War, diplomacy and informal empire : Britain and the republics of La Plata, 1836-1853

The massive transformations that occurred in the decade 1940-50 were decisive in shaping the modern history of Southeast Asia, and have determined the course of politics in the region right up to the present day. The 1940s saw the break-up of the European colonial empires in Southeast Asia and the creation of independent nation states. However, this nationalist revolution met resistance, not only from the colonial powers, but also from peripheral communities and regions that felt their identity to be threatened by these emerging nation-states and by the ideologies dominating Asian nationalism. A number of secession movements developed and separatist rebellions broke out and, although no movement achieved its objectives, some were resurrected during the Cold War when the region came to be seen as a key strategic zone. "It became an established practice in the 19th century for the European colonial powers - in particular, Britain and France - to exercise hegemony over large areas of the world by attempting to secure the election of governments that would favour their interests. Latin America was one such region which the colonial powers treated as their "informal empire". There has been much debate about the effectiveness of informal empire and it has generally been argued that the colonial powers found it more profitable to exercise control in this indirect manner than to administer territories directly. David McLean challenges this view, arguing that in practice there were great drawbacks to attempts to use diplomatic means to influence the domestic politics of the nations of Latin America. Attempts to secure peace and favourable trading arrangements in the Argentine and Uruguay proved extremely problematic; long-distance communications between the European governments and their diplomats in Latin America were slow and unreliable; conflicts between the European commercial classes and their governments were unavoidable; and the legitimacy of the merging nationalist movements in Latin America proved hard for the European powers to contest. This is a new study of a major aspect of colonial history and should be of interest to historians and to those with an interest in international relations."--Bloomsbury Publishing La Plata and the British before 1836; war and the invasion of Uruguay, 1836-43; the failure of diplomacy, 1843; Britain, France and the policy of intervention, 1844; the beginning of hostilities, 1845; an expedition into the Parana, 1845-6; Hood's mission to la Plata, 1846; Ouseley continues the war, 1846-7; the diplomacy of Howden and Walewski, 1847; Palmerston's search for a peace settlement, 1848; the resumption of relations at Buenos Aires, 1848-9; the liberation of Montevideo and the end of the war "Essentially an update on John Frank Cady's now-classic Foreign Intervention in the Río de la Plata, 1838-50 (1929). Challenges utility of the 'informal empire' concept in explaining Britain's sloppy handling of its Platine interests in the mid-19th century. McClean is more comfortable with English-language materials (which includes an array of documents from the PRO), than he is with those sources written in Spanish"--Handbook of Latin American Studies, v. 58. It was common practice in the 19th century for European colonial powers to exercise hegemony over large areas of the world by securing the election of governments that would favour their interests. Latin America was one such area, and McLean's study examines this major aspect of colonial history.