Origins of Modern German Colonialism 1871–1885

Abstract

The available material on German colonization, especially that in English, deals almost exclusively v^itli the external aspect ; it affords only fleeting glimpses of the elements and forces, the groups and parties, at work within the nation, which were responsible for outward activity. Such a point of view, moreover, conveys the impression that the German Government imposed a colonial policy upon the nation on April 24, 1884; and consequently that modern German colonialism dates from that year. Only a few brief accounts of any colonial activity before 1884 seem to exist, and hence the strength and significance of the internal movement remains underestimated. The present study proposes to concern itself primarily with the internal history of colonialism. It is based upon such sources as the Reichstag Debates, White Books, government docimients, records and letters of Bismarck, official publications of colonial and other societies, as well as propaganda literature, programs of political parties, periodicals, newspapers, histories of trading and banking companies. It has been necessarily limited to material available in the United States, as German archives have been inaccessible for several years; but the value of the documents in the Columbi_a_University_ and New York Public Libraries, the Congressional Library, and the Hoh enzollem Collection in the Harvard University Library, have made less serious the impossibility of consulting sources only to be found in Germany. The writer is glad of this opportunity to express her indebtedness to Professor Carlton J. H. Hayes whose work in German History has inspired this study. For his constant encouragement and advice as well as for his patient and laborious correction of manuscript and proof she is deeply grateful. She is also under obligation to Professor Charles D. Hazen whose kind interest, assistance and criticism she acknowledges with sincere appreciation.

‘Imperialism’: An Historiographical Revision1

“…Overproduction in the sense of an excessive manufacturing plant, and surplus capital which could not find sound investments within the country, forced Great Britain, Germany, Holland, France to place larger and larger portions of their economic resources outside the area of their present political domain, and then stimulate a policy of political expansion so as to take in the new areas. 1 Thus 'imperialism', in the special sense used by Hobson, is an external symptom of a social malady in the metropolitan countries. Without this domestic pressure for investment overseas, there would be no effective impulse towards the acquisition of new colonies.…”

“…It is therefore necessary to consider briefly the extent to which Lenin modified Hobson's ideas. 1 The greatest difference lies in the first and most important part of the argument; that is, in the nature of the internal pressure in the capitalist countries which forces them to expand their colonial possessions. Hobson had explained this pressure in terms of 'under-consumption' : but Lenin naturally had a more orthodox theory to hand.…”

“…Was it really necessary, on purely economic grounds, to annex the Transvaal in 1899 when the British mine-owners were making vast fortunes under Kruger's government, and had shown themselves so divided over the question of the Jameson Raid and the independence of the Republic? 1 Again, granted that Rhodes and the British South Africa Company had excellent economic reasons for wanting British control over Rhodesia, was their anxiety really due to the pressure of British funds waiting for investment opportunity?…”

“…And, as the rate of overseas investment seems to have been greatest when the terms of trade were against Britainthe 1880's being an exceptional period when special factors in the United States offset the general tendency -Cairncross concludes that 'it was foreign investment that pulled Britain out of most depressions before 1g14'. 1 Seen, therefore, from the point of view of Britain's part in the world economy, rather than in purely domestic terms, capital exports no longer seem to have been forced out of the British economy by the selfish interests of the capitalists to maintain artificially high interest rates, and become, as Professor Nurkse has described them, 'a means whereby a vigorous process of economic growth came to be transmitted from the centre to the outlying areas of the worl8.2 That is to say that the force behind the export of capital was the pull exerted by urgent need for capital in the newly-developing countries, who, because of their higher potential productivity and because markets were available for their exports, could afford to pay higher rates of interest than were obtainable in Britain. Yet, important though it was in explaining why the British and European investor chose to send his capital abroad, this differential in rates of interest should not be overestimated.…”