Category: Imperial & Global History

Alan Lester, Fae Dussart. Colonization and the Origins of Humanitarian Governance: Protecting Aborigines across the Nineteenth-Century British Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. x + 283pp. £65, US$99.00 (hardback), ISBN 9781107007833.

Reviewed by Richard Batten (University of Exeter)
Follow on Twitter @Richard_Batten

Through the early to mid-nineteenth century, the suffering of Aboriginal populations that resulted from violent settler colonization would provide the impetus for some individuals to endeavour to reconcile colonialism with ‘humanitarianism’. The endeavours that represented the project of ‘humane’ colonial governance towards indigenous peoples, like the Aborigines of Australia and the Māori of New Zealand, are the subject of this ambitious and important monograph. Published as part of the Cambridge University Press Critical Perspectives on Empire series, Colonization and the Origins of Humanitarian Governance explores how British colonial actors such as missionaries and governors attempted to reform colonial rule through the integration of ‘humanitarian’ aims into various colonial government initiatives. The authors, Alan Lester and Fae Dussart, suggest that humanitarian governance – the administration and regulation of colonial societies through a range of ‘humane’ approaches – became a key imperative in the mission to spread ‘Civilization’ across the British Empire. Continue reading “Colonization and the Origins of Humanitarian Governance” →

Gareth Curless
University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @IGHN_Exeter

The Imperial and Global History Network’s second conference will take place at the University of Exeter in June 2016. The theme of the conference will be ‘Empire and Humanitarianism’ and we’re delighted to announce that Professor Matthew Hilton (University of Birmingham) and Dr Emily Baughan (University of Bristol) will be delivering the keynote lectures.

As with our first conference in 2014, we’re particularly keen to have submissions from PhD students and early career researchers but proposals from more established historians are welcome too. A selection of papers from the first conference are scheduled to appear in the Journal of World History in 2016 and we anticipate that our second conference will result in a special issue or edited collection.  Continue reading “CFP: Empire and Humanitarianism, 13 and 14 June 2016, The University of Exeter” →