When Cecil Rhodes died in March 1902, this newspaper’s verdict was damning. “The judgment of history will, we fear, be that he did more than any Englishman of his time to lower the reputation and to impair the strength and compromise the future of the Empire,” said an editorial.
The Guardian’s contemporary criticism is useful evidence in the context of today’s row about Oxford University’s continuing Rhodes connections. It is a reminder, albeit expressed in the political language of the time, that it did not require a century to pass after the age of Rhodes before a liberal critique of the great imperialist was possible. Through the 1890s, the Manchester Guardian denounced Rhodes for attempting to engineer “the tainted war” against the Boers which began in 1899. In 1901, it urged that “The Commonwealth of the future in South Africa ought to include the mass of the native and coloured people, and legislation should lead to this result.”
Such language falls short by modern standards. But it is important proof that Rhodes and what he stood for could be, and was, trenchantly opposed in his own time, not just in ours. So, by the same token, there was nothing inevitable about Oxford’s, or Oriel College’s, embrace of parts of Rhodes’s massive £6m bequests (worth nearly £700m in today’s prices) which are the subject of the current Rhodes Must Fall campaign – even accepting that the money has been put to good educational use. In short, there was a choice to make, and Oxford and Oriel made theirs. It has long been a controversial one, not least during the period of anti-colonial struggles and especially after majority rule was finally achieved in South Africa and Zimbabwe. Now it is so again.
Today Oriel is under pressure from British-based supporters of the anti-Rhodes campaign in southern Africa. Last week, the college, where Rhodes studied, decided to remove a commemorative plaque and to consider removing a prominent statue of Rhodes. The controversy shows no sign of diminishing. Almost inevitably, the Rhodes Trust, which runs the prestigious international Rhodes scholarships at Oxford, has been dragged into the argument. It cannot be long before other UK universities are called on to review their own imperialist connections too, for this is a widespread phenomenon, not confined to Oxford.
There is no simple overarching answer to these challenges. But the right place to start is to acknowledge not deny the imperial legacy. What that means in practiceis complex, but it is something we rarely debate, let alone act on, properly; we would be a stronger society if we did. The contrast between Germany’s tradition of facing its past and Britain’s frequent evasions is, for example, very striking. Even Robert Mugabe has insisted that Rhodes’s grave in Zimbabwe should remain, as part of that country’s history.
Oriel College is right to be uneasy about the Rhodes connection. That is why moving the statue from its current position to a museum could be a sensible solution, ensuring that its meanings are still visible and thought about. The Rhodes Trust was also right when it decided in 2003, along with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, to fund Mandela Rhodes scholarships in South Africa for postgraduates and new generation leaders, as well as to engage with the “Redress Rhodes” movement among Rhodes scholars.
This is not to say the only solution is simply to purge every trace of the past as though it never existed. That is the fanatic’s way – and it has disturbing echoes. No one would dream of erecting a statue of Rhodes today. That is why Oriel’s dilemma is a more nuanced issue than, say, the positive desire of some in the American South to fly the Confederate flag, which can only be opposed. The Rhodes statue speaks to our complex inheritance and our need to address it better. It underscores the many ways in which the empire is part of the formation of modern Britain. It is better to have the issue out in the open than to pretend it is mere posturing about symbols.
[Source:-the gurdian]