 New 1933 edition | |
| Authors | Norman Angell |
|---|---|
| Original title | Europe's Optical Illusion |
| Language | English |
Publication date | 1909; 1933 |
The Great Illusion is a book by Norman Angell, first published in the United Kingdom in 1909 under the title Europe's Optical Illusion [1] and republished in 1910 and subsequently in various enlarged and revised editions under the title The Great Illusion. [2] It is an influential book in the field of international relations. [3]
In The Great Illusion, Angell's primary thesis was, in the words of historian James Joll, that "the economic cost of war was so great that no one could possibly hope to gain by starting a war the consequences of which would be so disastrous." [4] [5] For that reason, a general European war was very unlikely to start, and if it did, it would not last long. [6] He argued that war was economically and socially irrational [7] and that war between industrial countries was futile because conquest did not pay. J. D. B. Miller writes: "The 'Great Illusion' was that nations gained by armed confrontation, militarism, war, or conquest." [8]
According to Angell, the economic interdependence between industrial countries would be "the real guarantor of the good behavior of one state to another", [7] as it meant that war would be economically harmful to all the countries involved. Moreover, if a conquering power confiscated property in the territory it seized, "the incentive [of the local population] to produce would be sapped and the conquered area be rendered worthless. Thus, the conquering power had to leave property in the hands of the local population while incurring the costs of conquest and occupation." [8]
Further, the nature of modern capitalism was such that nationalist sentiment did not motivate capitalists, because "the capitalist has no country, and he knows, if he be of the modern type, that arms and conquests and jugglery with frontiers serve no ends of his, and may very well defeat them." [9]
Angell said that arms build-up, for example the naval race between England and Germany that was happening as he wrote the book in the 1900s, was not going to secure peace. Instead, it would lead to increased insecurity and thus ratchet up the likelihood of war. The only viable route to peace would be respect for international law, implemented in a world court, in which issues would be dealt with rationally and peacefully.
The Great Illusion was a best-selling popular success and was quickly translated into eleven languages, becoming something of a "cult", spawning study groups at British universities "devoted to propagating its dogma." The book was taken up by Viscount Esher, a courtier who was charged with remodeling the British Army after the Boer War. [10] Also enamored of the book was Admiral John Fisher, the First Sea Lord, who called it "heavenly manna". [7] Historian Niall Ferguson uses the receptiveness to the book of these paragons of the British military and naval establishments as evidence that it was not the pacifist work it superficially seemed to be, but instead a "Liberal imperialist tract directed at German opinion", with the aim of discouraging Germany from continuing its bid to become a great naval power, a program which had begun the fierce, and expensive, naval arms race between the United Kingdom and Germany. The fact that Angell was employed as editor of the Continental Daily Mail by Lord Northcliffe, a press baron whom Ferguson refers to as an "arch-scaremonger", is to Ferguson further evidence of a deeper, non-pacifist purpose to the book. [7]
A new edition of The Great Illusion was published in 1933; it added "the theme of collective defence." [11] Angell was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1933.
An empire is a political unit made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire exercises political control over the peripheries. Within an empire, different populations have different sets of rights and are governed differently. Narrowly defined, an empire is a sovereign state whose head of state is an emperor; but not all states with aggregate territory under the rule of supreme authorities are called empires or are ruled by an emperor; nor have all self-described empires been accepted as such by contemporaries and historians.
William I, usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087. A descendant of Rollo, he was Duke of Normandy from 1035 onward. By 1060, following a long struggle to establish his throne, his hold on Normandy was secure. In 1066, following the death of Edward the Confessor, William invaded England, leading an army of Normans to victory over the Anglo-Saxon forces of Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Hastings, and suppressed subsequent English revolts in what has become known as the Norman Conquest. The rest of his life was marked by struggles to consolidate his hold over England and his continental lands, and by difficulties with his eldest son, Robert Curthose.
The Norman Conquest was the 11th-century invasion and occupation of England by an army made up of thousands of Norman, Breton, Flemish, and French troops, all led by the Duke of Normandy, later styled William the Conqueror.
Pax Britannica was the period of relative peace between the great powers during which the British Empire became the global hegemonic power and adopted the role of a "global policeman".
Anarcho-pacifism, also referred to as anarchist pacifism and pacifist anarchism, is an anarchist school of thought that advocates for the use of peaceful, non-violent forms of resistance in the struggle for social change. Anarcho-pacifism rejects the principle of violence which is seen as a form of power and therefore as contradictory to key anarchist ideals such as the rejection of hierarchy and dominance. Many anarcho-pacifists are also Christian anarchists, who reject war and the use of violence.
The Zimmermann Telegram was a secret diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office in January 1917 that proposed a military alliance between Germany and Mexico if the United States entered World War I against Germany. With Germany's aid, Mexico would recover Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico. The telegram was intercepted by British intelligence.
Norman Mattoon Thomas was an American Presbyterian minister who achieved fame as a socialist, pacifist, and six-time presidential candidate for the Socialist Party of America.
Sir Ralph Norman Angell was an English Nobel Peace Prize winner. He was a lecturer, journalist, author and Member of Parliament for the Labour Party.
Alfred Hermann Fried was an Austrian Jewish pacifist, publicist, journalist, co-founder of the German peace movement, and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1911. Fried was also a supporter of Esperanto. He is the author of an Esperanto textbook and an Esperanto-German and German-Esperanto dictionary, first published in 1903 and republished in 1905.
The Kingdom of England was a sovereign state on the island of Great Britain from 12 July 927, when it emerged from various Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, until 1 May 1707, when it united with Scotland to form the Kingdom of Great Britain, and England is now part of the United Kingdom. The Kingdom of England was among the most powerful states in Europe during the medieval and early modern colonial periods.
The identification of the causes of World War I remains a debated issue. World War I began in the Balkans on July 28, 1914, and hostilities ended on November 11, 1918, leaving 17 million dead and 25 million wounded. Moreover, the Russian Civil War can in many ways be considered a continuation of World War I, as can various other conflicts in the direct aftermath of 1918.
The Harrying of the North was a series of military campaigns waged by William the Conqueror in the winter of 1069–1070 to subjugate Northern England, where the presence of the last Wessex claimant, Edgar Ætheling, had encouraged Anglo-Saxon Northumbrian, Anglo-Scandinavian and Danish rebellions. William paid the Danes to go home, but the remaining rebels refused to meet him in battle, and he decided to starve them out by laying waste to the Northern shires using scorched earth tactics, especially in the historic county of Yorkshire and the city of York, before relieving the English aristocracy of their positions, and installing Norman aristocrats throughout the region.
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James Bysse Joll FBA was a British historian and university lecturer whose works included The Origins of the First World War and Europe Since 1870. He also wrote on the history of anarchism and socialism.
Edward Ingram Watkin was an English Catholic philosopher, pacifist and writer.
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Germany's Aims in the First World War is a book by German historian Fritz Fischer. It is one of the leading contributions to historical analysis of the causes of World War I, and along with this work War of Illusions(Krieg der Illusionen) gave rise to the "Fischer Thesis" on the causes of the war. The title translates as "Grab for World Power". or "Bid for World Power". Essentially Fischer attempts to link together a continuum of German belligerence in its "grab for power" weaving it all together into a cohesive theme of German Weltpolitik.
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