EMPIRE AND AFTER^437
History suggests that tutelage can be a school. Of course, a lot de
pends on the teacher. Some imperial nations were better rulers than
others and their colonies did better after independence. This criterion
would have the Spanish and Portuguese bad, the Dutch and French
less bad, and the British least bad because of their willingness and abil
ity to invest in social overhead (railways in India, for example) and
their reliance on local elites to administer in their name. In 1900, India
had thirty-five times the railway mileage of nominally independent
China—a salute to Britain's sense of imperium and duty.^21 (A cynic
might argue that these railways were intended primarily to get raw
cotton and other primary products to port and soldiers to points of
unrest. Still, the linking of Indian markets eased food distribution in
a country vulnerable to local famines. And sometimes it might take a
famine to get a line built.)*
By this standard, however, the best colonial master of all time has
been Japan, for no ex-colonies have done so well as (South) Korea
and Taiwan, where annual growth rates per head from 1950 to 1973
exceeded those of the advanced industrial nations (Japan itself ex
cepted). This achievement reflects in my opinion the culture of these
societies: the family structure, work values, sense of purpose. (I say
this even though many economists do not accord importance to cul
ture, which cannot be measured and, for these experts, just gets in the
way of good ideas.) These values were already there under Japanese
rule, partiy in reaction to it, and showed in the response to profit op
portunities whenever the alien master gave the natives some working
room.^22 But the postcolonial success also testifies to the colonial legacy:
the economic rationality of the Japanese administration, which under
took in the colonies "the superbly successful modernization effort
which Japan itself had undertaken."^23
To be sure, the inhabitants of Korea and Taiwan would not agree
with this. They remember tyranny, torture, and abuse—memories em
bittered by an "in-your-face" Japanese refusal of regret or remorse.^24
Remorse for what? The system worked.^25 Besides,
- Note that the technical quality of the Indian railways was low; also that it was the
Indian taxpayer who involuntarily paid much of the cost in the form of guaranteed re
turns to the British investors. (For all their occasional wealth, the Indians were not in
terested in investing in these projects.) On this checkered story, see Headrick, Tentacles
of Progress, ch. 3.