Julie Evans, Patricia Grimshaw, David Philips & Shurlee Swain
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Studies in imperialism This book focuses on the ways in which the British settler colonies of Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa treated indigenous Indigenous people in British settler colonies, 1830s–1910 peoples in relation to political rights, commencing with the imperial policies of the 1830s and ending with the national political settlements in place by 1910. Drawing on a wide range of sources, its comparative JULIE EVANS, PATRICIA GRIMSHAW, approach provides an insight into the historical foundations of present-day controversies in these settler societies. DAVID PHILIPS & SHURLEE SWAIN The assertion of exclusive control over the land and the need to contain indigenous resistance meant that the governments preferred to grant citizenship rights to those indigenous peoples committed to individual property and a willingness to abandon indigenous status. However, particular historical circumstances in the new democracies resulted in very different outcomes. At one extreme Maori men and women in New Zealand had political rights similar to those of white colonists; at the other, the Australian Parliament denied the vote to all Aborigines. Similarly, the new South African Government laid the foundations for apartheid, whilst Canada made enfranchisement conditional on assimilation.These differences are explored through the common themes of property rights, indigenous cultural and communal affiliations, demography and gender. This book is written in a clear readable style, accessible at all levels from first-year undergraduates to academic specialists in the fields of Imperial and Colonial History,Anthropology and Cultural Studies. EVANS, GRIMSHAW EVANS, PHILIPS & SWAIN Julie Evans is Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of History at the University of Melbourne,Australia Patricia Grimshaw is Max Crawford Professor of History at the University of Melbourne,Australia David Philips is Associate Professor in the Department of History at the University of Melbourne,Australia Shurlee Swain is Associate Professor and Reader in History at Australian Catholic University and a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of History at the University of Melbourne,Australia Jacket picture: Unavailable River Design, Edinburgh Jacket design by general editor John M. MacKenzie Established in the belief that imperialism as a cultural phenomenon had as significant an effect on the dominant as on the subordinate societies, Studies in Imperialism seeks to develop the new socio-cultural approach which has emerged through cross-disciplinary work on popular culture, media studies, art history, the study of education and religion, sports history and children’s literature. The cultural emphasis embraces studies of migration and race, while the older political and constitutional, economic and military concerns are never far away. It incorporates comparative work on European and American empire-building, with the chronological focus primarily, though not exclusively, on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when these cultural exchanges were most powerfully at work. Equal subjects, unequal rights AVAILABLE IN THE SERIES Britain in China Community, culture and colonialism, 1900–1949 Robert Bickers New frontiers Imperialism’s new communities in East Asia 1842–1952 eds Robert Bickers and Christian Henriot Western medicine as contested knowledge eds Andrew Cunningham and Bridie Andrews The Arctic in the British imagination 1818–1914 Robert G. David Imperial cities Landscape, display and identity eds Felix Driver and David Gilbert Science and society in Southern Africa ed. Saul Dubow Emigration from Scotland between the wars Opportunity or exile? Marjory Harper Empire and sexuality The British experience Ronald Hyam Reporting the Raj The Britsh press in India, c. 1880–1922 Chandrika Kaul Law, history, colonialism The reach of empire eds Diane Kirkby and Catherine Coleborne The South African War reappraised ed. Donal Lowry The empire of nature Hunting, conservation and British imperialism John M. MacKenzie Imperialism and popular culture ed. John M. MacKenzie Propaganda and empire The manipulation of British public opinion, 1880–1960 John M. MacKenzie Gender and imperialism ed. Clare Midgley Guardians of empire The armed forces of the colonial powers, c. 1700–1964 eds David Omissi and David Killingray Female imperialism and national identity Imperial Order Daughters of the Empire Katie Pickles Married to the empire Gender, politics and imperialism in India, 1883–1947 Mary A. Procida Imperial persuaders Images of Africa and Asia in British advertising Anandi Ramamurthy Imperialism and music Britain 1876–1953 Jeffrey Richards Colonial frontiers Indigenous–European encounters in settler