WESTERN IMPERIALISM: It?s Causes, and It?s Impact on the World
Rehan Rizvi 
November 25, 1998        
 
 
  
The nature of political revolutions in the West was as such that 
equality and basic human rights
formed its very foundations. Nonetheless, the same people who claimed 
their inalienable rights by
virtue of principles of fundamental human rights, failed to apply 
these same principles when they
set out to colonize the world. The same people who were ready to die 
for their right to life,
liberty, and persuit of happiness, in their conquest for colonies, 
killed millions of human beings
who tried to claim the same rights. Some of the questions that 
logically come to mind, when we
encounter this irony, require an analysis of the underlying causes of 
the Western imperialism and
thus it's impact on the world. Why did hundreds of millions of people 
were subjected to such
misery by the people of the West, when they themsleves would not 
approve of it, if it were to be
applied on them? Or, how did they justify their cruel methods of 
imperialism in the presence of
standards of human rights they created for themselves? And, did the 
Western imperialism ever
end? 

Since these are very broad questions and require a considerable amount 
of intellectual persuit in
order to give a comprehensive response, which is beyond the scope of 
this article. Therefore, we
will focus essentially on the most important aspects of Western 
imperialism, it's fundamental
causes, and it's impact on the world. 

The Foundations of Western Imperialism 

Hence, the first question that arises in this respect is, why did the 
people of the West set out to
build empires in the first place? History tells us, for three basic 
reasons: to ensure cheap supply of
consumer goods and raw materials, to establish new markets for their 
own goods, and to create a
hegemony of the West over the rest of the world. And it all began when 
the demand for oriental
spices and luxury goods started to rise in the West. Due to the fact 
that the land route was
dominated by Italian merchants, and there were unnecessary tariffs 
added by countries from which
the goods passed through, people like Christopher Colombus and Vasco 
de Gama began to look for
a quicker and cheaper route via sea. Also, even though individuals 
played a key role in finding the
new routes and lands, there was an important part played by the 
institution of banking and
corporations in financing the expeditions. Banking made possible the 
financing, and corporations
the sharing of risks and profits with little investment. East India 
company, for example, was
established to import Indian goods and it made enormous profits. 
Everything was within the
parameters of trade and goodwill upto this point. But the greed for 
more and continuous profits
led these corporations to start what Gallagher and Robinson call in 
their writing, The Imperialism
of Free Trade, "the process of subjugating the free states into the 
domain of formal and informal
empires." 

In this regard, the scientific revolution played the key role. Three 
things are credited with
revolutionizing the West: gun powder, compass, and printing press. 
Whereas the use of compass in
finding the correct directions made the naval expeditions possible, 
and gun powder ensured
military advantage, printing press played an important role in 
bringing about the scientific
revolution by enabling the spread of ideas, such as economic theories 
of Adam Smith, faster and
cheaper. 

Eventually, the scientific revolution brought about the industrial 
revolution. Soon enough the
domestic markets became saturated and emerged the need for new markets 
to dispose off the
excess production. But foriegn markets could not be penetrated so 
easily. And so the corporations,
with the help of their governments, stimulated the process of 
colonizing, destroying indigenous
industries in the process, and killing the experienced artisans in 
some cases to eliminate even the
slightest competition. Jawaharlal Nehru in his book, Discovery of 
India, explains how East India
Company achieved this objective, causing millions of people to suffer 
under the artificially
created forced unemployment. India was comprised of thousands and 
thousands of villages, as
Fernand Braudel says in his writing, The Indian Mogul economy, and 
each village was a
completely self sufficient unit in food and textile. It was all 
replaced due to the need for raw
materials for British industries, by mass producing only one crop, 
such as cotton, in an entire
region causing eventually famine and death for millions of people. 

