This thesis will examine British attitudes and agendas during the build-up, proceedings and aftermath of the Shanghai Opium Commission (1909) which marked the first step towards the establishment of an international drugs control regime. The research is presented chronologically and draws on a wide range of primary and secondary source documents, including previously unused material in the National Archives of India. It will assess how far revenue concerns shaped British positions on the questions of the opium traffic and the regulation of opium consumption around the turn of the twentieth century. I argue that a more nuanced and complex appreciation of British positions is necessary in order to understand the foundation years of the international drugs control regime. The British agenda at the Shanghai Opium Commission represented varied and often competing visions of opium regulation held at different levels of the imperial and colonial administration. Moral, political and commercial concerns amongst some British groups motivated their commitment to end the India-China opium trade. The British no longer sought to defend their revenues derived from exports of opium from India to China. Instead the British saw the Shanghai Commission as an opportunity to ensure that the Chinese government fulfilled its own obligations to reduce its domestic production and consumption of opium in line with reductions of Indian exports to China. Nor were the British simply defending their opium revenues from domestic sales to Indian consumers. Instead, the representatives of British colonial governments in Asia, especially India, sought to protect systems of opium regulation which had been elaborated over two hundred years of colonial rule and which colonial administrators believed were tailored towards its maintenance. As such, the British fought to prevent the Commission establishing a principle of non-medicinal opium use which would make illicit widespread quasi-medical and recreational opium consumption. Colonial officials considered such stringent controls antithetical to a colonial policy regulating what they considered as culturally accepted and popular forms of opium consumption. Officials also considered the non-medical prohibition of opium consumption impracticable and, by interfering in the habits and customs of the native population, an unnecessary risk to the security and stability of colonial rule.

Previous scholarship suggests that the five weeks that Buffalo Bill's Wild West Exhibition spent in Barcelona in the winter of 1889-1890 was the low point of its various European tours if not indeed of its entire existence. The present study challenges that interpretation on the basis of evidence from a substantial body of contemporary sources in Catalan, English and Spanish, including newspaper and magazine coverage of the tour from Spain and the United States, previously unpublished correspondence and memoires by company members, together with official records. It argues for a re-evaluation of the Wild West's only visit to Spain in the context of recent studies of the life and works of William F. Cody by scholars such as Bonner, Kasson, Kroes and Rydell and Warren which have underlined the importance of Buffalo Bill's Wild West as a hugely successful and influential American cultural product and international intercultural phenomenon that flourished at a period that was crucial for American nation (re)building in the years after the Civil War, and for the development of United States' relations with Europe in the run-up to the First World War. It discusses the reasons why the exhibition did not return to Spain during its more extensive 1905-1906 European tour and concludes that the enduring influence of dominant historiographic trends found in accounts of Spanish-American international relations between the American Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the Spanish American War of 1898 have been crucial contributing factors to the on-going misunderstanding of the time that Buffalo Bill's Wild West spent in Barcelona. A number of the rare or previously unpublished sources which are cited as evidence in the argument are included as appendices to the study.

The main argument relates to an analysis of the essays written by Ernest Mason Satow in 1866, known as Eikoku Sakuron in Japanese, and also to an analysis of British diplomacy at the time of the civil war and during the Meiji Restoration in 1868-69. The major reason why these two areas should be examined is that the common understanding of them, which Japanese historiography has traditionally defined as historical truth, turns out not to be true. The main idea, which it was planned to argue in this thesis, was to emphasise the efforts of Satow during the Meiji Restoration, because Japanese historiography has consistently defined Eikoku Sakuron as the milestone for Japanese political modernization. In other words without Satow, nineteenth-century Japanese could never have promoted their remarkable national transformation. This modernization was connected with British diplomacy. Japanese historiography asserts that thanks to the British, who had supported the anti-feudal forces, the Japanese could found their modern state in such a short period. These two historical assumptions are viewed as common sense even in present Japanese society. However, through this research, it must now be recognised that the tenets defined by orthodox Japanese historiography cannot be accepted in wider academic argument, because what the Japanese have always believed is largely refuted by British and other sources. Regarding Eikoku Sakuron, although it was read by some Japanese, it did not create a huge psychological impact in nineteenth-century Japan. Satow’s argument was revolutionary, but it can hardly be defined as the guideline for eventual modernization. So why has Japanese historiography clung to its ideas and definition? When this question was asked, the direction for this thesis became established. The Japanese interpretation of the Meiji Restoration was established not to pursue historical truth but to justify political actions. In Japanese historiography, there is a tendency that when historians discuss the Meiji Restoration, they revere it unconditionally, whereas when discussing feudalism, they do not analyse it fairly. The Meiji Restoration will be argued more objectively in this thesis. It will become the opportunity to challenge traditional Japanese historiography.

