealth Chambers of Commerce Papers), Report of annual meeting, 1926, pp. 21–26 in Minute Book, 1911–1926 (FCCC minutes hereafter), pp. 227–228. All LMA references are from these papers unless otherwise stated.

  14. 14.

    For an overview of the Federation’s inter-war activities, see CLC/B/082/MS18282/002-3, Annual reports, 1918–1939.

  15. 15.

    McKenzie, Redefining the bonds of Commonwealth.

  16. 16.

    C.R. Schenk, Britain and the Sterling Area: from devaluation to convertibility in the 1950s (London, 1994).

  17. 17.

    LMA, CLC/B/082/MS18283/003, ‘Council meeting’, June 1942, FCCC minutes, vol. 3, p. 42.

  18. 18.

    De Leigh to delegates, 20 Sep 1945, inset in ‘Council Meeting’, 15 Oct 1945, FCCC minutes, vol. 3, pp. 59–60.

  19. 19.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287, Congress Proceedings, 1948 (Congress proceedings hereafter).

  20. 20.

    Ibid., 1945, p. 9.

  21. 21.

    Ibid., 1948, 1951, 1954, 1957, passim.

  22. 22.

    Ibid., 1945, p. 9.

  23. 23.

    Ibid., 1948, p. 36; 1951, p. 29.

  24. 24.

    J.D.B. Miller, Survey of Commonwealth affairs: problems of expansion and attrition, 1953–1969 (London, 1974), pp. 274–284; Schenk, Britain and the Sterling Area.

  25. 25.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/003, Council Meeting, 21 Nov. 1945, FCCC minutes, vol. 3, p. 67.

  26. 26.

    Chamber of Commerce Journal, Apr 1951, p. 10.

  27. 27.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287, Congress proceedings, 1951, p. 15.

  28. 28.

    P. Marshall, ‘Shaping the ‘new Commonwealth’, 1949’, The Round Table, 88 (1999), pp. 185–197; R.J. Moore, Making the New Commonwealth (Oxford, 1987).

  29. 29.

    Miller, Survey of Commonwealth affairs; W.D. McIntyre, ‘The admission of small states to the Commonwealth’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 24 (1996), pp. 244–277; K. Srinivasan, ‘Nobody’s Commonwealth? The Commonwealth in Britain’s post-imperial adjustment’, Commonwealth and Comparative Politics, 64 (2006), pp. 257–269; M.M. Ball, The “open” Commonwealth (Durham, NC, 1971).

  30. 30.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287, Congress proceedings, 1951, p. 53.

  31. 31.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/004, Council meeting, 24 Sept 1953, 29 Jul 1954, FCCC minutes, vol. 4, pp. 74, 101.

  32. 32.

    I. McCabe, ‘Leaving the Commonwealth’, History Ireland, 6 (1998), pp. 5–7.

  33. 33.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/003, Annual meeting, 16 Nov 1950, FCCC minutes, vol. 3, p. 141.

  34. 34.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/004, Executive committee, 4 May 1951, ibid., vol. 4, p. 2.

  35. 35.

    M. Misra, Business, race, and politics in British India, c.1850–1960 (Oxford, 1999), pp. 39–40, 55–57, 194–199, 208–209.

  36. 36.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/003, Council Meeting, 27 Feb 1946, FCCC minutes, vol. 3, pp. 73–74.

  37. 37.

    ‘Re-Organisation of the Federation’, 3 Jun 1959, FCCC minutes, vol. 5, pp. 71–72.

  38. 38.

    Council Meeting, 3 Jun 1959, ibid., pp. 71–72.

  39. 39.

    ‘Re-organisation of the Federation’, 3 Jun 1959, inset in FCCC minutes, vol. 5, pp. 71–73.

  40. 40.

    Annual meeting, 26 Nov 1959, ibid., p. 5.

  41. 41.

    CLC/B/082/MS18296, ‘Verbatim report’, Apr 1960, p. 11.

  42. 42.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/006, ‘Conference of Chamber of Commerce officials’, 29 May 1962; Council meeting, 29 Nov. 1962; Executive committee, 19 Feb 1963 in FCCC minutes, vol. 6, pp. 52–53, 72.

