{"id":1180,"date":"2013-07-13T01:33:06","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1180"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:33:06","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:06","slug":"34-the-problem-of-a-federated-heterogeneous-empire-vol-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15\/34-the-problem-of-a-federated-heterogeneous-empire-vol-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","title":{"rendered":"-34_ The Problem of a Federated Heterogeneous Empire.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n


\nCHAPTER <\/font><\/b>
\nVIII<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nThe Problem of a Federated<\/font><\/b>
\n<\/font><\/b><\/span>
\nHeterogeneous Empire<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n


\n
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0                    <\/span>
\n<\/font>I<\/font><\/b>F THE building up of
\na composite nation in the British Isles was from the beginning a foregone
\nconclusion, a <\/font> <\/span>geographical
\nand economical- necessity only prevented in its <\/span><\/font>
\nentire completion
\nby the most violent and perverse errors of statesmanship, the same cannot be
\nsaid of the swifter, but still gradual and almost unconscious process by which
\nthe colonial empire of Great Britan has been evolving to a point at which it
\ncan become a real unity. It was not so long ago that the eventual separation of
\nthe colonies carrying with it the evolution of Australia and Canada at least
\ninto young independent nations was considered the inevitable end of the
\ncolonial empire, its one logical and hardly regrettable conclusion.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>There were sound reasons for this
\nmental attitude. The geographical necessity of union was entirely absent; on
\nthe contrary, distance created a positive mental separation. Each colony had a
\nclear-cut separate physical body and seemed predestined, on the lines on which
\nhuman evolution was then running, to become a separate nation. The economic
\ninterests of the mother country and the colonies were disparate, aloof from
\neach other, often opposite as was shown by the adoption by the latter of
\nProtection as against the British policy of Free Trade. Their sole political
\ninterest in the Empire was the safety given by the British fleet and army
\nagainst foreign invasion; they did not share and <\/font><\/span>took no direct interest in the government of the
\nEmpire or <\/span><\/font>the shaping of its destinies.
\nPsychologically, the sole tie was a frail memory of origin and .a tepid
\nsentiment which might easily evaporate and which was combated by a definite
\nseparatist sentiment and the natural inclination of strongly marked human
\ngroupings to make for themselves an independent life and racial type. The race
\norigin varied, in Australia British, in South Africa<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

Page-311<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\npredominantly Dutch, in Canada half
\nFrench half English; but in all three countries habits of life, political
\ntendencies, a new type of character and temperament and culture, if it can be
\nso called, were being developed which were as the poles asunder from the old
\nBritish culture, temperament, habits of life and social and political
\ntendencies. On the other hand, the mother country derived no tangible
\npolitical, military or economic advantage from these offshoots, only the
\nprestige which the possession of an empire in itself could give her. On both
\nsides, therefore, all the circumstances pointed to an eventual peaceful
\nseparation which would leave England only the pride of having been the mother
\nof so many new nations.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>Owing to the drawing together of
\nthe world by physical Science, the resulting tendency towards larger
\naggregates, changed political world conditions and the profound political,
\neconomic and social changes towards which Great Britain has been moving, all
\nthe conditions now are altered and it is easy to see that the fusion of the
\ncolonial empire into a great federated Commonwealth or something that can
\nplausibly go by that name is practically inevitable. There are difficulties in
\nthe way,- economic difficulties, to begin with; for, as we have seen, geo-
\ngraphical separation does tend towards a divergence, often an opposition of
\neconomic interests, and an imperial Zollverein, natural enough between the
\nStates of the German Empire or a Central European Confederation such as was
\nplanned by one side in the Great War, would be an artificial creation as
\nbetween widely separated countries and would need constant vigilance and tender
\nhandling; yet, at the same time, political unity tends to demand economic union
\nas its natural concomitant and seems to itself hardly complete without it.
\nPolitical and other difficulties also there are which may yet become manifest
\nand destroy the imperial formation if the practical process of unification is
\nrashly and unwisely handled; but none of these need be insuperable or even a
\nreal stumbling-block. The race difficulty which was at one time serious and
\nmenacing in South Africa and is not yet eliminated, need not be more formidable
\nthan in Canada; for in both countries there is the English element which,
\nwhether a majority or minority, can by friendly union or fusion attach the<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\nPage-312<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\nforeign element to the Empire. Nor is
\nthere any such powerful outside attraction or clash of formed cultures or
\nincompatible temperaments as made so difficult the real union of the Austrian
\nEmpire.<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>All that is needed is that England should continue to handle the problem
\nwith a right instinct and not commit anything like her fatal American blunder
\nor the mistake she committed but fortunately receded from in South Africa. She
\nhas to keep it always in mind that her possible destiny is not that of a dominant
\ncountry compelling all the parts of her dominions to uniformity with her or to
\nperpetual subordination, but that of the centre of a great confederation of
\nStates and nations coalescing by her attraction into a new supra-national
\nunity. Here the first condition is that she must scrupulously respect the free
\ninternal life and will, the social, cultural, economic tendencies of the
\ncolonies while giving them an equal part with herself in the management of the
\ngreat common questions of the Empire. She herself can be nothing more in the future
\nof such a new type of aggregate than a political and cultural centre, the clamp
\nor nodus of the union. Given this orientation of the governing mind in England,
\nnothing short of some unforeseen cataclysm can pre- vent the formation of an
\nempire-unit in which Home Rule with a loose British suzerainty will be replaced
\nby Federation with Home Rule as it basis.1<\/sup> <\/font><\/span>
\n
\n <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font> <\/span>But the problem
\nbecomes much more difficult when the question of the other two great
\nconstituent parts of the Empire arises, Egypt and India, <\/span>– so difficult that the first
\ntemptation of <\/span>the political mind, supported by a
\nhundred prejudices and existing interests, was naturally to leave the problem
\nalone and create a federated colonial empire with these two great countries as
\nsubject dependencies.2<\/sup> <\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n1  <\/font><\/span><\/sup>
\nAll this, provided the Empire continues to be victorious and
\nprosper; provided, too, Britain’s foreign policy does not make the obligations
\nof federated unity too irksome to the srnaller
\nmembers.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n2  T<\/font><\/span>he
\nquestion of Egypt has already been settled since the above was written, and in a
\nsense adverse to union. India, already even then on the road to a free status,
\nhas already achieved it, although its two separating parts have figured for a
\ntime as Dominions and one of them may possibly adhere for some time to that
\nstatus while the other has adopted, although an independent Republic a new
\nformula of adhesion to the Commonwealth.<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n


