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The ‘re-turn’ to empire in IR: colonial knowledge communities and the construction of the idea of the Afghan polity, 1809–38

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 October 2013

MARTIN J. BAYLY
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Abstract

This article seeks to add to the exploration and development of Imperial History's contribution to the discipline of International Relations (IR). Focusing on British perceptions of Afghanistan in the period preceding the first Anglo-Afghan war the article considers colonial knowledge as a source of identity construction, but in a manner that avoids deploying anachronistic concepts, in this case that of the Afghan ‘state’. This approach, which draws on the insights brought to IR by historical sociology, shows that engaging with Imperial History within IR can encourage a more reflexive attitude to core disciplinary categories. This not only reveals alternative approaches to the construction of specific political communities but it also allows for a more historicist mode in the use of history by IR as a discipline. Furthermore, by moving away from material based purely on diplomatic history, Afghanistan's imperial encounter can be recovered from the dominance of ‘Great Game’ narratives, offering an account that is more appreciative of the Afghanistan context.

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Articles
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 40 , Issue 3 , July 2014 , pp. 443 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 2013 

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54 See IOR, Elphinstone Papers, Mss Eur F88/81, pp. 85, 91, 105, 111.

55 Burnes, Alexander, Travels into Bokhara, Volume I (London: John Murray, 1834), p. 162Google Scholar. Masson also requested a copy from Pottinger in 1833: IOR, Masson Papers, 20876 Mss Eur E.161/6-7/1a (microfilm).

56 One of these agents, Mullah Najib hosted Burnes on his later trip through Peshawar. Najib was at the time on a British pension. Burnes, Travels into Bokhara, Volume I, p. 105.

57 Omrani, ‘Charles Masson of Afghanistan’. Masson's correspondence with Pottinger and Wade is in the Masson Papers, IOR Mss Eur.E.161/631-632.

58 IOR/V/27/270/7, ‘Reports and Papers, Political, Geographical, and Commercial. Submitted to Government, by Sir Alexander Burnes; Lieutenant Leech; Doctor Lord; and Lieutenant Wood’.

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75 Ibid., p. 138.

76 As a rough guide, the modern territorial state of Afghanistan is bounded on its north, south, east, and west, by Bulkh (Balkh), Caubul (Kabul), Candahar (Kandahar), and Farrah (Farah), respectively. Additional important population centres include Heraut (Herat) in the north-west, and Peshawer (Peshawar) to the east of Kabul, on the present day border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

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92 IOR, Broughton Papers, Add MS 36473, p. 120. For the reports see IOR/V/27/270/7, ‘Reports and Papers, Political, Geographical, and Commercial. Submitted to Government, by Sir Alexander Burnes; Lieutenant Leech; Doctor Lord; and Lieutenant Wood’.

93 Henry St George Tucker, who was Chairman of the Company Board at the time, declined to support this second mission ‘feeling perfectly assured that it must soon degenerate into a political agency, and that we should as a necessary consequence be involved in all the entanglement of Afghan politics’. Kaye, History of the War in Afghanistan, Volume I, p. 181.

94 The Qizilbash were a Persian unit of the Afghan army that functioned as the personal bodyguards of the ruler of Kabul, having been originally established under the rule of Ahmad Shah (r.1747–72). The Qizilbash are to be distinguished from the ethnic Hazara community inhabiting the central highlands of the Hindu Kush who were also of the Shi'a sect of Islam and accordingly were viewed by the British as potentially aligning with Persia in the event of a Persian invasion.

95 IOR/V/27/270/7, p. 10.

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97 IOR/V/27/270/7, p. 15.

98 Ibid.

99 IOR/L/PS/20/MEMO1/15/3, pp. 4–5, 7. Shah Shuja also made three attempts to regain his throne, each of which failed. The first attempt via Kashmir in 1815, an aborted attempt in 1818, and then again 1834. The latter two had been followed by British officials and in the case of the 1834 expedition, supported by British financing. Despite this there was a reluctance to become more involved in these efforts and what was seen as an opaque political contest. Dalrymple, Return of a King, pp. 36–8, 45–6, 66–73.

100 IOR, Broughton Papers, Add MS 36473, p. 188.

101 IOR, Elphinstone Papers, Mss Eur F88/105, pp. 46–9.

102 IOR, Broughton Papers, Add MS 36473, pp. 370–7.

103 For this distinction see Bayly, Empire and Information, p. 144.

104 Masson, Narrative, Vol. 1, pp. vi–viii. Burnes made a similar argument in response to a letter from Elphinstone disputing the wisdom of the invasion. In his words, ‘I never doubted we could place the Shah on the throne but that I viewed the Army as far too large – Indeed the passing of so many British troops into Afghanistan has been the prime cause of Shah Shooja's partial unpopularity.’ IOR, Elphinstone Papers, Mss Eur F88/111, p. 81.

105 IOR, Elphinstone Papers, Mss Eur F88/111, p. 28.

106 Masson, Narrative, Vol. I, p. xi.

107 Satia, Spies in Arabia, p. 337.

108 Noelle, State and Tribe in Nineteenth-Century Afghanistan, p. 40.

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