Imperialism and the Professions: Notes on the Development of Professional Occupations in Britain's Colonies and the New States

Such themes are explored by (among others) Durkheim Emile , Professional Ethics and Civic Morals, (London, 1957), Tawney R. H. , The Acquisitive Society, (London, 1921), Veblen T. , Engineers and the Price System, (New York, 1921), Carr-Saunders A. M. Wilson P. A. , The Professions, (Oxford, 1933), Halmos Paul , The Personal Service Society, (London, 1970), and Lewis R. Maude A. , Professional People, (London, 1952).

Eisenstadt S. N. , ‘Changes in Patterns of Stratification Attendant on Attainment of Political Independence’, Trans. of the Third World Congress of Sociology, Vol. III Changes in Class Structure, (Amsterdam, 1955) p. 39.

I have no wish here to become embroiled in a discussion of either concept —‘modernisation’ or ‘elite’. Both usages are open to criticism, but the studies referred to are often couched in such language.

Smythe H. H. Smythe M. M. , The New Nigerian Elite, (Stanford, 1960) p. 81.

Ibid., p. 81.

Ibid., p. 5.

McDonald Ellen E. Stark Craig M. , English Education, Nationalist Politics and Elite Groups in Maharashtra 1885–1915, Center for South and South-East Asian Studies, Occasional Paper No. 5, (Berkeley, 1969).

Studies which explicitly, or by implication, suggest such a relationship include a number of articles to be found in Lloyd P. C. , (ed), Elites in Tropical Africa (Oxford, 1966), Béteille André , ‘Elites, Status Groups and Caste in Modern India’, in Mason Philip (ed), India and Ceylon: Unity and Diversity (Oxford, 1967), Kersteins , The New Elite in Asia and Africa (London, 1966).

Shils Edward , 'Demagogues and Cadres in the Political Development of New States), in Pye L. W. , Communications and Political Development, (Princeton, 1963), pp. 64–77.

Ibid., p. 68. This article by Edward Shils is not his most important contribution to the discussion, but it is perhaps the most explicit in claiming a positive relationship between professional values and political and economic development.

Ibid., p. 70.

Ibid., p. 68.

Ibid., p. 70.

Ibid., p. 73.

The diversity of professional culture in industrial societies is stressed, for example, by Bucher R. Strauss A. , ‘Professions in Process’, American Journal of Sociology, LXVI (January, 1961), pp, 325–334, Smith H. L. , ‘Contingencies of Professional Differentiation’, A.J.S., LXIII (January, 1958), pp. 410–414, and Hall O. , ‘Types of Medical Careers’, A.J.S., LV (November 1949), pp. 243–253.

I have argued elsewhere that such occupations are characterised by the acute problems of social control which attend the practitioner-client relationship; that these tensions may be resolved by a variety of institutionalised systems of occupational control depending on the relative power of professional colleagues, clients or external mediators of the relationship. Professionalism was suggested as a form of colleague control and Patronage as a form of client control. See Johnson Terence J. , Professions and Power, (London, 1972).

For a discussion of these attributes see Millerson Geoffrey , The Qualifying Associations: A Study in Professionalization, (London, 1964).

For a detailed discussion of the nature and extent of such links see, Johnson Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , Community in the Making: Aspects of Britain's Role in the Development of Professional Education in the Commonwealth, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London, 1973.

Other types of control include Oligarchic Patronage, which arose out of the conditions of the plantation colonies where professional services were monopolised by a plantocracy dependent on slave labour and secondly, Communalism, which arose as a result of the frontier conditions in a number of settler colonies and was characterised by the breakdown of the specialised professional role and its exposure to community values and norms. The various types of occupational control which emerged in the British colonies will be discussed in some detail in a comparative study now in preparation.

For a discussion of the general characteristics of Indian administration see Tinker Hugh , ‘The Structure of the British Imperial Heritage’, in Brabanti Ralph , Asiatic Bureaucratic Systems Emergent from the British Imperial Tradition, (Durham, N. C., 1966).

See Johnson Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , ‘Britain's Role in the Development of the Commonwealth Medical Profession’, Working Paper No. 6, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, Unpublished, 1972.

British Medical Journal, II, 1900, p. 1041.

Johnson Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , Community in the Making, op. cit.

McCarthy J. A. , was Solicitor-General of the Gold Coast during the 1890's and at times acted as Attorney-General. See Kimble David , A Political History of Ghana 1850–1928, (Oxford, 1963), for a discussion of the exclusion of Africans from colonial posts. pp. 93–105.

Minute of 29 April 1902 by Chamberlain , C.O.96/403.

The significance of this point is elaborated in Johnson Terence J. , Professions and Power, op. cit., pp. 41–47.

C.O.96/369.

British Medical Journal, I, 1904, pp. 806–807.

Ibid., I., 1907, p. 1557.

Fanon Frantz , A Dying Colonialism, (London, 1970), p. 114.

Scott H. H. , A History of Tropical Medicine, (London, 1939).

British Medical Journal, I, 1904, p. 265.

An account of the relationships between Indian and British lawyers at the turn of the century can be found in the autobiography of Setalvad Motilal , My Life: Law and Other Things, (Bombay, 1970).

For a description of this complex organisation see Johnson Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , ‘Britain's Role in the Development of the Commonwealth Medical Profession’, op. cit.

For a detailed discussion of architectural development in the colonies, see Johnson Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , ‘The Royal Institute of British Architects and the Commonwealth Profession’, Working Paper No. 5, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, Unpublished, 1972.

Leach Edmund Mukherjee S. N. (Eds.), Elites in South Asia, (Cambridge, 1970), p. x.

The part played by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in supervising Commonwealth accountancy examinations is described in Johnson, Terence J. Caygill Marjorie , ‘The Development of Accountancy Links in the Commonwealth’, Accounting and Business Research, Vol. 1, No. 2, 1971, pp. 155–173.

Government of Maharashtra, Note on the Progress of the Medical Department during the last Ten Years—1960–70, (Bombay, 1971).

Report of the 1st Bombay Conference of General Practitioners, March, 1971.

This refers to the situation in 1971–72.

In most of the new states government employed doctors are not permitted private practice. Nevertheless, it is not unknown for medical officers to engage in private practice without permission.

Originally British, a number of these firms have become Anglo-American in organisation.

See Johnson Caygill , Community in the Making, op. cit., p. 153.

Marx Karl , The New York Daily Tribune, July 20th 1853, reproduced in Avineri Shlomo , Karl Marx on Colonialism and Modernization, 1969, p. 117.

In colony after colony the British rulers cursed the fates that had brought them such a litigious people to rule—so much so that litigiousness became an important element in the racial stereotypes held by the colonisers.

Advocacy was the most important form of practice among the colonised lawyers. Except in a few instances, such as Jamaica, the law profession in the colonies was never divided between barristers and solicitors as in Britain. This remains true in the new states where advocacy is still regarded as the core of the lawyer's work.

For a discussion of a notable case of such proceedings see, Seervai H. M. , ‘The Bank Nationalization Case’, lecture delivered at the University of Bombay, April 1970.

Types of occupational control emergent in the British situation are discussed in Johnson Terence J. , ‘Professions and Power’, op. cit.