Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
James Belich to Give Inaugural @ExeterCIGH Annual Lecture – ‘Globalization and Divergence over Five Millennia’
The inaugural Centre for Imperial & Global History Annual Lecture, will take place on 25 May (full details and abstract below). Professor James Belich (Beit Professor of Imperial and Commonwealth History, University of Oxford) will be speaking on Globalization and Divergence over five millennia. The lecture should be of wide interest. Attendance is open to Exeter staff and students. The lecture will be followed by a drinks reception.
Britain’s ‘Return East of Suez’: A Historical Perspective
Helene von Bismarck
In March 2016, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon confirmed during a trip to Oman that the British Government was considering the establishment of a permanent army training base there. It is the latest in a series of announcements indicating that Britain is extending and consolidating its military presence in the Persian Gulf.
This development started in 2010, when incoming Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron announced the ‘Gulf Initiative’, by which he meant a coordinated attempt to rekindle Britain’s formerly close relationships with the Gulf States. The implementation of this policy was delayed by the advent of the Arab Spring, but was kickstarted again in December 2014 when Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond confirmed that Britain would build a Royal Navy base in Bahrain. In November 2015, the Strategic Defence Review published by the British Government called for a ‘new Gulf strategy’ and ‘a permanent and more substantial UK military presence’ in the area.
Nor has the British Government shied away from invoking Britain’s imperial past in this context. The Strategic Defence Review stressed Britain’s ‘historic relationships’ with Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, and Mr. Hammond went as far as calling the project to build a base in Bahrain Britain’s ‘return East of Suez’.[1] Continue reading “Britain’s ‘Return East of Suez’: A Historical Perspective”
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
An advert for the canal, for the US market, c. 1930, from the Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council
Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
From empire by collaboration to the rise of the global citizen, here are this week’s top picks in imperial and global history. Continue reading “This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History”
Registration Open for ‘Embassies in Crisis’ – British Academy, 9 June 2016
Embassies in Crisis
British Academy, 9 June 2016
Embassies have long been integral to international diplomacy, their staff instrumental to inter-governmental dialogue, strategic partnerships, trading relationships and cultural exchange. But Embassies are also discrete political spaces. Notionally sovereign territory ‘immune’ from local jurisdiction, in moments of crisis Embassies have often been targets of protest and sites of confrontation. It is this aspect of Embassy experience that this conference explores.
The Embassies in Crisis conference will revisit flashpoints in the recent lives of Embassies overseas. Much of the focus will be on Britain’s Embassies, but several papers will also consider other instances of Embassies in crisis, whether British or otherwise. Serving and former British Ambassadors will be presenting as ‘witnesses’ alongside invited academics who have been invited to discuss dramatic instances of international confrontation or mass demonstration that placed particular nations, their capitals, and the Embassies they housed in the global spotlight.
Key themes include: Continue reading “Registration Open for ‘Embassies in Crisis’ – British Academy, 9 June 2016”
What FDR and Reagan Had in Common – A Talk by H. W. Brands
What FDR and Reagan Had in Common
And What Might be Disappearing from American Foreign Policy
a Talk by
Professor H. W. Brands
When: 24 May, 2.00-3.30
Where: Laver LT6, University of Exeter
RSVP online at Eventbrite
Abstract: Franklin Roosevelt epitomized liberalism in America in the 20th century, and Ronald Reagan conservatism. Yet while they disagreed on nearly everything in domestic affairs, they agreed on the need for the United States to play the leading role in world affairs. This consensus among liberals and conservatives is at risk from the mediocre performance of the U.S. economy since 2008 and from a questioning at both ends of the political spectrum of the value to the United States of trying to solve the world’s problems. Continue reading “What FDR and Reagan Had in Common – A Talk by H. W. Brands”
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
From how history can save the global economy to African utopias of the 1960s, here are this week’s top picks in imperial and global history. Continue reading “This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History”
Daily History Q&A: The “Conspiracy” of Free Trade
Clinton Sandvick
Daily History
Cross-posted from Daily History
Marc-William Palen’s new book The ‘Conspiracy’ of Free Trade: The Anglo-American Struggle over Empire and Economic Globalisation, 1846-1896
Palen is a historian at the University of Exeter. He has written extensively on globalization and free trade for the New York Times, the Australian, The Conversation, Globalist Magazine, History News Network and many others. Palen has recently published two outstanding articles (‘Free trade is once again tearing apart the Republican Party‘ and ‘Trump’s anti-trade tirades recall GOP’s protectionist past‘) explaining how Donald Trump’s economic policies echo previous GOP stances on free trade. He is also the current editor for Imperial & Global Forum. You can follow Palen on Twitter at @MWPalen.
