2 PARIS, 1937: COLONIAL QUESTIONS AND PEACE 221shared Shiels’s views on the subject of colonial transfers. In the midst of
the discussion of Nicholson’s presentation she exposed what she saw as the
morally confused, hypocritical and disingenuous features of the arguments
in favour of ceding colonies to Germany.^474 This was not the first time that
Perham had forcefully entered the debate on colonial transfers. In February
1936, she contributed three articles to the Times on the topic of British
colonial administration. In the first of these articles, Perham noted that the
British characterised their colonial policy as one of trusteeship, adding that
‘in its meaning of unqualified service to our wards’ trusteeship still remained
‘an ideal.’^475 She stated that she viewed the mandate system as an improve-
ment upon the policy of trusteeship because under that policy it was at the
discretion of the imperial trustee as to whether or not it was in ‘the best
interests of his wards...[to]...attain their majority’; by contrast, Article 22 of
the covenant assumed that the role of the mandatory was temporary: under
that article the mandatory was charged with ‘developing backward peo-
ples until they can “stand by themselves.”’^476 Having stated that based on
official statements one could assume that the British government accepted
the mandate principle in respect to both mandated territories and colonial
possessions in Africa, Perham observed that amidst the diversity of Britain’s
African administration one could clearly discern a trend in favour of the
principle of indirect rule.^477
Perham’s second article in the series appeared in the newspaper the
following day and commenced with the observation that the British were
today providing Africans, ‘judged by the best of their administrations,...
effective training in self-government.’^478 After having explained in detail
how this training was being provided, Perham went on to observe that
it was the vibrancy of British democracy that guaranteed the course that
British ‘native policy’ had taken: it was difficult to imagine that a pol-
icy providing for the training of subject peoples in self-government could
come into existence and expand ‘in a country where there was not the
(^474) Anthony Kirk-Greene, ‘Margery Perham and Colonial Administration: A Direct Influence
on Indirect Rule,’ in Frederick Madden and D. K. Fieldhouse, eds., Oxford and the Idea of
CommonWealth: Essays Presented to Sir Edgar Williams (London: Croon Helm, 1982), 123.
(^475) Margery Perham, ‘Our Task in Africa: I—Administration of Natives: The British
Method,’ Times, February 10, 1936.
(^476) Ibid.
(^477) Ibid.
(^478) Margery Perham, ‘Our Task In Africa: II—The Colonial Structure: Creating a
Service,’ Times, February 11, 1936.