John Hobson: An Early Critique of Imperialism

John Hobson, a socialist reformer, argued that the unequal distribution of income made capitalism unproductive and unstable. He argued that if wages were better equated at home then private investors would not have the capital to broaden imperially. In his book Imperialism, he attacked the subject with the following points:

· Wars of imperialism have been directly motivated by aggression of white races on “lower races”

· Pax Britannica has become a more impudent falsehood recently with the expansion to frontiers in Africa and Asia

· Natural Resources is the main conflicting interest between European Countries in their territorial and commercial expansion

· These are the interests of business men – not of the common people

· These business men use the public resources to push their private businesses, but they feign national antagonisms which do not have any basis

o For instance, the Boer War was driven by gold speculators

· These business politicians use biology and sociology (Social Darwinism) to weave convenient theories of a race struggle for the subjugation of “inferior people

· These same men stress the “burden” of educating and elevating the races of “children”

· Imperialism has become purely parasitic – living on these natives and stripping them of natural resources and labor