ABSTRACT
Civilized Rebels is about the British Empire's decline, collapse and aftermath. Brexit is part of a wider rebellion from below now rumbling in the West, both through the European Union, and in the United States. This chapter examines contrasting perspectives on the gradual disintegration of British imperial influence. The biographies of our four rebels, taken together, transport us from the north Atlantic seaboard in the 1850s to the Pacific Rim at the present day. The British alleviated the problem of rebellious forest-dwellers by recruiting many into the British army, especially from the Karen people. The British encountered another type of primitive rebel among the dominant Burman people of the Irrawaday plain and delta. We see these rebels opposing overbearing regimes from inside the societies those regimes dominated. In both Burma and South Africa the outcomes after World War II included neo-fascist regimes and prolonged internal conflict.
