‘Britain’s economic success is the result of ingenuity and industry, not colonialism’
Badenoch backs new book
KEMI Badenoch has insisted that Britain’s prosperity is the result of the nation’s “ingenuity and industry” rather than slavery and colonialism.
The Business Secretary said the significance of the empire and slavery to the UK’s economic development has been “exaggerated”.
She made the comments in praise of a book published by the free-market Institute of Economic Affairs think tank, in which its author claimed Britain’s growth was not financed by the slave trade or its imperial possessions.
Ms Badenoch, seen as a leading contender for the Conservative leadership should the party lose the coming election, said: “This paper shows it was British ingenuity and industry, unleashed by free markets and liberal institutions, that powered the Industrial Revolution and our modern economy.
Misguided
“It is these factors that we should focus on, rather than blaming the West and colonialism for economic difficulties and holding back growth with misguided policies.”
Author Kristian Niemietz argues that colonialism made only a “minor contribution” to Britain’s economic development, “and quite possibly none at all”, with the benefits outweighed by the military and administrative cost of running an empire.
He added that the slave trade was no more important to the British economy than sheep-farming or brewing, and most trade was with North America and Western Europe rather than the colonies, even if some individuals did become “very rich” from “overseas engagement”.
Dr Lawrence Goldman, historian and former director of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, said: “Kristian Niemietz is to be thanked for his lucid and well-evidenced paper showing that Britain’s wealth since the Industrial Revolution has neither been dependent on slavery nor colonialism.
“Economic historians have known this for decades; nevertheless, false ideas still circulate, no doubt for political and ideological reasons.
“It was Disraeli in 1852 who called the colonies ‘millstones round our necks’. It’s to be hoped that Dr Niemietz’s paper will circulate widely and re-establish historical truth,” he added.
But specialist historians have criticised the claims, saying they are based on “cherry-picked” data and “straw man” arguments.
Absurd
Alan Lester, professor of historical geography at the University of Sussex, said: “Historians have demonstrated in thousands of research publications that British investors’ ability to appropriate land and subordinate people in some 40 overseas colonies, ensuring a supply of commodities such as tea, cotton, opium, rubber, meat and wool produced with free or low-cost labour, made a significant contribution to Britain’s economic growth.
“Because this is so self-evident, to challenge it would be absurd.”
He said the claim that military costs of empire outweighed the economic benefits was “risible”.
He concluded: “If Britons had continued to invest in the maintenance of colonial rule and the denial of self-determination to their colonial subjects against their own aggregate material interests for over 300 years, what does that say about the spirit of British entrepreneurship?”