The British Empire: A source for good or evil? January 2014 | Page 14

Yleanna and Anne

BRITISH EMPIRE

Introduction: During the colonisation, the British Empire controlled many countries and the
Britain imposed their rules, their culture and their way of life. Indeed, in the various colonies, it was
the British who had all the power : legislative and executive and the rest of the population had none
power of decisions: they suffered the British' domination. Even if many people made nothing to
fight against the settlers, there was also some groups, some associations of rebels which formed and
which organised many manifestations (the most famous rebellion is the Mau-Mau, in Kenya,
between 1949 and 1956). But, this rebellion lead to massacres like the Amritsar Massacre, in India,
in April, 13th of 1919.
The British Empire had no only good sides like the infrastructures or the medicine but there were
also bad sides. Indeed, the rebellion made several deaths. Furthermore, there were rebellions
because the colonized populations had lost their rights and wanted to get them back

I. The Amritsar Massacre
a) A non-respected promise
After the First World War, in April, the 13th of 1919, a non-violent group of Indians, leaded
by Gandhi, demonstrated against the British settlers to denounce the economic difficulties of the
moment and the hardening of the English politic.
Indeed, British had promised at Indians, in 1917, to give them back their autonomy because
they had participated and they had supported English during the First World War. In 1919, there was
an implementation of a new Constitution which offered a better representation of the Indian
communities in Legislative assemblies. However; the executive power was always in English's
hands. It was thus far from being the autonomy that they had promised and whose other colonies of
Australia and Canada benefited.
Following this failure to respect their agreement, the anger rose in the minds of In X[