The Illusions of Western Superiority 

Moreover, the people of the West had this illusion of them being more 
civilized then the rest of
the world. Their actions implied that eating with a fork, shooting 
with a gun, and production by
machines was all that was needed to become civilized. Therefore, they 
considered all the people
they encountered as "savages". Even if they were not savages, as in a 
very rare cases, they were not
civilized either. One of the reasons was that they were not 
Christians. To bring their illusion of
civilization to these savages, Christian missionaries were sent to 
civilize them. What these
missionaries accomplished was simply impossible to achieve only by 
means of force. They
brought European diseases unkown in the regions they were trying to 
civilize and unwittingly
caused entire people to be vanished from the face of the earth, as was 
the case in Americas when
the entire civilizations of Aztecs, Incas, and Mayas were destroyed. 
In any case, where they did get
to preach, they taught the savages to not respond to violence with 
violence as it was not the way of
the Christ, making the process of colonizing smooth and quick, as in 
Africa. 

In addition to that, the people of the West had another illusion of 
being a superior race. Wherever
they went, they treated other people as inferior only because of the 
color of their skin. The most
horrible episode in this respect was that of slave trade. Tens of 
millions of people from Africa
were hunted and captured like animals and were transported to Europe 
and Americas to the
plantations. 

In other places, the coloreds were simply treated as inferiors. In 
India, for example, all the
previliges were restricted for the whites. In white areas signs were 
posted warning that dogs and
coloreds were not allowed. Only whites could travel in the first 
class. The French were no
different, they practised the same racist doctrine in their colonies. 
And for that matter, no
European or American was different in this regard. People who suffered 
under the segregation
laws in America are still alive, for the civil rights bill was passed 
not very long ago in 1964, and
even that after immense struggle and unrest. 

Hence, one must ask whether the declarations of American and French 
independence were mere
rhetorics? All men are created equal, they say. That they are endowed 
by their Creator with certain
inalienable rights, they go on. Among these are life, liberty, and 
persuit of happiness in the case of
Americans; and liberty, property, security, and resistance to 
oppression in the French case. How
ironic for these people to inflict on others what they would not allow 
on themselves? But as we
discovered earlier, when they said "all men", what they meant was all 
white, Christian men of
European origin. In America, it was even further narrowed down to 
White Anglo-Saxon
Protestant (WASP) men. Even today, if we lookup the list of American 
presidents, except for John
F. Kennedy, who was a Catholic, every single president has been a WASP 
man. But this is not an
isolated incident. The people of other races, ethnicity, and religions 
have always been considered
inferior by the majority in the West. 

For example, when the Chinese requested to the British crown to stop 
the people who were
engaged in opium trafficking, the British government responded by 
declaring war on China. The
Chinese request was simple. The British were not only taking the 
Chinese made goods to their
country, but to balance the trade deficit were selling poison to the 
Chinese. But since the British
did not consider the Chinese as their equals, even though opium was 
banned in Britain, it was all
right to poison the Chinese, even if they had to fight to sell it. 
They defeated the Chinese and asked
for huge concessions including the continuation of opium trafficking, 
not knowing they
themselves would be facing a similar problem one day. China, 
incidentally, is also a good example
of informal empires, where Western governments used their military 
muscle to yield unlimited
influence without direct occupation. 

Divide and Rule...Forever 

One of the most important impact of the Western imperialistic ventures 
was the alteration of the
local political structures by the colonial governments. As we have 
noted before, their rule was
extended by means of formal and informal empires. In the case of 
direct rule or formal empire,
since the colonial governments were not legitimate from the beginning, 
there was always a fear of
uprising by the colonized people. The method most commonly used to 
maintain rule was to create
divisions, escalate tensions, and encourage fighting among the 
different ethnic and religious
groups. In other words, the infamous policy of "divide and rule" 
officially or unofficially was a
part of the direct colonial governments. The continuation of this 
policy, as intended, resulted in
increased tensions and disunity of entire people. As a result, when 
the colonial governments were
forced to leave, these factional fightings remained a part of the 
newly freed states. Hence, if we
observe any such fightings and wars in the now freed states of the so 
called "third world", we must
remember that it is partly the legacy of the imperialistic West. 

