Talk:British Empire

New article: British Empire from subjects' POV

Does anyone want to write an article on the history of the British Empire, from the perspective of its subjects? This is really lacking in Wikipedia's coverage imo. I can create a new page with that premise and page link to relevant pages, however there's going to be a lot of empty sections, and I have too much on my to do list as of now. I'd really appreciate if people could write about it Alexanderkowal (talk) 10:27, 2 June 2024 (UTC)

Do you have any sources that discuss this as a topic? TFD (talk) 12:25, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

True, there needs to be supra sources to justify the page creation.

• [1] from the Canadian perspective
• [2] is from a world history perspective, with perspectives from local and world history
• [3] discusses problems in British historiography to do with the imperial perspective
• [4] "both the British perspective and that of the colonies is considered"

I think it's right that this article focuses on the imperial perspective, and I think it's very well written and fair, however it's very difficult to insert subject's perspectives when that'll mostly take the form of social history in an article about political history. In summary, I don't really want to mess with this article as it's quite the masterpiece, and I don't have any issues with it. Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:47, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

See for example Gold Coast (British colony), it would be an accumulation of these articles Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:52, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

There is a very serious danger of doing lots of orientalism and the like though Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:55, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Obviously the page created will try to be fair and not have its sole purpose to villianise with the superficiality of some post-colonial literature Alexanderkowal (talk) 12:51, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

That sort of article is lacking because it's explicitly against policy to create WP:POVFORKs. CMD (talk) 13:53, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Okay that makes sense, I just thought this article could focus on the internal composites of the British Empire whilst ignoring the wider context Alexanderkowal (talk) 15:08, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

During the FAR of this article it was noted there are actually many missing subarticles. There could be a good article such as Governance of the British Empire for example, and articles such as Economy of the British Empire and Demographics of the British Empire are basically stubs. This current article was effectively demoted for essentially being History of the British Empire, and thus missing out on everything else. CMD (talk) 17:08, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Yes Governance of the British Empire could be really good, could cover the governance of the different parts of the empire (with sections probably regional and in order of when they became part of the empire) and also include perspectives from the governed.

I think this article should have a former country infobox like the other colonial empires, and have all of this under the history section? Then have a section on governance, economy, demographics, and legacy (with summaries of their main articles) Alexanderkowal (talk) 17:36, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

historiography also Alexanderkowal (talk) 17:38, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@The Red Hat of Pat Ferrick, GoldRingChip, Jr8825, BrownHairedGirl, Wiki-Ed, and Nikkimaria: pinging main contributors to hear their thoughts Alexanderkowal (talk) 17:47, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

The reason there aren't articles on those things is not because they're "missing", it's because they're not viable subjects or the content exists already under different headings which more accurately reflects the weighting in reliable sources. E.g. there was no 'governance of the British Empire' article because that's covered by existing articles on the Government of the United Kingdom or the government of (insert country). Asserting or suggesting - through article naming - that there were separate centralised structures and processes is misleading. Wiki-Ed (talk) 20:12, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Government of the United Kingdom is a separate topic from governance of the British Empire, there's not even a history section. Governance of the British Empire would focus on the administration of the colonial empire and the relation between the colonies and the UK/British/English government, as well as governance. Alexanderkowal (talk) 20:27, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

When I said you need a source that discusses the topic, I meant a book or article with a title like "British Empire from subjects' POV". You can't get one source about the Empire from a Canadian's perspective and similar sources from the perspectives of people living in the empire in different places and different times and create an article. TFD (talk) 21:13, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Yeah I've ditched that idea, think having a page on the Governance of the British Empire would be better, per above.

• [5]: The Power of Commerce: Economy and Governance in the First British Empire
• [6]: The Oxford History of the British Empire: Volume II: The Eighteenth Century: C5 The Anointed, the Appointed, and the Elected: Governance of the British Empire, 1689–1784
• [7]: The Oxford History of the British Empire: Volume III: The Nineteenth Century: C9 Imperial Institutions and the Government of Empire
• [8]: Administering the Empire, 1801-1968

There's more on each region, idk whether this is enough to warrant a page? I think it's substantive detail per WP:Notability Alexanderkowal (talk) 21:36, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

The subject is certainly notable, but a looong discussion on this some time back (I've looked in the archives but can't find it) argued pursuasively that since (perhaps compared to say the French), the British arrangements were somewhat ad hoc, differing very widely by place, and then by time, the article would be very bitty, and the wood hard to find for the trees. One might do a shortish summary, but getting into too much detail for individual areas would be fatal, I think. Whether the subject is adequately covered in all the individual by-territory articles, I rather doubt. Johnbod (talk) 23:12, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

