Elites

Historians who acknowledge the empire as a force in British society tend to argue that it promoted social stability rather than strife. In developing this thesis they put forward four main propositions. The first is that the empire was a powerful reminder to the British peoples of those things that they held in common. ¹ The second suggests that the colonies acted as a ‘safety-valve’ for domestic discontents, releasing (or displacing) tensions that existed in the ‘home’ society by providing a useful outlet for its more anti-social, restless or eccentric elements. ² The third interprets imperial ideology as something that underpinned a cohesive idea of the social order, extending the life of hierarchical conceptions of society that would otherwise have fallen prey to the language of class. ³ And the fourth identifies the groups that gained the most from overseas expansion as those that were already dominant in society, the main effect of empire therefore being to protect and prolong the status quo. ⁴ According to this way of thinking, therefore, it is the governing and privileged classes who were tied most closely to the colonies. Further down the social scale support for imperialism diminished, with the working classes harbouring a more narrow and superficial interest in the empire, if indeed any interest at all.