(^450) THE WEALTH AND POVERTY OF NATIONS
Serious unease set in toward the end of the century. It was linked to
political changes signaling a shift in the balance of power: Germany's
sudden rise to primacy on the Continent; its defeat of France in 1870
and establishment of a Deutsches Reich; its colonial ambitions in Africa
and the Pacific; its projects of railway construction and trade in the Ot
toman empire, which the British saw as threats to the India lifeline; the
departure of the prudent, sagacious Bismarck and his replacement by
a chauvinistic emperor who bullied his political advisers and resented
his British cousins (so much for family ties); finally, Germany's decision
to build a big navy, that is, to challenge Britannia's God-given right to
rule the waves. All of this, moreover, rested on substantial economic
gains: rapid growth of heavy industry (iron, steel, chemicals); special
strength in the newer technologies (electricity, organic chemicals, in
ternal combustion, and gas and oil motors); a banking sector excep
tionally supportive of manufacturing and commercial enterprise; an
educational system that was turning out large numbers of technicians,
engineers, and applied scientists. Britain had cause to worry.
For the student of economic performance, this growing concern raises
interesting questions. Was Britain failing? Was Britain declining? If so,
whose fault? What remedies? The debate, believe it or not, has been
going on for more than a century, indeed, is still going on. In April
1993, Professor Barry Supple of the University of Cambridge devoted
his presidential address to the British Economic History Society to the
question of Britain's alleged "failure" and suggested that the fear was
greater than the reality.^20 In September 1995, an international collo
quium met at Montpellier, France, to deal with the same issue and
came to similar conclusions. And in May 1997, still another group
convened in the shadow of Windsor Castie to treat of national "hege
monies"—the very word pronounced in as many different ways as there
were countries present. Subjects of special attention: Britain in the
nineteenth century; the United States in the twentieth. How long
must we worry this old bone?
Forever. For all kinds of reasons:
- The terms of the quarrel betray a confusion or misunderstanding
of the issues—matter for endless disagreement. People speak or write
of "decline."* Yet Britain clearly has not declined in a material sense.
It is richer today than a hundred years ago. To be sure, entire branches
* The word recurs repeatedly. A small sample: Eatwell, Whatever Happened... The
Economics of Decline; Gamble, Britain in Decline; Pollard, Britain's Prime and