The wood would be covering the history behind it, the impacts, and the historiography. There are decades of people asking "Was there a British Empire?" so its a topic with direct sourcing, and it would help answer the questions we have sometimes had here as to why the opening sentence of this article is structured the way it is. The risk is as you mention that it degrades into a list, as articles are wont to do. It is definitely not covered in the individual articles well, Gold Coast (British colony) mentioned above has a similar situation of being a summary of history rather than covering anything else, so there's easy room for improvements. CMD (talk) 04:05, 12 June 2024 (UTC)

@Skitash is it worth having another RfC on which infobox to have? The previous consensus is 7 years old and had very limited participation Kowal2701 (talk) 15:25, 11 August 2024 (UTC)

Why isn't Edward I included in this article?

Wales was England's first colony, so I don't understand why this isn't included. Hogyncymru (talk) 13:47, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Because it was not a colony, any more than Burgundy is a colony of France. Slatersteven (talk) 13:49, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

Article misrepresents the reason for the puritan fleeing a known misrepresentation in science

under "Americas, Africa and the slave trade" the article states ", Plymouth was founded as a haven by Puritan religious separatists, later known as the Pilgrims. Fleeing from religious persecution..." the puritan's were not "fleeing from religious persecution" [9]https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/religion/rel01.html under heading Crossing the Ocean to Keep the Faith: The Puritan, they left to try and recreate the church of England. and very much wanted to persecute none believers in there way. Also Wikipedia actually coveres this in the article about the Puritans 62.31.61.202 (talk) 15:50, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Try quoting the whole text next time. Slatersteven (talk) 15:53, 20 August 2024 (UTC)

Afghanistan

Shouldn't the map include the Emirate of Afghanistan? From 1879 to 1919 as per the Treaty of Gandamak, the emirate was a protected state of the British Empire, a similar relationship and agreement to the one between Sultanate of Zanzibar and the British Empire. Anvib (talk) 23:11, 21 September 2024 (UTC)

Nope. You've partly answered your own question: this article does not include protected states - as per the first line of the article. More importantly, reliable sources don't treat Afghanistan as part of the British Empire. Wiki-Ed (talk) 19:00, 22 September 2024 (UTC)

as I stated in my original message; the Sultanate of Zanzibar and the Emirate of Afghanistan had a similar arrangement and status when it came to their relationship to the United Kingdom: Zanzibar is included in the map, hence the contradiction here. Anvib (talk) 00:21, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Protecates were not apart of the British Empire, they only acted as influence. 2607:FEA8:4D60:590:C49E:A72C:3146:7972 (talk) 02:03, 23 September 2024 (UTC)

Other protectorates are shown on the map though, as shaded areas. Celia Homeford (talk) 09:24, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

THe issue maybe that Afghanistan was a protectorate in name only. Slatersteven (talk) 10:37, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

Yes, I would agree there. Celia Homeford (talk) 12:27, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

It was a protected state not a protectorate. Different kind of animal. Sort of. Wiki-Ed (talk) 19:49, 24 September 2024 (UTC)

That is a good point. The people were considered British protected subjects rather than British subjects, which is still a distinction in British nationality law. TFD (talk) 06:39, 26 September 2024 (UTC)

Why isn’t the Columbia District on the map?

Shouldn’t the Columbia District (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbia_District) be included on the map showing “Areas of the world that were part of the British Empire”?

I understand that the Treaty of 1818 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_1818) allowed it to be part of both the British Empire and the US from 1819 to 1846. 2600:100A:B1E4:4379:BD5F:8A9C:7D3D:1B0C (talk) 04:24, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

I also can’t understand why the Queen Charlotte Islands aren’t included. It seems like there are multiple mistakes on the map. 2600:100A:B1E4:4379:BD5F:8A9C:7D3D:1B0C (talk) 05:02, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Not sure why Haida Gwaii isn't included - presumably an oversight by the map author (and which no-one else noticed until now). You could ping them and see if they could correct it.

However, regarding Columbia District: I think that is deliberate - the sources used for the map don't seem to treat company holdings as British territory. Also notable that when the British Government did get involved it didn't really contest the line (or seemingly pay much attention to where it was drawn - presumably hence Point Roberts?), which is something we could reasonably assume it would have done if it felt it truly 'owned' that land. Wiki-Ed (talk) 19:51, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

Since the Empire was not a legal entity with defined borders, what belonged to it is solely determined by what sources said. TFD (talk) 23:24, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

"First" and "Second" British Empire

The concept of "first" and "second" (and third and fourth) is not one that is universally agreed by historians. The dates are contested, the reasons are debated, the goalposts move with each successive generation of historians. Even Marshall, seemingly the current flag bearer of this concept, can't seem to decide whether it is demarcated by the American Revolution or repeal of the Navigation Laws nearly 75 years later. Adding labels to periods might be useful if everyone agreed that they signified something, but that is not the case.

