British colonialism killed 100 million Indians in 40 years

[Anonymous]

Recent years have seen a resurgence in nostalgia for the British empire. High-profile books such as Niall Ferguson’s Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World, and Bruce Gilley’s The Last Imperialist, have claimed that British colonialism brought prosperity and development to India and other colonies. Two years ago, a YouGov poll found that 32 percent of people in Britain are actively proud of the nation’s colonial history.

This rosy picture of colonialism conflicts dramatically with the historical record. According to research by the economic historian Robert C Allen, extreme poverty in India increased under British rule, from 23 percent in 1810 to more than 50 percent in the mid-20th century. Real wages declined during the British colonial period, reaching a nadir in the 19th century, while famines became more frequent and more deadly. Far from benefitting the Indian people, colonialism was a human tragedy with few parallels in recorded history.

Experts agree that the period from 1880 to 1920 – the height of Britain’s imperial power – was particularly devastating for India. Comprehensive population censuses carried out by the colonial regime beginning in the 1880s reveal that the death rate increased considerably during this period, from 37.2 deaths per 1,000 people in the 1880s to 44.2 in the 1910s. Life expectancy declined from 26.7 years to 21.9 years.

In a recent paper in the journal World Development, we used census data to estimate the number of people killed by British imperial policies during these four brutal decades. Robust data on mortality rates in India only exists from the 1880s. If we use this as the baseline for “normal” mortality, we find that some 50 million excess deaths occurred under the aegis of British colonialism during the period from 1891 to 1920.

Fifty million deaths is a staggering figure, and yet this is a conservative estimate. Data on real wages indicates that by 1880, living standards in colonial India had already declined dramatically from their previous levels. Allen and other scholars argue that prior to colonialism, Indian living standards may have been “on a par with the developing parts of Western Europe.” We do not know for sure what India’s pre-colonial mortality rate was, but if we assume it was similar to that of England in the 16th and 17th centuries (27.18 deaths per 1,000 people), we find that 165 million excess deaths occurred in India during the period from 1881 to 1920.

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2022/12/2/how-british-colonial-policy-killed-100-million-indians

Interesting look at colonialism. It makes sense when you think of what colonialism was.

[Anonymous]

There are a couple assumptions that seem arguable. But at first look, there's no reason to think that colonialism could be good for the colonized - but the die cannot be unrolled, the present cannot be changed, and colonization did bring some benefits too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are a couple assumptions that seem arguable. But at first look, there's no reason to think that colonialism could be good for the colonized - but the die cannot be unrolled, the present cannot be changed, and colonization did bring some benefits too.

I think the colonized should be the judge of that--and if the 100 million death toll was worth it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a couple assumptions that seem arguable. But at first look, there's no reason to think that colonialism could be good for the colonized - but the die cannot be unrolled, the present cannot be changed, and colonization did bring some benefits too.

I think the colonized should be the judge of that--and if the 100 million death toll was worth it.

Then why are we discussing this at all? Ask Jeff to take this thread down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are a couple assumptions that seem arguable. But at first look, there's no reason to think that colonialism could be good for the colonized - but the die cannot be unrolled, the present cannot be changed, and colonization did bring some benefits too.

I think the colonized should be the judge of that--and if the 100 million death toll was worth it.

Shall we ask them to abandon "colonialist" benefits like a unified India, democracy, electricity, railroads, sanitation systems, the constitution, and the abolition of sati?

[Anonymous]

Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

Could it be that the British took the majority of wealth and left little for the Indians?

[Anonymous]

How did British rule cause this tremendous loss of life? There were several mechanisms. For one, Britain effectively destroyed India’s manufacturing sector. Prior to colonisation, India was one of the largest industrial producers in the world, exporting high-quality textiles to all corners of the globe. The tawdry cloth produced in England simply could not compete. This began to change, however, when the British East India Company assumed control of Bengal in 1757.

According to the historian Madhusree Mukerjee, the colonial regime practically eliminated Indian tariffs, allowing British goods to flood the domestic market, but created a system of exorbitant taxes and internal duties that prevented Indians from selling cloth within their own country, let alone exporting it.

