Anti-colonialism: The ‘canker of imaginary guilt’

By Catherine Sheehan

Regius professor emeritus of Moral Theology at the University of Oxford and best-selling author, the Reverend Dr Nigel Biggar, was recently in Hobart speaking about his best-selling book ‘Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning’.

At the invitation of the Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies, Dr Biggar, also an Anglican priest and Chairman of the Free Speech Union, spoke at the Cathedral Centre on 19 October.

Dr Biggar’s book which was first published in 2023 tackles the thorny issue colonialism and the British Empire, seeking to determine if the current politically-correct abhorrence for both the former and the latter is warranted.

“I had noticed colonial history, or rather a caricature of colonial history, being used for political purposes that I regarded as destructive,” Dr Biggar said.

The impetus for the book came after he became aware of “the canker of imaginary guilt”.

“We in Britian are again succumbing to a fresh and more general guilt about our colonial past… and I began to think I might want to do this… to write a book that tells the whole truth,” he said.

“Yes, the bad bits, but also the good bits about Britain’s imperial past. To immunise us and you, and the Canadians, and the New Zealanders against the canker of imaginary guilt, at a time when faced with Russian and Chinese aggression, the liberal West needs to keep all of its pillars standing.”

Dr Biggar pointed out that empires have existed throughout human history and not only in the West, but all around the globe, including among the Chinese, the Muslim Arabs, and the Mughals in southern Asia.

“Empire was a fact of life, and the truth is, I think, probably most people in history have lived under empires,” he said.

“We British can find in our imperial past cause for both shame and pride,” he added.

Dr Biggar addressed the questions of whether the British Empire was racist, whether its main aim was to invade and dominate, and if it was “excessively violent”, and perpetrated cultural genocide.

“My answer to each of those questions is no,” he said.

“The migration of peoples and the domination [and] displacement of other peoples is a universal phenomenon… usually they move in search of the means of subsistence to escape famine, poverty, persecution, or to pre-empt neighbours from attacking them, but peoples move throughout history… Europeans were late in the game, and they weren’t alone.”

While the British Empire presided over “bad things” such as slavery, the epidemic spread of disease, economic, social, and cultural disruption, the unjust displacement of natives, racial prejudice, unjustifiable violence, to name a few, it also was responsible for “good things” such as, the ending of slavery within the empire and elsewhere, promotion of a free market, new economic opportunities, enabling foreign investment, a growing humanitarianism, liberal institutions, a free press, and independent judiciary.

“The empire underwent a moral conversion in the late 1700s, which created a persistent humanitarian impulse that began with anti-slavery, moved on to a wider concern about the impact of modernity on native peoples,” Dr Biggar said.

“The empire exported liberal institutions and traditions that often succeeded in holding colonial government to account.”

The British Empire also fought against “the massively murderous regime in Nazi Berlin” during the Second World War.

“I think that says something important about what the Empire had become. I’m not claiming the Empire, at the end of its life, was sin-free. It certainly wasn’t. I’m a Christian. I don’t really expect anything human to be sin-free, but the Empire had become, in important ways, humane and liberal, and that’s the conclusion of my argument.”

Director of the Dawson Centre, Dr David Daintree AM, said Dr Biggar put the actions of the British Empire into perspective.

“The British Empire attracts most of the flak nowadays.  But Biggar puts it into perspective – empire-building has been an almost universal human activity on all continents.  What an irony that the British Empire was the first in human history not only to ban slavery, but to enforce that ban!”