Colonial internationalism and the governmentality of empire, 1893-1982

Abstract

In 1893, a group of colonial officials from thirteen colonies abandoned their imperial rivalry and established the International Colonial Institute (ICI), the world's most important colonial think tank of the twentieth century. Through the lens of the ICI, Florian Wagner argues that these colonial internationalists reshaped colonialism as a transimperial governmental policy, demonstrating that the ICI's goal of encouraging colonial development through the international cooperation of colonial experts in fact served to maintain colonial rule beyond the official end of empires. By inviting the colonized elites to participate, it laid the groundwork for the structural and discursive dependence of the Global South. The book presents a detailed study of the ICI's creation, the transnational activities of its prominent members, its interactions with state governments and colonial actors, and the reactions of Africans and Asians who were unsure as to whether the ICI was a tool of colonialism or an objective third party that might aid their calls for greater autonomy.