ABSTRACT
The Great Depression of the 1930s went hand in hand with a lobbying frenzy for colonies by continental European states. The chapter explores how experts argued about connections between colonies and the welfare of national polities in Europe. These debates importantly linked raw materials, currency management, and balances of payments. National welfare, however, involved a wider political setting. Colonies figured in arguments about nutrition and food autonomy as well as in discussions about the wider economic, social, and ideational reproduction of populations as nations. The debates surrounding the League of Nations’ enquiry on raw materials and colonies will subsequently serve to analyse tensions and connections between national and international policy conceptions and practices. The concluding synthesis argues that imperial statehood in Europe emerged in the early twentieth century in response to the crises of globalization. During the Depression of the 1930s, moreover, national policy-makers saw colonial control in matters of raw materials and currency as a potential tool of economic crisis management.
