Political economy of the raj 1914 - 1947 : economics of decolonization in India

This thematic study of the economic basis of British rule in the last decades of the Raj draws on new research to provide a series of fresh insights into the problems and purposes of imperial rule and the process of decolonization in South Asia.

The main focus of the book is on the commercial, military and, especially, monetary and financial advantages that the British Government secured through its rule over India. A study of Britain's changing objectives in India and in the systems of control needed to obtain them provides the material for a new and comprehensive account of the factors that led, through major acts of economic and constitutional policy, to the transfer of power in 1947. This is complemented by a wider analysis of the relationship between the Indian and imperial economies, spotlighting the trading, marketing and banking institutions that linked India to the outside world and that transmitted the effects of economic change from the international marketplace to the Indian village. British rule in India required a particular sort of colonial economy; as that economy came under pressure between 1914 and 1947 the foundations of the Raj were shaken and destroyed.

This economic history of decolonization attempts to break away from the well-worn clichés of imperial historiography. The clash of national and international economic forces, the cost to the Third World of debt repayment, the attempts of a European power to maintain a hold over the economy of an Asian country, the role of government action in economic development and the growth of the corporate state are all themes which are explored here - and themes that still have contemporary relevance.