Imperialism and the Corruption of Democracies (review)

Herman Lebovics’s latest collection of essays, sketchy in its argumentation, frequently off-topic, and rife with errors, is a disappointing treatment of a promising subject.

The book’s objective is “to trace the general impact of conquest, rule, and exploitation on the countries that conquered colonial empires” (ix). Inspired by George Orwell, Lebovics concludes that “colonies are dangerous to the health of democracy” (ix). In other words, not only do the colonized suffer, often unspeakably, but “imperialism abroad…has been damaging to democratic efforts at home” (ix). As in the Hegelian parable, the master’s fate is inseparable from that of the enslaved.