The editorial in The Telegraph dated 12 July 2026 has revived a controversy over the reassertion of the imperial demand for the so‑called “civilising mission” that had lain dormant for some years. The timing of its arrival is as dramatic as the audacity of Suella Braverman. The former British home secretary, now ensconced in the far‑right Reform UK party, recently argued on social media that former British colonies should pay reparations to London for the Empire’s “investment, effort, and contribution” in building them. She asserted that the British Empire did so much good for the world. This is not a mere political gaffe; it is a statement that emanates from a rising tide of neo‑imperialist sentiment that seeks to drag the world backwards to an age when the West lorded over the Global South with impunity. Braverman’s statements are the ideological ammunition of a resurgent imperialism of domination, exploitation and plunder, dressed in the camouflaging robes of a “civilising mission.” This mission, at its core, has always had the mission of plunder. Why are such fanciful ideas being presented to the world in the twenty‑first century? The ideological anchorage is provided by Trumpnomics—unshackled capitalism, unsustainable right‑wing welfare measures, massive inequality leading to a slowdown in working‑class consumption demand at home, and the stagnation of the world economy.
It is worth repeating that Edward Said, in his seminal work Orientalism, demonstrated that Western hegemony was perpetuated not merely by military might and economic coercion, but through the production of knowledge itself—a vast intellectual construct of the “Orient” as backward, irrational, ahistorical and in need of the paternalistic but firm hand of British masters. Rudyard Kipling infamously termed it the “white man’s burden”—a notion that it was the moral obligation of the white races to govern and civilise the darker peoples of the world. It was, and still remains, an ideology that justifies the most brutal exploitation as an act of charity. Braverman’s claim that the empire “invested” in its colonies for their benefit is a direct descendant of this ideology. The coloniser is recast as the benefactor; the colonised, a perpetual debtor. This stark contradiction finds an echo in Trump’s claim regarding Greenland as a saviour from the Nazis.
There is overwhelming evidence to show that the British economy was built to extract resources, labour, and wealth for London, not to develop colonised nations on their own terms. Based on two centuries of data, the economist Utsa Patnaik argued that the British looted approximately $45 trillion from India alone during British rule. Was it investment or theft? This loot was accompanied by untold violence and cruelty. The Great Bengal Famine of 1943 claimed an estimated three million lives, primarily because Winston Churchill deliberately diverted food supplies from India to feed British Allied forces in the Second World War. This was not a natural disaster, but a man‑made calamity engineered by colonial policy. Communities were destroyed, traditional economies were dismantled, and Indian civilisation was subjugated to British industry.
It is a bit rich to oppress, enslave, torture, kill and maim Indians for two hundred years and then claim to be democratic at the end of it. According to one account, India’s share of the global economy was 23 per cent when the British arrived, but had dropped to 4 per cent when the Union Flag was finally lowered. The British themselves estimated that
“taxation was two or three times higher than it had ever been under non‑British rule, and higher than anywhere in the world.”
Shashi Tharoor suggests that some 8 per cent of South Asian GDP was transferred to Britain every year. On top of that, revenues generated in India were used to fund the colonial army, which relied on Indian soldiers and was sometimes sent to fight wars in other regions of the world.
Turning to the Caribbean, slavery produced enormous fortunes for Britain. When slavery was abolished, compensation went to slave owners rather than the enslaved. The British state continued servicing that debt until 2015. Against this backdrop, Suella Braverman argues that twenty‑first‑century Britain cannot be held liable for eighteenth‑century actions. Britain recognised a financial obligation towards slave owners for nearly two centuries, while the descendants of societies whose labour and resources helped finance Britain are now being told that they still owe Britain a debt.
Braverman’s tirade is unsettling, and her suggestion that victims pay their tormentors is both historically inaccurate and morally obscene. Her defence of colonialism, her eagerness to excuse its crimes, and her demand that its victims pay for the infrastructure they enjoyed constitute a chilling manifestation of the “beggar‑thy‑neighbour” syndrome of British imperialism. She has internalised the logic of the oppressor. She now serves as its most passionate advocate, even as Britain subjugates itself to American imperialism. Dr Shahridan Faiez asserts that Braverman’s words are not isolated outbursts; they are part of a broader ideological project that seeks to rewrite history, rehabilitate empire, and reassert the moral and political supremacy of the West over the rest.
Professor Bhabani Nayak, recalling a parallel at the Munich Security Conference in 2026, asserts that the echoes of racial capitalism, colonialism and imperialism hide unashamed imperialist strategies under idealism; domination behind diplomacy; and the concealment of European and American expansion of free markets and democracy behind the language of security. Marco Rubio called for
“renewal and restoration driven by a vision of a future as proud and sovereign and as vital as our civilization’s past.”
God, guns and national glory define the unity of imperial powers.
The world has slipped into a deep crisis. Rising oil prices have a knock‑on effect on the cost of all goods and services essential to human survival. Oil and gas prices are sky‑high. Prof. Nayak explains that the plundering of natural resources, the domestication of labour as a compliant rather than a revolutionary force, the unquestionable hegemonic dominance of American imperialism backed by its European minions, and unfettered profit for corporate capitalism constitute four core principles of American imperialism. To achieve these objectives, forging alliances with authoritarian, reactionary and religious forces is necessary. Braverman‑like ideologues manufacture a strange logic of reparation with the help of comfortable historical amnesia. It is time the victims of colonialism shun the invisible scars of extraction and point out that Malaysia’s rubber exports rescued a bankrupt post‑war UK, generating more critical US dollar revenue than all of Britain’s domestic industries combined. People from all walks of life must unmask the colonisers and should not mistake the master’s whip for a gift. The working class should not shrug and brush aside this hypocrisy as one individual’s personal opinion; rather, it is a larger design to cloud working‑class consciousness.
