The ‘Rod of Empire’

The Debate Over Corporal Punishment in the British African Colonial Forces, 1888–1946

Dados Bibliográficos

ID8980756
AutoresDavid Killingray (University of London, autor correspondente)
Ano1994
Volume35
Fascículo2
Páginas201-216
Data de publicação1994-07-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoThe Journal of African History (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0021-8537 • E-ISSN: 1469-5138
EditoraCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0021853700026396
OpenAlexW2025845034
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas34
Referências citadas21

Throughout the twentieth century the British Colonial Office sought to limit the severity of corporal punishment and to regulate more closely its use in the colonies. This article has looked at one aspect of that policy involving the African Colonial Forces. Most military officers argued that corporal punishment was essential to maintain discipline, especially in times of war or active service. The Colonial Office sought to limit severely the circumstances in which corporal punishment could be administered but accepted that its use should be retained or revived during the two World Wars. In the Second World War the arguments for retaining corporal punishment for African soldiers were increasingly denounced by officials and various humanitarian lobbies. African Colonial Forces had come under direct War Office control in September 1939 and during the war many African soldiers served overseas alongside British and other units; they also constituted part of an imperial order which, so propaganda increasingly proclaimed after the fall of Singapore, was opposed to racial discrimination. Corporal punishment based on racial terms was out of kilter in the war and was maintained only at the insistence of senior military men. Once the war was over the Colonial Office ordered that this ‘relic of discrimination’ should be ended

Colonialism · Corporal punishment · Criminology · Empire · Military service · Political science · Punishment (psychology · Racism · Sociology · Spanish Civil War · World War II · African history and culture studies · Colonialism, slavery, and trade · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories · History · Law · Psychology