Here is the interview with Marc-William Palen.
If someone asked you to quickly summarize your book, what would be your 2-minute elevator version?
Briefly, The “Conspiracy” of Free Trade provides a new interpretation of Anglo-American imperialism and economic integration from the mid to late 19th century. The issue of free trade dominated the era’s political scene like no other. But whereas Britain turned to free trade as a national policy and ideology by mid-century, the United States turned to economic nationalism. The book thus argues that Anglo-American economic globalization was driven by this political and ideological conflict between free trade and economic nationalism from the 1840s onward.
Continue reading “Daily History Q&A: The “Conspiracy” of Free Trade”
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
From the librarian who saved Timbuktu’s heritage to walking tours of Barcelona’s slave trade past, here are this week’s top picks in imperial and global history. Continue reading “This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History”
J. A. Hobson and Imperialism – A New Talking Empire Podcast
In 1902, journalist John A. Hobson published Imperialism: A Study. The book was among the first to connect the rise of finance capital with the growth of imperial expansion after 1870. Hobson’s theory would fast number among the most influential critiques of imperialism. Although Hobson himself was not a Marxist (he was a classical liberal), his theory would play a key role in shaping subsequent Marxist theories of imperialism, most notably that of V. I. Lenin.
In this Talking Empire podcast, Centre Director Richard Toye discusses Hobson’s Imperialism with Dr. Marc-William Palen.
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
From Krushchev’s 1956 charm offensive to democracy in East Germany, here are this week’s top picks in imperial and global history. Continue reading “This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History”
History Repeating Itself? Free trade is once again tearing apart the Republican Party
Marc-William Palen
University of Exeter
Free trade has become the Republican elephant in the room, thanks to Donald Trump.
The GOP front-runner has helped make trade one of the hot-button issues of the 2016 presidential race. And it’s tearing the Republican Party apart – just like it did in the wake of the U.S. Civil War.
Back then, a third-party run by free trade Republicans put the GOP on a protectionist course that lasted 100 years, as I’ve explored in a recent book on the topic. Could it happen again? Continue reading “History Repeating Itself? Free trade is once again tearing apart the Republican Party”
The Victorian Origins of Will and Kate’s Visit to India
Charles V. Reed
Elizabeth City State University
Editor, H-Empire
As the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge visit south Asia this week, doing the sorts of things that royals are expected to do whilst abroad in the former empire – attend fancy social events, commemorate, inaugurate, and patronize, play cricket, and so on – the celebrity-obsessed global media has enthusiastically followed their every move. An even cursory glance at the tweets tagged #RoyalVisitIndia reveals the performative and visual character of the royal tour – so essential to its purpose since the first visits of the nineteenth century. William and Kate’s touring ancestors would find much familiar in their itineraries, the ceremony, the responses. It’s a quite odd thing, when we think about it, considering nearly seventy years of Indian independence from British rule. Of course, the present Queen’s dedication to the Commonwealth and maintaining the monarchy’s role in the former empire — as chronicled in Philip Murphy’s Monarchy and the End of Empire — explains much of it. But the Victorian history of the royal tour is of equal significance. Continue reading “The Victorian Origins of Will and Kate’s Visit to India”
Apply by April 17 for an International PhD Student Award @ExeterCIGH
The deadline (April 17) is fast approaching to apply for an international PhD student award, through which you can become a crucial part of the Centre for Imperial and Global History.
We offer internationally-recognised supervision with geographical coverage from staff across African, Asian (including Chinese), Middle Eastern, North American, Latin American, European, Imperial, and Global history from early-modern to contemporary eras. We have strong inter-disciplinary links with colleagues across the humanities and social sciences at Exeter, particularly with the Centre for War, State and Society and the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies. The Centre has particular research interests in:
- Globalisation’s past and present
- Comparative empires and transnationalism
- Humanitarianism, development and human rights
- Law and colonialism
- Political economy and the imperial state
- Europe, decolonisation and the legacies of empire
- The impact of armed conflict on society
- Colonial warfare and counterinsurgency
Continue reading “Apply by April 17 for an International PhD Student Award @ExeterCIGH”
This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History
Marc-William Palen
History Department, University of Exeter
Follow on Twitter @MWPalen
From 21st-century death merchants to the Cold War’s ‘black world’, here are this weeks top picks in imperial and global history.
Continue reading “This Week’s Top Picks in Imperial & Global History”
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