The imperial security state
Subtitle: British colonial knowledge and empire-building in Asia
By: James L. Hevia, Professor of International History, University of Chicago
Series: Critical perspectives on empire
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Cambridge; New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 304
ISBN-13: 9780521896085
Subjects: National security; Colonial influence; HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain; Military policy; Sources; Imperialism; Internal security; Great Britain; Colonies; History; Great Britain. Army. British Indian Army; Military intelligence
Description: "The Imperial Security State explores an important but under-explored dimension of British imperialism - its information system and the close links between military knowledge and the maintenance of empire. James Hevia's innovative study focuses on route books and military reports produced by the British Indian Army military intelligence between 1880 and 1940. He shows that together these formed a renewable and authoritative archive that was used to train intelligence officers, to inform civilian policy makers and to provide vital information to commanders as they approached the battlefield. The strategic, geographical, political and ethnographical knowledge that was gathered not only framed imperial strategies towards colonised areas to the east but also produced the very object of intervention: Asia itself. Finally, the book addresses the long-term impact of the security regime, revealing how elements of British colonial knowledge have continued to influence contemporary tactics of counterinsurgency in twenty-first-century Iraq and Afghanistan"--
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Machine generated contents note: 1. Introduction; 2. The military revolution of the nineteenth century; 3. Imperial state formation, the professionalization of the army, and the making of experts; 4. Forming intelligence, making an archive; 5. Disciplining the space of Asia: triangulation and route books; 6. Regulating the facts of Asia: military reports and handbooks; 7. The uses of intelligence; 8. The effects of the imperial security regime in Asia and Great Britain; 9. Imperial security and the transformation of Asia; Bibliography.