\nPage-313<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\nnot last and, if obstinately
\npersisted in, would lead to the most undesirable results, if not to eventual
\ndisaster. The renascence of India is as inevitable as the rising of tomorrow’s
\nsun, and the renascence of a great nation of three hundred millions with so
\npeculiar a temperament, such unique traditions and ideas of life, so powerful
\nan intelligence and so great a mass of potential energies cannot but be one of
\nthe most formidable phenomena of the modern world. It is evident that the new
\nfederated empire-unit cannot afford to put itself in permanent antagonism to
\nthis re- nascent nation of three hundred millions and that the short- sighted
\nstatesmanship of those servants of today and its interest who would stave off
\nthe inevitable issue as long as possible can not be allowed to prevail. This
\nhas indeed been recognised in principle; the difficulty will be in the handling
\nof the problems that will arise when the practical solution of the Indian
\nquestion can no longer be put off to an uncertain future.<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>The nature of the difficulties in the way of a practical union between
\nsuch different aggregates is sufficiently obvious. There is first that
\ngeographical separateness which has always made India a country and a people
\napart, even when it was unable to realise its political unity and was receiving
\nby invasion and mutual communication of cultures the full shock of the civilisations
\naround it. There is the mere mass of its population of three hundred millions
\nwhose fusion in any sort with the rest of the nations of the Empire would be a
\nfar other matter than the fusion of the comparatively insignificant populations
\nof Australia, Canada and South Africa. There is the salient line of demarcation
\nby race, colour and temperament between the European and the Asiatic. There is
\nthe age-long past, the absolute divergence of origins, indelible associations,
\ninherent tendencies which forbid any possibility of the line of demarcation
\nbeing effaced or minimised by India’s acceptance of an entirely or pre-
\ndominantly English or European culture. All these difficulties need not
\nnecessarily mean the insolubility of the problem; on the contrary, we know that
\nno difficulty can be presented to the human mind which the human mind, if it
\nwill, cannot solve. We will assume that in this case there will be both the
\nwill and the necessary wisdom; that British statesmanship will commit no<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\nPage-314<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\nirreparable error; that from the
\nminor errors which it cannot fail to commit in the handling of such a problem,
\nit will retreat in time, as has been its temperament and habit in the past; and
\nthat, accordingly, a little sooner or a little later some kind of psychological
\nunity may possibly be created between these two widely disparate aggregates of
\nthe human race.<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>The question remains under what conditions this is possible and of what
\nnature the unity will be. It is clear that the governing race must apply with a
\nfar greater scrupulosity and firm resolution the principle it has already
\napplied elsewhere with such success and the departure from which has always
\nafter a certain stage been so detrimental to its own wider interests. It must
\nallow, respect and even favour actively the free and separate evolution of
\nIndia subject to the unity of the Empire. So long as India does not entirely
\ngovern herself, her interests must take a first place in the mind of those who
\ndo govern her, and when she has self-government, it must be of a kind which
\nwill not hamper her in her care of her own interests. She must not, for
\nexample, be forced into an imperial Zollverein which under present conditions
\nwould be disastrous to her economic future until or unless these conditions are
\nchanged by a resolute policy of stimulating and encouraging her industrial
\ndevelopment, even though that will necessarily be prejudicial to many existing
\ncommercial interests within the Empire. No effort must be made to impose
\nEnglish culture or conditions upon her growing life or make them sine qua
\nnon <\/i>for her recognition among the free peoples of the Empire and no effort
\nof her own to defend and develop her own culture and characteristic development
\nmust be interfered with or opposed. Her dignity, sentiments, national
\naspirations must be increasingly recognised in practice as well as in
\nprinciple. Given lese conditions, the security of her political and economic
\ninterests and a care for her own untroubled growth might keep her in: the
\nEmpire and time might be given for the rest, for the more subtle and difficult
