Deconstructing Empire

Conventional accounts of Britain's retreat from §empire after the Second World War portray a bankrupt §imperial nation forced to surrender her most prized §territories. In Deconstructing Empire, author Robin §Newnham draws on archival research to argue that, §despite these circumstances, the withdrawals from §the Indian subcontinent and the Mandate of Palestine §were in fact conceived as means of establishing a §post imperial order in which Britain would continue §to exercise global influence. Newnham also argues §that the decisions to withdraw set in motion a §process by which different ethnic and religious §groups sought to emphasise their claims for just §treatment and their right to form independent §states. Britain's attempts to adjudicate between §these competing claims led ultimately to two §partitions - one in Palestine immediately overriden §by the outbreak of war, the other in the Indian §subcontinent creating a dividing line that still §stands today. Deconstructing Empire will be of §interest to anyone who wants to understand more §about the origins of some of the most intractable §conflicts in modern international relations.