The Development of Britains Relationship with the Commonwealth - Essay Example

The development of Britains relationship with the Commonwealth History of commonwealth  Though the modern Commonwealth is just 60 years old, the idea took root in the 19th century. In 1867, Canada became the first colony to be transformed into a selfgoverning Dominion, a newly constituted status that implied equality with Britain. The empire was gradually changing and Lord Rosebury, a British politician, described it in Australia in 1884 as a "Commonwealth of Nations. Australia (1901), New Zealand (1907), South Africa (1910) and the Irish Free State (1922) were the early members of the Commonwealth (Commonwealth history, n. d.). Commonwealth is an intergovernmental organization of 54 member states at present. Except Mozambique and Rwanda, all of the Commonwealth member countries were once part of the British Empire. The Commonwealth member states operate within a framework of common values and goals like the promotion of democracy, human rights, better governance, individual liberty, free trade, etc as outlined in the Singapore Declaration. Even though the member countries have diverse social, political, economical, and cultural backgrounds, all members enjoy equal status in Commonwealth. Even Britain enjoys the same status only like the other member states even though, as a courtesy, the member states give the opportunity to inaugurate commonwealth events to the British monarch. It should be remembered that the recently concluded Delhi commonwealth games 2010 was inaugurated by Indian president and the British monarch, Charles jointly. Commonwealth activities were carried out by the commonwealth secretariat headed by a secretary general. In what ways did the end of empire affect British society and politics?  Even though Britain and its allies succeeded in winning the second world war, the after effects of that war was so profound so that the British empire started to show signs of exhaustion. Anti-Colonial movements and their agitations against Britain attained momentum after the Second World War. India, the largest colony of Britain succeeded in getting independence from British colonial rule in 1947. Apart from the Asian region, Britain forced to give independence to the African countries also in the 1960’s. The granting of independence to Rhodesia (Zimbabwe), the New Hebrides (Vanuatu) in the 1980’s marked almost the end of the decolonization process started after the Second World War. The British national identity started to exhaust after the decolonization. Earlier, British people have shown immense pride of ruling the world, in their approaches, attitudes and dealings. After decolonization, they have realized that Britain has not much role in the global matters as before. They forced to witness other countries like United States, Soviet Union, China etc like countries gaining prominence in the global politics. “Asides from the threat of the ‘Europeanisation’ of ‘Britishness’ to detract attention from the death-throws of imperialism, there was Americanisation of culture and a particularly American brand of affluence in Britain” (Avonism, 2010). In short, Americanism started to influence the British public after decolonization and currently the dominance of America in international matters forced Britain to support Americanism even without much analysis or evaluations which is witnessed in the recent political matters like, Iraq war, war on terror etc. Did the Second World War make decolonisation, an inevitability?  Second World War forced Britain to speed up the decolonization process. “The Second World War weakened the European powers substantially and resulted in a new international climate hostile to colonialism” (Ferraton, 2009). British colonies which were waited for an opportunity to strengthen their freedom movements, started to oppose strongly against the British colonial rule after the Second World War. These colonies realized that the exhausting of British Empire as a result of Second World War provides them a golden opportunity to free up their territories. Britain was not in a position to exercise much pressure in its colonies after the World War 2. Europe, generally and Britain specifically lost their prominence in world politics after the Second World War which made the decolonization an inevitability. How does the European Union affect the commonwealth?  EU and commonwealth are maintaining a good relationship. Commonwealth has member countries all over the world whereas EU has only European countries as members. Britain has membership in both of these unions. These two governmental bodies are cooperating well in tackling political, legal, economical matters. In fact EU assist commonwealth in helping the poor commonwealth member countries in Africa. EU wants Britain to be prominent member in global politics as the prominence of Britain in global politics may help the EU also in different ways. Some EU leaders suggest that – over time – the European Union should continue to accept new members ever further to the east and possibly even to embrace countries around the Mediterranean. The British foreign secretary, David Miliband, has said eventual enlargement might extend all the way to the Caucasus and even into the Middle East (Palmer, n. d., p.9) EU is currently gaining prominence in global politics and they have plans to expand it beyond the boundaries of Europe. They have realized that the functioning of EU only in the boundaries of Europe may not bring any good in the long run, especially in a highly globalized world order at present. But it is difficult for EU to expand to other regions without seeking assistance from other bodies like Commonwealth since Commonwealth has many member countries in almost the entire parts of the world. Thus EU is maintaining a strong relationship with Commonwealth for mutual benefits. Why has the commonwealth survived? Commonwealth survived so far because of the good governance and the equality and liberty given to the member countries in their internal matters. Commonwealth shows no discrimination towards any of its member countries with respect to their culture, politics, or economic background. The highly developing country like India and the underdeveloped African country like Mozambique are enjoying equal status in Commonwealth. Even, Britain is not taking any dominant role in the functioning of Commonwealth which helped the commonwealth to survive until now. The recently concluded Delhi Commonwealth games like events helped the member countries to increase their pride in being the member country in Commonwealth. References 1. Avonism, (2010), [Online], Available at: http://avonism.blogspot.com/2010/04/decolonization-and-national-character.html [Accessed on 18 October 2010] 2. Commonwealth history (n. d.) [Online], Available at: http://www.thecommonwealth.org/Internal/191086/34493/history/ [Accessed on 18 October 2010] 3. Ferraton,M. (2009), World War II and Decolonization: Rise of African Nationalism in the Post-Second World War Era, [Online], Available at: http://www.suite101.com/content/world-war-ii-and-decolonization-a180906#ixzz12gwr92zP [Accessed on 18 October 2010] 4. Palmer, J. (n.d.), Beyond EU Enlargement-Creating a United European Commonwealth, [Online], Available at: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/sei/documents/working_paper_1041.pdf [Accessed on 18 October 2010] Read More