Manpower Shortage and the End of Colonialism The Case of the Indian Civil Service
- 1 January 1973
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Cambridge University Press (CUP) in Modern Asian Studies
- Vol. 7 (1) , 47-73
- https://doi.org/10.1017/s0026749x00004388
Abstract
Why did European countries abandon colonies after the Second World War? No acceptable theory exists to help us with this question—theory neither in the sense of conceptualizations which ‘map out the problem area and thus prepare the ground for its empirical investigation’, nor in the sense of a set of interconnected hypotheses about the specific reality of the end of colonialism which can be validated or refuted by empirical research. Lenin's classic work on imperialism develops powerful theoretical insights regarding the establishment, growth and nature of imperialism, but it does not refer directly to the end of the specific form of imperialism which concerns us here, namely colonialism, although one may infer from Lenin's work the very general proposition that imperialism disappears when capitalism is replaced by socialism. Imperialism as a consequence of capitalism is still with us today, yet colonies have been abandoned. Lenin's theory is not refuted, but at the same time it does not help us directly with an explanation for the end of colonialism.Keywords
This publication has 3 references indexed in Scilit:
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- From Empire to NationPublished by Harvard University Press ,1960
- Manpower Shortage and the Fall of the Roman Empire in the WestPublished by University of Michigan Library ,1955