\npart of the process of unification to fulfil itself more or less rapidly.<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font>
\n<\/span>The unity created could never take the form of an Indo- British Empire;
\nthat is a figment of the imagination, a chimera which it would never do to hunt
\nto the detriment of the real<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage-315<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\npossibilities. The possibilities
\nmight be, first, a firm political unity secured by common interests; secondly, a
\nsound commercial interchange and mutual industrial helpfulness on healthy
\nlines; thirdly, a new cultural relation of the two most important sections of
\nhumanity, Europe and Asia, in which they could exchange all that is great and
\nvaluable in either as equal members of one human household; and finally, it
\nmight be hoped, in place of the common past associations of political and
\neconomical development and military glory which have chiefly helped in building
\nup the nation-unit, the greater glory of association and close partnership in
\nthe building of a new, rich and various culture for the life of a nobler
\nhumanity. For such, surely, should be the type of the supra-national unit which
\nis the possible next step in the progressive aggregation of humanity.<\/font> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n\u00a0<\/font><\/span>It is evident that this next
\nstep would have no reason or value except as a stage which would make possible
\nby practical demonstration and the creation of new habits of sentiment, mental
\nattitude and common life the unity of the whole human race in a single family.
\nThe mere creation of a big empire-unit would be a vulgar and even reactionary
\nphenomenon if it had not this greater issue beyond it. The mere construction of
\na multi coloured Indo-British unity arrayed in armour of battle and divided by
\ncommercial, political and military egoism from other huge unities, Russian,
\nFrench, German, American, would be a retrogression, not an advance. If at all,
\ntherefore, this kind of development is destined, – for we have only taken the
\ninstance of the British Empire as the best example of a possible new type, –
\nthen it must be as such a half-way house and with this ideal before us that it
\ncan be accepted by the lovers of humanity who are not bound by the limitations
\nof the old local patriotism of nation against nation. Always provided that the
\npolitical and administrative means are those which are to lead us to the unity
\nof the human race, <\/font> <\/span>–<\/span><\/font> for on that doubtful hypothesis we are at present proceeding. The
\nprobability of such an eventual development is as yet scanty, for the temper
\nboth of Muslim and Hindu India is still overwhelmingly in the direction of
\nindependence and nothing has been done on the English side to build up the
\nother possibility. But the possibility had still to be con-<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage-316<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\nsidered, as it is not utterly out of
\nquestion that under changed conditions there might be an acceptance of virtual
\nindependence in place of a separate and isolated autonomy. If so, it would be a
\nsign that one of Nature’s steps towards the final result was leading towards
\nthis passage. This much could be said for it that if such a combination of two
\nso disparate peoples and cultures proved <\/font> <\/span>to be possible, the greater question of a
\nworld-union <\/span><\/font>would begin to bear a less remote
\nappearance.1<\/sup> <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n


\n1  <\/font><\/span><\/sup>Things have taken, as was practically inevitable all through, a
\ndifferent turn; but this part of the chapter has been left as it was because
\nthe consideration of this possibility was necessary to the theme. The failure
\nof that possible experiment to come anywhere near realisation is an illustration
\nof the fact that this intermediate stage in the progress towards a total
\nworld-union presents difficulties which make it almost impossible. Its place
\nhas been taken by such agglomerations as the Commonwealth, the Soviet Union and
\nsuch possibilities as the proposed United States of Europe and other
\ncontinental combinations such as are coming into being as between the two
\nAmericas and may some day be possible in Asia<\/font><\/span>.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage-317<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CHAPTER VIII The Problem of a Federated Heterogeneous Empire   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0                    IF THE building up of a composite nation in the British Isles was from…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","wpcat-25-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1180"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1180\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}