• Using this terminology at all suggests is widely accepted and well used. A brief play around with Google Scholar suggests "Second" or "First British Empire" only appears in (at most) 0.45% of the corpus of 871,000 "British Empire" sources.
• Using this terminology for specific dates is coming down in favour of a certain perspective: it is not clear that historians agree on dates, so we don't know that this represents the majority position.

Either way this is not neutral, so in violation of core policy. It cannot be given undue prominence in the article's structure without qualification (which is what the quotation marks were for). And I'm not sure the brief reference in the text is appropriate either, but perhaps it could be retained given it already carries a caveat ("some historians" is weasel wording which demonstrates this is not a majority view). Wiki-Ed (talk) 20:35, 12 October 2024 (UTC)

if we waited until things were "universally agreed by historians" we would never get anywhere. That "this is not a majority view" is no reason to omit it completely, so long as this is made clear, and "some historians" is not weasel wording at all, so long as examples are given (in the refs is enough). Johnbod (talk) 02:58, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Not sure about that. If this were a historiography article and other perspectives were presented then I'd agree it could be covered. But it's the main article and we don't present other views. So this is not compliant with Wikipedia content policy on weighting and due prominence. If I was being particularly pedantic I'd even suggest 0.45% of sources is an extremely small minority and therefore doesn't belong on Wikipedia (but I don't place that much credence in Google's search results so I'm not going to push that). Through trial and error we've navigated around most of the historiographical debates - so we're making compromises and therefore pleasing no-one - but with the benefit that the article is relatively stable. The place for historiographical debates is the historiography article, although the contradictory writing style is a bit odd ("this is clear" followed by multiple examples of why it is not at all clear). Wiki-Ed (talk) 09:39, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Yes we can mention it, as a one line mention. Slatersteven (talk) 10:22, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

Does using "First" and "Second" add anything that using just dates doesn't? Roger 8 Roger (talk) 19:46, 13 October 2024 (UTC)

New Zealand

I recently added a subsection about the entry of New Zealand into the empire. Before then it received scant and misleading mention linked to Cook and Australia. user:Celia Homeford has removed a relevant paragraph claiming it is off topic, about NZ history. This is odd, seeing that this whole article is about the history of current lands that are or were part of the empire. What I had added is very specifically about what the Colonial Office was involved with in NZ and NSW in the 1830s - it is directly related to the empire, not just NZ, or NSW. My additions are all sourced. It is hard to fatham this long standing editor's reasoning, beyond just being peeved. I made the initial change with intent to return to iron out typos and add more sources, which I have now partly done. user:Celia Homeford, your cavalier removal of sourced detail about how a later dominion entered the empire looks somewhat uncalled for. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 12:34, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

As I said for one, you seemed to be using present tense for historical situations, so was this very badly written or a quote? Slatersteven (talk) 12:36, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Also wp:agf. Slatersteven (talk) 12:37, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

This new subsection was a bold addition, but it is clearly disproportionate to the rest of the article. Following the addition, the time devoted to New Zealand comes second only to India. I would go further than Celia Homeford, and leave the added detail to a more dedicated article. CMD (talk) 12:54, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Good to see your comments. Where is the present tense being used?? The part removed {"General..") is all in the past. Being second only to India is not a reason to shorten, but to improve/expand elsewhere I would think. Taking a step backwards, what was there about NZ was not ideal and at best misleading, hence my 'bold' edits. The reluctant creation of the colony of nz in 1840 is inextricably linked to the way it was being treated by the colonial office (ie the officials of the empire) before 1840, which is why the disorder resulting from NZ not being officially in the empire is mentioned. Is that what you think is 'off-topic' or too much? To just say sovereignty was claimed in May 1840 without any background is misleading and not informative. I have intentionally kept meantion of Maori to a minimum in order to keep this to the topic of the empire, not nz history. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 13:29, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

It maybe the typos were throwing me off. Slatersteven (talk) 13:44, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Being second is a reason to shorten; article length has previously come up in quality reviews. I have not stated that the detail is off-topic, but that it is undue. Multiple paragraphs for each British colony would be unwieldly, at this level there is going to be a lot of missing background. CMD (talk) 13:53, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

