The British Seaborne Empire, by naval historian Jeremy Black, is a narrative of the British Empire through the lens of seaborne trade, military power projection, and marine exploration. Jeremy Black focuses on the maritime tradition of Britain. He examines how Britain’s identity has been shaped by her interactions with, and across, the sea. He identifies the origins of this maritime tradition with the trading network fostered by Rome, and traces it through to the present day. The book suffers from two major problems, both of which could be fixed by a question that does not distort what he seeks to define.
Black’s use of a narrative format that follows the rise and fall of empire, and which focuses on just the maritime tradition, leads him to an analysis hobbled by comparisons. These comparisons do not indicate the scope and domain of influence by which Empire is identified. Furthermore, he is concerned solely with the masculine pursuits of military conquest, trade, and power projection. The book misses out on the important considerations of cultural and identity politics in the metropole, as well as the consumption of goods.
In his introduction, Jeremy Black begins by writing that there is ‘need for care in too readily applying theories of decline to changes in British power over the last century’. This would imply an awareness of the dangers of using the narrative format of an Empire’s rise and fall. Black, however, spends a great deal of time discussing the relative power of the British Empire in the postcolonial period and after World War II. He comes to the conclusion that the Empire and its relationships continue to hold potency in a modern context. He cites the lasting effects of Empire; continued influence through the spread of language, emographic movements, and ideas. In addition, he mentions that Britain retains a number of her overseas possessions. This continued territorial control is comparatively extensive to Britain in 1500. This selection of evidence indicates that Black has not managed to distance his analysis from a method of comparative success and failure. His argument for continued imperial power in a postcolonial paradigm is convincing, but for the fact that these indicators of imperial success are not actually helpful for rating relative power. They lose significance unless they are placed within their own time periods.
For instance, Britain’s overseas possessions in 1500 had far less direct influence over the power balance in Europe. In fact, British overseas possessions in the current world order are far more crucial to understanding military capability and strategy because of technological changes in warfare and the changing face of international politics. David A. Baldwin writes, ‘In discussing power… it is essential to specify or at least imply who is influencing whom with respect to what; in short, both the scope and domain must be specified or implied.
Comparing simple documentations of territory conquered, or statistics of languages spoken, or movements of people, is not an accurate measure of imperial power. These statistics must always be paired with an analysis of their perceived value, both to the metropole and the periphery, as well as the other powers that are influencing the balance. Empires cannot be accurately described by comparing them to earlier or later periods that supposedly exemplify success or failure.
Rather, to rate success or failure they must be placed firmly within their own time period, where the stated goals of the actors, and their achievements, can be examined. As indicated in his chapter titles, and developed in the text itself, he continues to work within the framework of empire as having a beginning, middle, and end. Additionally, these phases are characterized by elements of growth, apex, and decline. He begins with the ‘Origins of Empire’, moves through a period of’Growing Strength’ to a zenith of ‘World Power’, eventually followed by an ‘Empire Under Challenge’ and it’s ‘Loss and Legacy’.
Again, in his conclusion, though he states, ‘there is no central narrative to the seaborne empire’, he is referring to narrative in the sense that he believes that there is no central theme other than ‘change’. It is clear, that in this text, while he understands empire as an eclectic mix of individuals acting out logical goals over time, empire is still defined by comparisons that lack context. As a naval historian, Jeremy Black has an understandable focus on the impact of Britain’s relationship with the sea, and the way that relationship coloured her interactions with the world.
However, it is dangerous to conflate Britain’s maritime tradition with her Empire. Britain’s interactions with the sea may have begun with the Roman trade networks, but those interactions are not the same as those that characterized her empire. Jeremy Black writes, in his chapter ‘Origins of Empire’, that ‘the general crisis of the British Empire continued until 1652, by which time the forces of the Commonwealth regime in England had overcome resistance throughout the British Isles. ‘ This quote encapsulates a problem with his definition of empire.
What is his conception of what constitutes British and what constitutes empire? Scotland, Ireland, and Wales are part of an English imperial ‘project’. In 1652, there was no consensus of a British identity that could be accurately combined with a political entity that exerted influence as a metropole over peripheral states. In 1707, The Act of Union marks the beginning of a political union of Britain, but even then a British identity was contestable. Furthermore, it is not until the reign of Queen Victoria, that Britain formally claims the title of empire.
Self-identification is key to how empire should be defined, but it must be balanced with political definitions. Specifically, a British Empire, as such, does not exist before 1876, when the British Isles as a coherent unit self-identifies as a political imperial regime. Black claims that Drake and his exploits are, ‘an important symbolic moment in English imperialism, one that linked personal heroism, enterprise and bellicosity with monarchy and Protestantism’. He goes on to clarify that, ‘it is worth discussing… he extent to which English maritime activity and force projection were not a simple story of heroic success’.
Despite this, he never breaks away from an analysis predicated on the idea of empire as a purely male pursuit that is encapsulated in traditionally masculine characteristics of physical force, uninhibited movement, and aggression. Women also engaged in the pursuit of power projection. This was acted out in a specifically feminine way. Feminine forms of imperium were acted out through the exertion of control on individual bodies, both their own and others.
Through the employment of slaves or servants, through the redefinition of refined behaviour, and through the formation of a British identity by cultural appropriation of the peripheries into the domestic sphere, women created their own version of Empire that dovetailed with the ‘masculine’ version. While at first glance it appears that these types of influence have little to do with a seaborne empire, none of these things would have been possible without the interactions with the sea.
Movement of goods and people were inherently dependent on seaborne trade, but consumption of many of those goods was driven by women. Luxury was redefined by women who refurbished their homes in the styles of the ‘orient’, drank tea out of the finest china, and wore dresses that were sewn by slaves. A maritime tradition belongs as much to these people as it does to those who engaged in the more traditionally masculine pursuits of military exploits, trade, and exploration.
Even a book that is concerned with a conception of the British Empire only as refracted by the sea needs to include a discussion of the way the peripheries influenced the metropole through the feminine aspects of social existence. Black’s conception of empire is profoundly flawed. He recognizes that it is both political and cultural in nature, and that it operates through cooperation and collusion as well as resistance, but he has not followed these threads through to their conclusion.
What is missing is a focus on empire or imperialism that is not thrusting or controlling, but rather, coercive. The book is primarily narrative, and though accurate in its description, it fails in framing the question to adequately address the pluralities of empire. And, even within that chosen framework, it does not examine the ways in which the identity of the British Empire, as a commercial enterprise borne by the sea, thrived in the feminine sphere.
