 Toward the end of the 19 th century the term “splendid isolation” was applied to the British foreign policy – the meaning: Britain was without allies in a dangerous world, British power was not sufficient to protect the Empire  There were some allies: the components of the Empire, mostly the Dominions and India  During WW I both the United States and Japan contributed to the British Empire ‘s survival

 The British Empire and the Commonwealth reached their greatest physical extent in 1933when the Australian government accepted responsibility for a large sector of Antarctica  In the development of British imperial power and of Commonwealth evolution one group of colonies had a special role: the Dominions  1914 Canada sent across the Atlantic an army larger than the combined forces of Wellington and Napoleon

 Australia had its own navy  Their growing independence was apparent from their insistence upon having a voice in the higher direction of war  A stimulus for their development was the gold rush – population growth, urban expansion, altering the political and demographic focus of each region  Canada was a clearly north American country, had many echoes of US politics  Australia was less nationalistic than Canada

 South Africa was the last to be formally unified, only by force could it be brought under British sovereignty  India was neither a colony nor a dominion, it was an empire  One-tenth of British overseas investments went to India which was also the leading market for the British manufacturers – the safety valve in Britain’s economic position as European and American competitors turned to tariff protection

 WW I - caused an irreversible change in the political life: it precipitated the collapse of the Russian, German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires  A destructive impact on the British Empire – it cost 9 billion pounds, there were lost markets and gains of competitors  There were mandated territories, in fact new colonies thus adding 2 million square miles and 13 million subjects mostly in Africa and Middle East

 The impact of the war had many aspects: social reformers became influential, concern for public health, an era of emancipation  Women were supreme beneficiaries of the war years – they found new opportunities in clerical and administrative work, in munitions and engineering factories  The new increasingly effective nationalist uprising against British rule

 WW II – initially a conflict to preserve the Western and Central Europe from the aggressive menace of German fascism  Turned into a broader effort to sustain the Commonwealth and the Empire  The white Dominions and South Africa lent immediate support in terms of raw materials and armed naval  The credits run up with India and Egypt in particular – were vital in assisting Britain with supplies 

 The entry of the Soviet Union into war in June 1941, that of United States in December ensured that the war would remain a worldwide one fought in every continent and every ocean and that the structure of the British Empire would come under acute threat  Much British military, naval, air force effort was put into preserving the traditional lines of communication in the Middle East, centered on the Suez Canal, and the bases of the Persian Gulf with their oil reserves

 The war impact –  a vast upheaval in the pattern and structure of the population;  a new centralization and state control to regulate social and economic control  A profound spirit of egalitarianism  Novel questions began to be asked about public policy  1942 – the most celebrated document the Beveridge report a scheme of social security, financed from central taxation

 1949 – marks the pivotal point at which Commonwealth’s colonial legacy was transformed positively into a partnership based on equality, choice and consensus  Prior – 1926 the Balfour Declaration had established all member countries as “equal in status to one another, in no way subordinate to one another” – adopted into a law in the 1931 Statute of Westminster  1949 – the Declaration of London – Heads of Government from Australia, Britain, Ceylon, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa and the Canadian Secretary of State for External Affaires met in London to discuss the future of the Commonwealth

 The declaration - both innovative and bold  His Majesty King George VI would be recognized as  ‘the symbol” of the Commonwealth  Emphasized the freedom and equality of its members not only in the relationship to the Head of the Commonwealth, but also in their cooperative “pursuit of peace, liberty and progress”  The prefix British was dropped from the title  When King George VI died, Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth II assumed his role