After English internal migrants, the Irish were the largest group to relocate to London in the early nineteenth century. This thesis explores the experiences of the Irish communities in London at this oft-overlooked point in the Irish diaspora’s past. The work is split into two parts. The first of these parts focuses on understanding who the Irish were and what it meant to be ‘Irish’ in the early nineteenth century. It also explores what cues contemporaries used to identify the Irish in London during these two decades, and how those cues were different from those that can be used by historians. The goal of this first section is to determine the best way for historians to identify Irish individuals in sets of historical records. This would make it possible to do comparative analyses of the Irish and non-Irish in the city. Ultimately this can be achieved through three processes: nominal record linkage (finding archival evidence of an individual’s Irish connection), keyword searching for Irish geographical terms, and a surname analysis. The surname analysis was based upon a study of 278,000 records from the census of 1841, and validated against thousands of records from 1778-1805, to determine the most reliable surnames. This surname analysis resulted in the creation of a tool (Appendix I), which I argue can be used by historians to identify probable Irish individuals when no other evidence is available. This digital humanities tool was then tested through a series of historical case studies to determine its value for historians. The case studies involved an examination of Irish defendants in the Old Bailey Proceedings, which highlights how the local population reacted to the Irish when interpersonal conflicts occurred. The Proceedings contain abridged transcripts of the trials of all 25,000 defendants tried for felonies in London during this period. Using the census analysis, I was able to identify 1,700 ‘probable Irish’ defendants. I then conducted data mining and quantitative analyses that identified differences in the conflict resolution strategies used by the locals when dealing with the Irish and the non-Irish respectively. The evidence suggests that locals were more suspicious when dealing with the Irish, and quicker to turn to the legal system when things went wrong. However, it would seem that as a group, the Irish gave cause for concern. An Irish underclass was certainly heavily involved in crime; but more importantly, Irish seasonal migration led to a dramatic increase in the city’s Irish population each summer and autumn. Poor planning by government ministers also meant that mass demobilisation of Irish soldiers and sailors after the wars with the French had a similar effect (particularly in 1802), unintentionally swelling the size of the Irish population in the capital. These impermanent migrants failed to adhere to the social expectations the locals had of their neighbours, thus breeding resentment. For Londoners, the transitory nature of these individuals upended traditional conflict resolution strategies. I conclude that surname analysis can provide useful proxy evidence for historians upon which hypotheses can be generated, and theories can be tested. It is best suited to large textual corpora, and should always be supported by close reading, when possible.

This dissertation examines British policy in Afghanistan between 1864 and 1879, with particular emphasis on Sir John Lawrence’s term as governor-general and viceroy of India (1864-69). Having achieved national renown for his exploits in the Punjab during the Indian Mutiny, as governor-general Sir John (later first Baron) Lawrence became synonymous with a particular line of foreign policy in Afghanistan, commonly referred to by contemporaries as ‘masterly inactivity’. His tenure at Calcutta coincided with a critical period in Anglo-Afghan relations, on account of a protracted civil war in Afghanistan and the renewal of Russian military advances in central Asia. This dissertation explains why government ministers granted Lawrence so much latitude for formulating British policy and what motivated his ‘masterly inactivity’, an alluring although misleading expression. A central concern is the extent to which public criticism in Britain influenced Lawrence’s decisions in India. Some of the constraints on policy-makers are also explored, including contemporary perceptions about the importance of ‘prestige’ to the control of India. In addition, the thesis considers some of the domestic effects of British imperialism, by reference to Lawrence’s public criticism of government policy before the second Afghan war, and by analysing metropolitan reaction to the murder of the British envoy at Kabul in 1879. His utility to parliamentary Liberals and prominence in public discussion about Afghanistan in 1878 demonstrate that—after nearly a lifetime on the imperial ‘periphery’—Lawrence ultimately exerted a considerable influence on politics in the imperial metropolis. A portrait of Sir John Lawrence (by George Frederic Watts; oil on panel, 1862) is currently displayed at the National Portrait Gallery, London (NPG 1005).

