Khan 369upper and middle class Creoles and the circular “pilgrimages” toward
the metropole undertaken by the Creole/colonial bureaucrat is similar
to the phenomenon being described here. However, Anderson’s discus-
sion of the metropole is largely restricted to its effect on Creole nation-
alism, a quite different animal than the type of anti-colonialism being
forged in Africa and Asia. Also, Anderson’s discussion of the psychologi-
cal impact of the metropole on nationalism is—in complete contrast to
Wallerstein—on the scale of the individual. The group identity formed as
a result of this impact is presented as one in which the group does share
a set of experiences, but these are not forged through shared deliberations
on those experiences. Anderson’s nationalists come together through
alienation from the metropole; the nationalists in this story seek each
other in and through the metropole, and across national/ethnic boundar-
ies. The metropole for them is a multidimensional, and often positive and
positivist, experience.
n the metropoles, these budding nationalists not only found I
avenues in which to express and organize their programs but also allies
to help develop them. Europe provided a meeting place for activists of
various persuasions and even opposing viewpoints, who together were
engaged in imagining a new world order. This conglomeration of individ-
uals could only meet in a metropole and indeed could only communicate
in a metropolitan language, an aspect of transnationalism that deserves
further study. Not only did the the metropoles gather together national-
ists across divides that might be insurmountable in their homelands, but
the laws of Europe also provided a safe haven to dissidents who could not
be prosecuted in the same way in England or France as they could be in
the colonies. Note, for example, that attempts by the British authorities to
ban the 1910 Egyptian Youth Conference, while successful in France, were
unsuccessful in Belgium. As Belgian law would not allow the banning of
any open meeting that did not advocate the overthrow of the Belgian
monarch, British Intelligence had to settle for sending their own infor-
mants to monitor the activities. Similarly, access to funding could not be
limited in the same way in the metropoles as in the colonies; not only
was the economy far more diffuse than the semi-oligarchical economies
of many colonies, but the laws protecting private property and personal
use of wealth were far more stringent.