This unequal trade regime crushed Indian manufacturers and effectively de-industrialised the country. As the chairman of East India and China Association boasted to the English parliament in 1840: “This company has succeeded in converting India from a manufacturing country into a country exporting raw produce.” English manufacturers gained a tremendous advantage, while India was reduced to poverty and its people were made vulnerable to hunger and disease.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

From the article

To make matters worse, British colonisers established a system of legal plunder, known to contemporaries as the “drain of wealth.” Britain taxed the Indian population and then used the revenues to buy Indian products – indigo, grain, cotton, and opium – thus obtaining these goods for free. These goods were then either consumed within Britain or re-exported abroad, with the revenues pocketed by the British state and used to finance the industrial development of Britain and its settler colonies – the United States, Canada and Australia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

Britain was exporting food out of Bengal to the UK (on those much-praised trains) while the Bengal Famine was killing millions in the region. The same thing happened during the Irish Potato Famine.

The point of colonialism is exploitation of the colony for natural resources to go back to the mother country, not development of the colony. The British outlawed textile production in India so that Indians would have to buy British textiles weaved using exported Indian cotton.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

Oh, FFS!

https://youtu.be/f7CW7S0zxv4

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

How did British rule cause this tremendous loss of life? There were several mechanisms. For one, Britain effectively destroyed India’s manufacturing sector. Prior to colonisation, India was one of the largest industrial producers in the world, exporting high-quality textiles to all corners of the globe. The tawdry cloth produced in England simply could not compete. This began to change, however, when the British East India Company assumed control of Bengal in 1757.

According to the historian Madhusree Mukerjee, the colonial regime practically eliminated Indian tariffs, allowing British goods to flood the domestic market, but created a system of exorbitant taxes and internal duties that prevented Indians from selling cloth within their own country, let alone exporting it.

This unequal trade regime crushed Indian manufacturers and effectively de-industrialised the country. As the chairman of East India and China Association boasted to the English parliament in 1840: “This company has succeeded in converting India from a manufacturing country into a country exporting raw produce.” English manufacturers gained a tremendous advantage, while India was reduced to poverty and its people were made vulnerable to hunger and disease.

However, at the same time, England and the rest of Europe was starting into the Industrial Revolution that really accelerated the wealth of England and didn't really have much to do with India at all.

A better argument, but not one that the study authors, or others citing the study, would be that England kept India out of the Industrial Revolution - but there's no reason to think that happened and that had England never encountered India that India would have proceeded alongside Europe in the Industrial Revolution during that time period.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

Britain was exporting food out of Bengal to the UK (on those much-praised trains) while the Bengal Famine was killing millions in the region. The same thing happened during the Irish Potato Famine.

The point of colonialism is exploitation of the colony for natural resources to go back to the mother country, not development of the colony. The British outlawed textile production in India so that Indians would have to buy British textiles weaved using exported Indian cotton.

IOW, the British were lousy at colonization. The point of colonialism is not to create markets in India, or at least it shouldn't have been, although that's one of the things that the UK did.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teaching improved farming techniques makes up for this hypothetical increase in deaths. I don't see any causal explanation for these excess deaths or lower living standards. Did the British salt the earth so farms wouldn't get crops?

Could it be that higher population itself increased the poverty rate? More poor people having more kids would boost a poverty rate very high.

Britain was exporting food out of Bengal to the UK (on those much-praised trains) while the Bengal Famine was killing millions in the region. The same thing happened during the Irish Potato Famine.

The point of colonialism is exploitation of the colony for natural resources to go back to the mother country, not development of the colony. The British outlawed textile production in India so that Indians would have to buy British textiles weaved using exported Indian cotton.

IOW, the British were lousy at colonization. The point of colonialism is not to create markets in India, or at least it shouldn't have been, although that's one of the things that the UK did.

That’s quite a lot of gymnastics. The point of colonialism is to exploit. It is exploitative to take your raw materials and forcing you to buy their (inferior) finished products. It created a huge market for British products that otherwise did not exist.

[Anonymous]

Colonialism was bad. Other than a couple of dimwits here, is there really anyone pro-colonialism today? I don’t think anyone is power is pro-colonialism.