Studies of the theories of ethnicity, ethnology and ethnogenesis prevailing in early modern Ireland are noticeable by their absence. This dearth persists despite the fact that major periods of Irish history are understood as confrontations between differing, even incompatible, cultures or as conflicts between ethnic identities expressed as political ideologies – the Tudor expansion of the English state, the Cromwellian conquest, the Williamite War and even the Northern Irish Troubles are all interpreted in this manner. As there are few extant accounts of these theories, and their intimate connection to British and Irish political reality and practise, my research attempts to address this scholarly lacuna by charting the development of such ethnologies from the late Elizabethan period to the middle of the eighteenth century. Building on the work of Joep Leerssen and Clare O’Halloran, this research will look at the aspects of this topic that are still incomplete. Charles O’Conor of Belanagare is a significant presence in their accounts and, in the context of this thesis, his antiquarian works and historiography will be used to analyse preceding and prevailing ethnographical theories and ethnological attitudes. It is intended to first contextualize the nature of this ethnology by looking at those theories prevalent from 1690 to 1766 and to underscore their politically charged nature by analysing how they were shaped by political developments. Chapter one commences with a brief reference to the Lucas affair of 1748-50 and the fourth chapter returns to this controversy, exploring it in greater depth in order to analyse the nearest ethnographical dispute prior to the publication of O’Conor’s Dissertations on the Antient History of Ireland (1753). This work, alongside a history of the scholarly rehabilitations of the theory of Milesian ethnogenesis, is the subject of the fifth chapter. The second and third chapters deal with the gradual alterations in attitudes to various ethnological theories in Ireland between 1690 and 1750. The last chapter deals with O’Conor’s historiography, explaining the ethno-political theories adumbrated in his work, their uncontroversial reception among Irish Protestants, his activism after its publication and his attempt to contribute to Hiberno-Scottish historiographical debates.

This thesis examines the response of the Labour Government to events in Portugal following the coup d’état in April 1974. Britain, as Portugal’s traditional ally and largest trading partner, with close partisan ties between the Labour movement and Portuguese Socialist Party, was a leading player in the international response to developments in Lisbon. The Portuguese Revolution also had wider implications for British foreign policy: the presence of communist ministers in government threatened both the cohesion of NATO and detente with the Soviet Union; West European leaders sought to influence events in Lisbon through the new political structures of the EEC; the outcome of events in Portugal appeared to foreshadow a political transition in Spain; and decolonisation in Angola and Mozambique made Rhodesia’s continued independence unlikely. This study therefore contributes to historical debate concerning the Labour Government and its foreign policy during the 1970s. It considers the extent to which the domestic, political and economic difficulties of the Labour Government during this period undermined the effectiveness of its foreign policy. This thesis also considers the relative importance of, and interplay between, the factors which shaped post-war British foreign policy: the Cold War, membership of NATO and the EEC; relations with newly independent states in the developing world and the Commonwealth; and the relationship with the United States. It also examines how those within the government who play a role in foreign policy- principally the Prime Minister, Foreign Secretary, Cabinet, Treasury and the Foreign Office- interpreted the national interest and sought to influence policy-making accordingly; the role of outside groups, such as the political parties, Trade Unions and the media, are also considered.

