ABSTRACT
THE INTERNATIONA L CONTEXT It is difficult for historians of decolonisation to ignore the changed international environment after the Second World War. The period between about the late 1940s and the late 1980s was unique in the sense that it was dominated by two rival superpowers - the United States and the Soviet Union. Before the war, international relations had been dominated by several competing great powers but in the postwar, bi-polar era the world divided into two opposing camps in what was labelled the Cold War. In this, the 'international colonial system' was superseded and eventually dismantled. The colonial system came into being between about 1880 and 1914 and survived only slightly modified by the First World War. It was characteri sed by a system of co-operation rather than rivalry between the major European powers. International treaties demarcated each colonial territory as the exclusive 'sphere of influence' of a particular imperial power. Hence, Britain could rely on no other major power interfering in its colonial affairs. Decolonisation can thus be explained by the postwar marginalisation of this colonial system in worl d politics [120; 129]. One Colonial Office mandarin apparently recognised the trend as early as 1942 when he declared: 'Nineteenth century conceptions of empire are dead' [129 p. 37].