societies ed. Lynette Russell Jute and empire The Calcutta jute wallahs and the landscapes of empire Gordon T. Stewart The imperial game Cricket, culture and society eds Brian Stoddart and Keith A. P. Sandiford British culture and the end of empire ed. Stuart Ward Equal subjects, unequal rights INDIGENOUS PEOPLES IN BRITISH SETTLER COLONIES, 1830–1910 Julie Evans, Patricia Grimshaw, David Philips and Shurlee Swain MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS Manchester and New York distributed exclusively in the USA by PALGRAVE Copyright © Julie Evans, Patricia Grimshaw, David Philips and Shurlee Swain 2003 The right of Julie Evans, Patricia Grimshaw, David Philips and Shurlee Swain to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Published by MANCHESTER UNIVERSITY PRESS OXFORD ROAD, MANCHESTER M13 9NR, UK and ROOM 400, 175 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, NY 10010, USA www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk Distributed exclusively in the USA by PALGRAVE, 175 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, NY 10010, USA Distributed exclusively in Canada by UBC PRESS, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA, 2029 WEST MALL, VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA V6T 1Z2 British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data applied for ISBN 0 7190 6003 6 hardback First published 2003 11 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 10 987654321 Typeset in Trump Medieval by Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Manchester Printed in Great Britain by Biddles Ltd, Guildford and King’s Lynn CONTENTS List of maps — page vi General editor’s introduction — vii Notes on authors — ix Acknowledgements — x Introduction page 1 Part I Claiming a second empire 1 Imperial expansion and its critics 17 Part II Establishing settler dominance 2 Canada: ‘If they treat the Indians humanely, all will be well’ 43 3 Australasia: one or two ‘honorable cannibals’ in the House? 63 4 South Africa: better ‘the Hottentot at the hustings’ than ‘the Hottentot in the wilds with his gun on his shoulder’ 88 Part III Entrenching settler control 5 Canada: ‘a vote the same as any other person’ 113 6 Australasia: ‘Australia for the White Man’ 134 7 South Africa: saving the White voters from being ‘utterly swamped’ 157 Conclusion 182 Index — 193 MAPS 2.1 British North America in 1849 page 45 3.1 The colonies of Australia in 1836 and 1859 67 3.2 White settlement in New Zealand in 1852 73 4.1 South Africa in 1855 91 5.1 Canada in 1912 114 6.1 New Zealand and the Commonwealth of Australia in 1901 150 7.1 South Africa in 1895 159 [ vi ] GENERAL EDITOR’S INTRODUCTION It is a welcome development that we have now moved beyond the nationalis- tic approach to the history of the former ‘dominions’, the territories of white settlement of the British Empire. Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa (from 1910) have many points of similarity in their emergence as coun- tries in which indigenous peoples were dispossessed by a series of white dis- persals extending from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries. Until 1776, the American colonies were in the same category, but this book is concerned with the four that remained within the British orbit. Apart from its comparative approach, what marks this book out is the fact that it deals with political rights, essentially parliamentary representation and the extension of the franchise. This is innovative, for in the past, land and other social and economic rights have figured more prominently in the concerns of historians. In many respects, the question of political rights boils down to the contrast that was sometimes drawn between subjects and citizens. Although these two concepts were often discussed, the British Empire never formalised them. The French did, and the status of sujets and citoyens was carefully defined, with attendant rights and responsibilities. For the French a citoyen had abandoned indigenous social organisation all together. The citoyen had become a black Frenchman, educated as such, accepting French cultural norms, usually living in cities, and thereby liable for military service as well as having a right to vote. The centralisation of the French imperial system was symbolised by the fact that the citoyens secured representation in the French Assembly in Paris. The British always retained dispersed political authority, but, in effect, some of the indigenous people of the British white dominions aspired to a similar status, particularly those who were products of the missionary environment. What is striking about the conclusions of this work is the stress that the authors place upon an anti-progressive history. As devolved political institu- tions were granted to whites, partly as a direct fear of further revolutions along the American model, the treatment