How the East Was Won: Barbarian Conquerors, Universal Conquest and the Making of Modern Asia (LSE International Studies)

"How did upstart outsiders forge vast new empires in early modern Asia, laying the foundations for today's modern mega-states of India and China? In How the East Was Won, Andrew Phillips reveals the crucial parallels uniting the Mughal Empire, the Qing Dynasty and the British Raj. Vastly outnumbered and stigmatised as parvenus, the Mughals and Manchus pioneered similar strategies of cultural statecraft, first to build the multicultural coalitions necessary for conquest, and then to bind the indigenous collaborators needed to subsequently uphold imperial rule. The English East India Company later adapted the same 'define and conquer' and 'define and rule' strategies to carve out the West's biggest colonial empire in Asia. Refuting existing accounts of the 'rise of the West', this book foregrounds the profoundly imitative rather than innovative character of Western colonialism to advance a new explanation of how universal empires arise and endure." -- Publisher's description Front Matter Dedication Contents Maps Preface and Acknowledgements Introduction 1. From the Rise of the West to How the East Was Won 2 The Eurasian Transformation 3. The Rise of Asia’s Terrestrial Empires 4. European Infiltration and Asian Consolidation in Maritime Asia, 1600–1700 5. The Great Asian Divergence: Mughal Decline and Manchu Expansion in the Eighteenth Century 6. The East India Company and the Rise of British India, 1740–1820 7. Crises of Empire and the Reconstitution of International Orders in South and East Asia, 1820–1880 Conclusion References Index Phillips reveals how Mughal, Manchu and Western imperialists developed common strategies of 'define and conquer' and 'define and rule' to subjugate South and East Asia. Examining how they leveraged cultural difference to pursue universal conquest, this book exposes the vital role 'barbarian' conquerors played in forging today's Asian superpowers