This thesis gives a historical account of the political philosophy of the Wittenberg reformer Philipp Melanchthon (1497-1560) from his arrival in Wittenberg in 1518 to the end of the Schmalkaldic War in 1547. Whilst scholars have discussed partial aspects of Melanchthon's political thought, this has primarily been with a focus on Melanchthon's theological writings. In contrast, it is a central argument of this thesis that Melanchthon delineated politics as a philosophical discipline distinct from theology. Accordingly, this thesis discusses Melanchthon's specifically political writings in their own right, and in their intellectual and political contexts, to give a fuller account of the development of his political thought. Chapter one analyses Melanchthon's earliest humanist political thought. In the 1525 Oratio de legibus in particular Melanchthon formulated a political position by drawing on Cicero, distinct from contemporary scholastics, renaissance humanists, and from Luther. Chapter two argues that Melanchthon's 1530 commentary on Aristotle's Politics should be understood as a criticism of late medieval Ockhamist political thought. Motivated by the uprisings of 1525, Melanchthon developed an account of political authority on the basis of natural law to undermine Ockhamist arguments that could legitimise rebellion. Chapter three discusses Melanchthon's 1538 Philosophiae moralis epitome. There, Melanchthon developed his account of political authority on the basis of natural law further, drawing on both scholastic and humanist elements, to address contemporary political problems. Chapter four discusses Melanchthon's intervention in the polemics of the Schmalkaldic War. Melanchthon's 1547 Von der Notwehr Unterricht drew on his moral and political philosophy to formulate an alternative theory of resistance to the theological and apocalyptic arguments forwarded by his fellow Lutherans. In conclusion, the thesis shows how Melanchthon's political thought addresses some of the larger questions discussed in the scholarship on sixteenth century political thought, indicating how Melanchthon influenced later political thinkers.

This thesis examines several interconnected families from the Scottish Borders who served in the East India Company between 1780 and 1857. Utilising the letters, diaries and wills of the members of these families, I present an ‘intimate’ history of Company service. Asserting the complex and multifarious connections of the eighteenth and nineteenth-century Borders with India scotches the perception of the area as essentially parochial. Starting with the poetry of Walter Scott, chapter one advances an argument for a distinctive Border identity that was based on an appeal to the medieval Anglo-Scottish Border conflicts. Company service offered Border Scots the chance to enact this identity (often violently) in India. Chapter two suggests the centrality of hunting in maintaining connections to Scotland while in India. Instead of focussing on the phenomenon of ‘big game’ hunting, I suggest the importance of ‘marginal’ game and hunting landscapes. Taken together, these two chapters argue that the Border landscape, both physical and imaginative, was integral to sustaining Company service for the families under examination. The third chapter ‘blackens’ the Borders by examining the lives of mixed-race children brought ‘home’ to Scotland and the institutions that educated them. Chapter four asserts the central role played by unmarried women in sustaining imperial service in the Borders through educating their nephews and younger brothers for a career in empire and by ‘improving’ the family estate for their absent brothers. The fifth chapter ventures into the interiors of the houses these men built on their return. Analysing the objects they furnished their houses with offers insight into how material goods, often quotidian, structured responses to imperial service. Looking to the networks of people, objects, buildings, landscapes and animals connecting the Scottish Borders to India, this thesis places this rural area of Scotland in a global context.

This dissertation explores female involvement in British Protestant medical missions in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. It uses individual case studies to trace the work of female medical missionaries across Empire, interested in how they identified with and negotiated their position as medical women and how this understanding shaped relationships to each other, to their patients and non-medical colleagues, to Christian missions, and to wider imperial interests more broadly – both at home in Britain and on the mission field. Drawing from the personal and published writings of medical women, the project examines the contradictions and tensions inherent within the professional and private lives of the first generations of women who pursued medical mission work overseas as qualified doctors. The thesis is loosely structured as two main sections. Part one examines missionary recruitment among qualifying female doctors at home in Britain. It explores contributing factors which might have motivated medical candidates to pursue mission work and what training and knowledge these applicants held prior to field deployment about the cultural, religious and geographical differences they were to encounter. It also examines burgeoning professionalism among women doctors, tracing how they organized within medical and missionary ranks to influence professional agendas and promote institutional change. Close analysis will show how they controlled the use of medical terms and professional designations to protect themselves as a distinct and unified professional body. Part two addresses specific case studies of female doctors working overseas in an effort to follow the experiences of individual women from medical school to the mission field.