As I said, it's disproportionate, badly-written (e.g. "esconded sailors ... missianaries"), and unnecessarily repetitive (e.g. we are already told that "an assortment of Europeans and Americans which including [sic] whalers, sealers, escaped convicts from New South Wales, missionaries and adventurers" arrived in the country it is not necessary to repeat that "escaped convicts ... were freely roaming the country"; we have been told that already). Celia Homeford (talk) 13:31, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

While I'm fond of New Zealand, I don't think we can give it more space than India (500 words vs 420 words). And that doesn't mean we need to expand all the other countries: as others have noted, there are already concerns about article length. In addition, I agree it wasn't well written and some of it was not encyclopedic language (e.g. "land speculators of dubious content"). I resisted the urge to revert earlier in the week because the editor had indicated in the comments that they intended to tidy it up. But this hasn't happened.

I couldn't follow the logic, but if there are specific points in the original text which somehow make the historical narrative misleading then please spell them out here. We can help with drafting quality, if necessary. Wiki-Ed (talk) 20:06, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

Okay, I see the collective point/s being made. I probably rushed the changes, copying and pasting sentences from other articles and adding non-referenced text that I knew I could reference later, but didn't do it immediately which I should have done. I also should have dealt with the typos more quickly. If there is no objection I will re-write this subsection, making it shorter, and see what the feedback is. On the broader topic, the main point I was trying to deal with was the way NZ entered the empire, which wasn't clearly explained. Despite connections in the process with Australia, NZ's path was distinct and IMO deserves a section of its own. It was a later dominion after all, not just one of several Caribbean Islands. I will probably put my new version hear first for comment. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 21:54, 8 November 2024 (UTC)

It's excessive. Newfoundland, Massachusetts, Virginia, Quebec, Barbados, India, Australia, and South Africa were all more significant to the history of the empire, and there are probably more. TFD (talk) 03:34, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

Comments please...

"After Cook’s visits to New Zealand in the 1770s, Britain took no formal steps to take possession. Church of England missionaries began arriving from 1814; the few other Europeans who were there, such as whalers and adventurers, co-existed with the indigenous Maori and were not subject to British law or administration. From 1788 when the colony of NSW was established, its governor in Sydney became the closest form of official British authority. By the 1830s, general disorder within of the minimal European population had taken hold in New Zealand and, for this and other reasons, the need for Britain to intervene more formally became unavoidable. The Colonial Office reluctantly sent out Captain William Hobson with instructions to establish British sovereignty after first getting native consent. After he arrived, the Treaty of Waitangi was signed with Maori chiefs in stages, initially on 6 February 1840. On 21 May 1840, on two documents, Hobson proclaimed sovereignty over all New Zealand. Initially, New Zealand was a dependency within the jurisdiction of New South Wales, whose border had been temporarily extended eastwards: Hobson was its lieutenant-governor below Governor Sir George Gibbs in Sydney. This transitional arrangement ended on 3 May 1841 when New Zealand became a separate Crown Colony with Hobson as its governor." (Sources not included here) This image could be used

This is less than half the size of my previous addition and with some text removed from Oceania it amounts to around 200 more words. It is a better summary of NZ's entry into the empire than what was there before. The next issue is where to put it. It does have a connection with early NSW but that link is overstated. Despite that, it makes sense to keep them in the same section. Against that idea is that nothing significant was done about NZ until decades later than NSW which means NZ would better fit in the 19thC section. IMO, other factors also make NZ fit better in the 19thC than the 18thC but they are beyond the scope of this article so they won't be considered here. NZ as a colony developed largely by itself, not connected with the rest of the empire so I agree with TFD's comments, its effect on the empire was less than other similar sized territories. However, it was a significant settler colony and wasn't a small island somewhere, so it should get more than a passing mention. It's relevance to the empire can also be gauged by its connection with certain Pacific Islands and Antarctica. On reflection, I am now leaning towards keeping my suggested changes of NZ 1769-1841 in the pre-1815 section to maintain a continuity of flow from Cook onwards. Anyway, comments welcome please. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 07:27, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

I agree with other editors that this might be WP:UNDUE in this article. I've added a hatnote linking to Colony of New Zealand. That article might benefit more from your scene-setting about the situation in New Zealand prior to the formal establishment of the colony. That would allow the summary here to remain brief.

Your contribution here still needs some workshopping I think, but it would fit quite well in that article. David Palmer//cloventt ^(talk) 08:40, 9 November 2024 (UTC)

I think that you should fix Colony of New Zealand not try and turn this into a clone of it. Slatersteven (talk) 10:49, 9 November 2024 (UTC)