  43. 43.

    LMA, CLC/B/082/MS18285: [Commonwealth Chambers of Commerce] Directory, 1965.

  44. 44.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/005, Council minutes, Jun 1960, FCCC minutes, vol. 5, p. 10.

  45. 45.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/016, Congress proceedings, 1962, p. 14.

  46. 46.

    Chamber of Commerce Journal, Jun 1962, p. 1.

  47. 47.

    W.D. McIntyre, ‘Britain and the Creation of the Commonwealth Secretariat’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 28 (2000), pp. 135–158.

  48. 48.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/017, Congress proceedings, 1964, pp. 17–18, 19–21.

  49. 49.

    Ibid., 1951, pp. 79–80.

  50. 50.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/014, Congress proceedings, 1957, p. 71.

  51. 51.

    Ibid., p. 18.

  52. 52.

    The six founding members of the European Communities were Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and West Germany.

  53. 53.

    Ibid., p. 36.

  54. 54.

    Commonwealth trade, 1950 to 57 (London, 1959), p. 27.

  55. 55.

    S. Ward, Australia and the British embrace: the demise of the imperial ideal (Melbourne, 2001).

  56. 56.

    P. Robertson and J. Singleton, ‘The old Commonwealth and Britain’s first application to join the EEC, 1961–1963’, Australian Economic History Review, 40 (2000), pp. 153–177; J.D.B. Miller, ‘The Commonwealth after De Gaulle’, International Journal, 19 (1963), pp. 30–39; Miller, Survey of Commonwealth affairs, pp. 315–334; A.A. Mazrui, ‘African attitudes to the European Economic Community’, International Affairs, 39 (1963), pp. 24–36.

  57. 57.

    N. Rollings, British business in the formative years of European integration, 1945–1973 (Cambridge, 2007).

  58. 58.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/006, Executive committee, 15 Feb 1962, FCCC minutes, vol. 6, pp. 45–46.

  59. 59.

    Melbourne, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne Chamber of Commerce Records, MS10917, Council Minutes, 1 Sep 1958, p. 60; ‘Australia’s Interests in Europe’, Canberra Comments, Oct 1959.

  60. 60.

    Ottawa, Libraries and Archives Canada, Canadian Chamber of Commerce, MG 28 III 62, box 8, Anglo-Canadian Trade Committee, 25–26 May 1962.

  61. 61.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/016, Congress proceedings, 1962, p. 21.

  62. 62.

    R. Toye, ‘Words of Change: The rhetoric of Commonwealth, Common Market and Cold War, 1961–1963’, in L.J. Butler and S.E. Stockwell eds., The wind of change: Harold Macmillan and British decolonization (Basingstoke, 2013).

  63. 63.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/016, Congress proceedings, 1962, pp. 26–31, 37–40.

  64. 64.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/018, Congress proceedings, 1968, p. 8.

  65. 65.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/020, Congress proceedings, 1972, pp. 10–11, 31–40.

  66. 66.

    As a result relations with the Common Market occupied a lot of Arnold Smith’s attention. See, for example, London, Commonwealth Secretariat, Arnold Smith Papers, 2003/80, Commonwealth and EEC, 1968–1972.

  67. 67.

    See CLC/B/082/MS18286.

  68. 68.

    S.R. Ashton, ‘British government perspectives on the Commonwealth, 1964–1971: an asset or a liability?’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 35 (2007), pp. 73–94; P. Alexander, ‘A tale of two Smiths: the transformation of Commonwealth policy, 1964–1970’, Contemporary British History, 20 (2006), pp. 303–321.

  69. 69.

    Tony Hopkins has argued that changing patterns of globalisation underlay decolonisation more broadly. See A.G. Hopkins, ‘Rethinking Decolonization’, Past & Present, 200 (2008), pp. 211–247.

  70. 70.

    Schenk, Britain and the Sterling Area; D.K. Fieldhouse, ‘The metropolitan economics of Empire’, in J.M. Brown and W.R. Louis, eds., Oxford history of the British Empire. vol.4, the twentieth century (Oxford, 1999), pp. 90–113 at p. 111.

