Unequal treaties prefigured neoliberal empire without formal territorial control

Evidence

On these grounds, he praised the Opium Wars that had ‘opened’ China to British trade; ‘no barriers ought to be put in the way even of the trade in poisons’, he argued, it being up to each individual to restrain himself. The unequal and extraterritorial treaties imposed on China established a precursor for neoliberal forms of empire ‘predicated on legally protected freedom of trade without formal territorial control’. In a different context, the challenge for the neoliberals was to conceptualise the institutional and legal conditions that would compel postcolonial states to offer their resources on the market’s terms. — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 262

Categorization

• SEED: Angle for an essay: the Opium Wars as the template for later free-trade imperialism — how drug-trade precedent anticipates WTO-style coercion of resource access.
• XREF: connects to: National Socialism functioned as a non-state ruling directly without legal mediation — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 1183; Postwar suffrage, planning confidence, and national treaties empowered politics against economy — Quinn Slobodian, Globalists: The End of Empire and the…, 113; Formal decolonization gave way to a neo-imperial global economic order — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2: Identity…, 315 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• Neocolonialism keeps formally independent states economically and politically directed from outside #corroborates (0.92) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 181
• Formal decolonization gave way to a neo-imperial global economic order #corroborates (0.90) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 315
• Neoliberal international order modeled supervision on the British Empire and mandates system #expands (0.88) — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, 265
• Liberal rights discourse has historically justified rather than opposed empire #corroborates (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 72
• Neoliberal structural adjustment replaced postwar modernization as imperial policy #exemplifies (0.80)
• Humanist defenses of native rights legitimized imperial acquisition #corroborates (0.74)
• Imperial informal influence beat treaties by remaining flexible and hidden #qualifies (0.72) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 551