Abstract
Ever since Kenneth Pommeranz published his interesting book The Great Divergence in 2000, there has been a lively debate on this phenomenon to which K. Yazdani has made a remarkable contribution. About a fifth of his book is devoted to the fundamental contrast between Europe and Asia. At the centre of his discussion is the concept of ‘modernity’ which he divides into early, middle (sixteenth to nineteenth centuries) and late century. In the middle period, Asia registered notable achievements, which ‘eurocentric’ historians have tended to ignore. Pommeranz has shown that the region around the lower Yangtze river in China was nearly on the same economic level as Great Britain in the late nineteenth century. Parallel to this, Yazadani has examined the economies of Mysore and Gujarat. Pommeranz stressed the divergence, which follows this equal status and explains it by pointing out that Britain could draw on its coal and on American and other colonial raw materials for its industrial revolution. Yazdani, however, dwells on his case studies of Mysore and Gujarat without highlighting the British case, which is anyhow well known. He has explored sources in Indian, British, French and German archives and looked at a great deal of secondary literature.
The two case studies are very convincing, but the reader will miss a comparison between Mysore and Gujarat, which would have been a study in contrast. Mysore was converted into something like a modern military state by Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan whereas Gujarat lacked a stable state in this period. Challenged by the British, the rulers of Mysore concentrated on an efficient revenue administration in order to finance their military and amazing armaments. They even had rockets that could aim as far as 2.4 km. After Tipu Sultan was defeated and killed by the British, his ‘modern state’ disappeared. In Gujarat, the dissolving Mughal Empire still controlled large parts of the region, including Surat—its main port, but the Marathas repeatedly invaded the Mughal domain. However, they did not replace the Mughal administration. Nevertheless, in economic terms, Gujarat flourished. There was a great textile industry and extensive maritime trade. Rich Gujarati traders sent dozens of ships across the Arabian Sea. But these traders were insecure as the example of Mohammed Ali, the richest of them, showed; he had built a fortified port of his own at Surat but ended up in the jail of the Mughal governor, where he died.
The British remain marginal figures in Yazdani’s account. This is adequate for this period. But it cannot be denied that they took the decisive steps in the eighteenth century, which then led to the ‘divergence’. They had entered into a parasitic symbiosis with India, which endured for a long time. They had opened up a flourishing market by selling printed Indian textiles in Europe, which sold like hotcakes. In 1700, they had then closed their home market for Indian printed textiles and started to only import white Indian cotton cloth, which served as an input for the British cotton printers, the pioneers of the industrial revolution. The East India Company proved to be very resourceful in obtaining these cloths for bleaching them to the strict specifications of the printers. The next step was the spinning of cotton in England. This was very labour-intensive and the English woollen industry could not spare labour. In spite of woollen producers’ complaints, their business boomed and their exports expanded. Thus, cotton spinners were scarce. The invention of labour-saving devices such as Hargreaves’ Spinning Jenny in 1764 was, therefore, very welcomed. James Hargreaves was an illiterate weaver, but he was destined to be on the threshold of the industrial revolution. Yazdani should have mentioned this development and its repercussions in India. He could have also mentioned the lack of mercantilist policies (restraining imports and encouraging exports) in India and their importance for the industrial revolution in England. He only mentions mercantilism through passing quotes of Per de Vries, who edits the series in which Yazdani’s book appears. Vries stresses the importance of British mercantilist policy and its absence in India. Yazdani agrees with him as far as Gujarat is concerned, but argues that Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan adopted a mercantilist policy for Mysore. As he, unfortunately, does with many important items, Yazdani has relegated this important issue to the footnotes of his text.
British rule in India was not won by means of heroic battles, but rather by subtle infiltration. Only the three Mysorean wars were real wars of conquest. British power was on the razor’s edge at that time. If Tipu had made an alliance with the Marathas and the Nizam of Hyderabad, he could have vanquished the British. But he waged wars against them and they formed alliances with the British against him. In Gujarat, the British and the Dutch had already established bridgeheads in the early seventeenth century and had started their ‘factories’ in Surat.
The nineteenth century is only covered marginally by Yazdani. In its first half topic covered is that how British rule caused a severe deflation in India. In this period, the British exported silver, which they had earlier brought into the country, in order, to buy textiles. They also cultivated opium in India and shipped it to China, thus, making the Chinese poor and themselves rich. Then they bought tea from China, which they sold at a high profit in Europe. In England, the Industrial Revolution progressed at that time. The early textile factories were run by watermills. They required only limited investments. The real industrial revolution started only when it was powered by steam engines. The spread of the railways marked the second phase of the industrial revolution. The railways also reached India and then silver again flowed into the country. Modern textile mills were established in India on the British pattern. Their owners were the first real Indian capitalists. However, neither the railways nor the textile mills produced linkages in India. Rails and engines and also the textile machinery were imported from Great Britain. Indian capitalism was severely limited in its economic impact under British Colonial rule.
When discussing Indian capitalism, Yazdani is cautious and circumspect. But he does think that without colonial rule, Tipu’s Mysore could have progressed to industrial capitalism along German lines. Gujarat perhaps could have also advanced from mercantile to industrial capitalism. Yazdani’s judgements are always carefully balanced. He has made an excellent contribution to the debate on the ‘Great Divergence’ and to Indian economic history.