In the event that the objectives could be achieved by means of 
influencing the local government,
the expenses of direct rule were saved by exercising informal rule. 
The term "puppet rulers" is
often used in this respect. Since the goal of the imperialistic 
ventures was not only to find raw
materials, exploit natural resources, and force establish markets for 
industrial goods; a cultural
invasion on the indigenous cultures was also a part of it. To 
establish Western hegemony over the
rest of the 'uncivilized, savage' world, it was necessary to first 
Christianize them and then force
convince them that Western values, culture, and race was better then 
their own. 

"The Planet of the Apes" 

Thus, they created a class of elites who were mentally conditioned to 
accept Western ways. This
was an insurance policy that one day when and if they had to leave 
their colony, the supply of raw
materials and exploitation of natural resources along with the market 
for their goods, would
continue uninterrupted. And the slave-minded, thoroughly brain-washed 
elite would conitnue to
ape the Western values in the hopes of becoming or at least appearing 
like their "superior" former
subjugators and current masters by buying Western products, eating 
Western foods, wearing
Western clothing, watching Western films, listening to Western music 
and speaking Western
languages among other things. The undercalsses usually follow the 
elites. Thus, the more subtle
form of informal empire would still be there in any event. 

The examples are abound: The establishment of Middle eastern kingdoms, 
shiekdoms, and
princedoms by the West and continued protection even today, in order 
to ensure the continuous
supply of cheap oil. The Western interference in the affairs of the 
less developed countries, such as
Pakistan, is no secret. And for that matter, the recent history of 
South and Southeast Asia, Africa,
South and Central America is a testimony to such interference. The 
dictators and elites in these
regions still pledge their loyalties to the US and Europeans by their 
actions and are thus given
protection to plunder their respective countries. With the few 
exceptions where the Communists,
as in Cuba, or more recently the Islamists, as in Iran, were able to 
overthrow the military/
monarchic/ oligrachic regimes, the former colonies are still in the 
neo-colonial shackles and are at
the mercy of the slave-minded elites of their countries. 

The Riches of the World Must Flow West...At All Costs 

The transfer of wealth still continues from the neo-colonies to the 
West in the form of raw
materials, agricultural products, cash reciepts from the sales of 
weapons and over-priced
manufactured goods, looted wealth by puppet regimes and corrupt 
elites, and from the brain drain
of what little professionals these under-developed countries could 
produce from their limited
capital resources. The prices of the commodities and raw materials 
produced by these countries are
determined by the West. While the manufactured and capital goods, 
which are produced by the
West, and which are needed desperately by the neo-colonial, so called 
third-world countries to
develop, are sold at the premium prices, also determined by the West. 
The disparaties between
these neo-colonists and neo-colonial countries, also sometimes 
referred to as Haves and Have
Nots, are widening with every passing year. 

Every time the interests of the neo-colonists are threatened, they 
invoke the mantra of human
rights and democracy or some other feel-good ideological facade for 
justification in putting down
whosoever threatens their interests. But as long as their supply of 
cheap oil, raw materials, and
cheap consumer goods, as well as the markets for their high-end 
products, weapons and capital
goods is safe, they don't mind the ruthless dictators and military 
generals, corrupt monarchs,
illiterate feudals, greedy bureaucrats and similar oligarchic elites 
wreaking havoc with their
countries. 

Instead, any uprising, rebellion, opposition, and struggle against 
them, democratic or not, is
considered a threat to the stability and is put down by all necessary 
means, by both covert and
overt help to the corrupt regimes. All in the name of democracy, free-
market and preservation of
the Western way of life; which is nothing but the perpetuation of an 
unjust world-order and a
selfish status quo, where as much as 90% of the world resources are 
consumed by only 10% of the
world population in the West. We must remember that it was the greed 
for gold and the lust for
luxury that started the Western imperialism in the first place. To 
that end, one is forced to ask
whether there ever was, and will there ever be, an end to the Western 
imperialism? 

 

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