  71. 71.

    CLC/B/082/MS18287/018, Congress proceedings, 1968, p. 3; J. Pinder, The Commonwealth and the trend towards world and regional economic systems (London, 1968) in CLC/B/082/MS18288/001. See also ‘John Pinder: obituary’, Guardian, 7 Apr 2015.

  72. 72.

    Commonwealth trade, 1970 (London, 1971), p. 23.

  73. 73.

    T. Rooth, ‘Britain, Europe and Diefenbaker’s trade diversion proposals, 1957–1958’, in P.A. Buckner ed., Canada and the end of Empire (Vancouver, BC, 2005), pp. 117–132.

  74. 74.

    Schenk, Britain and the Sterling Area; Miller, Survey of Commonwealth affairs, p. 296.

  75. 75.

    Miller, Survey of Commonwealth affairs, p. 289.

  76. 76.

    ‘Future of the Federation’, 6 Jul 1966, p. 1. On Australian scepticism see Canberra, National Archives of Australia, Roy Rowe papers, M1595-8, ‘Federation of Commonwealth Chambers of Commerce, 1960–1972’.

  77. 77.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/006, Council Meeting, 6 Jul 1966, FCCC minutes, vol. 6, p. 183.

  78. 78.

    ‘Future of the Federation’, p. 5.

  79. 79.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/006, Council Meeting, 6 Jul 1966, FCCC minutes, vol. 6, pp. 189–190.

  80. 80.

    Ward plays down the Australian moves in the late 1950s, but their significance perhaps is not as an absolute point of departure but as the emergence of an alternate regional focus and framework. See Ward, Australia and the British embrace.

  81. 81.

    ‘Australian trade mission to south east Asia’, Canberra Comments, 9/1, Jan 1955.

  82. 82.

    ‘Seizing our economic opportunities’, Canberra Comments, 20/4, Apr 1966; Dunedin, Hocken Library, Dunedin Chamber of Commerce Papers, UN-022-OCC/12/11/3/2, Trade with Japan, 1959–1961; OCC/12/11/2, Trade Missions, pp. 58–62.

  83. 83.

    ‘Union of business interests in Asia’, Canberra Comments, 19/2, Feb 1965; ‘Asian Businessmen form regional organisation’, ibid., 20/6, Jun 1966.

  84. 84.

    Wellington, Turnbull Library, Associated Chamber of Commerce of New Zealand papers, 94-170-10, Minute books 1966–1967, 10 Mar 1967, p. 10; 26 May 1967, pp. 3–4; 29 Nov, pp. 14–20; 27 Sep 1968, p. 11; 25 Jul 1968, pp. 8–9.

  85. 85.

    LMA, CLC/B/082/MS18296, ‘Future of the Federation’, 6 Jul 1966, p. 2.

  86. 86.

    ‘Future of the Federation’, pp. 2–3.

  87. 87.

    Arnold Smith papers, 1997/10, Noel Slater, ‘Record of Meeting… 5 May 1972’ (8 May 1972).

  88. 88.

    ‘Union of business interests in Asia’, Canberra Comments, 19/2, Feb 1965, ‘Asian businessmen form regional organisation’, ibid., 20/6 Jun 1966.

  89. 89.

    CLC/B/082/MS18296, ‘The future’, Oct 1974, p. 3.

  90. 90.

    CLC/B/082/MS18283/007, Council minutes, 15 Jan 1974, in FCCC minutes, vol. 7, p. 59.

  91. 91.

    Ibid., pp. 73–80.

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  1. University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, UK

    Andrew Dilley

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  1. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    David Thackeray

  2. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    Andrew Thompson

  3. Department of History, University of Exeter, Exeter, United Kingdom

    Richard Toye

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Dilley, A. (2018). Un-Imagining Markets: Chambers of Commerce, Globalisation and the Political Economy of the Commonwealth of Nations, 1945–1975. In: Thackeray, D., Thompson, A., Toye, R. (eds) Imagining Britain’s Economic Future, c.1800–1975. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71297-0_12

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