Vol. 2 No. 2 (2025)

Research Articles

British Colonial Strategy in Malaya in the 19th Century: Deliberate Global Strategy or Geopolitical Necessity?

Published 2025-02-28

  • Yutong Wen
    • ,
  • Chenglin Liu

Yutong Wen
University of Nottingham Ningbo, China, Ningbo 315100, China

Chenglin Liu
University of Nottingham Ningbo, China, Ningbo 315100, China

Abstract

The Industrial Revolution drove Britain’s globally strategy in the 19th century, which saw the Malay Peninsula’s geographic location and resources as key. The process of British colonization in Malaysia was as much the result of deliberate strategic planning as it was of geopolitical in rivalry and flexibility. Britain progressively increased its authority over the Malacca Straits by managing tin and rubber assets. And it would strengthen her hold over the area. Britain first focused mostly on the security of shipping in the Indian Ocean. It did not see the strategic value of the Malay Peninsula until rivalry with other powers increased. Adopting “informal imperialism” and “sub-im-perialism,” Britain indirectly controlled the Malay area by means of trade control and cooperation with local the rich and famous. And its lower the cost of conflict but also causing social divisions and laying the seeds of later ethnic conflicts and independence movements. British colonial advances on the Malay Peninsula mixed global strategies and geopolitical reality is unspoken threats due to the variety and complexity of imperialism.

Keywords

British Empire, Malaya, Colonialism, International Politics

PDF

References

  1. Mills, Lennox Algernon. 1966. British Malaya, 1824-1867. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
  2. Weng, Huiming. 2001. ‘The Struggle for the Malacca Strait by Early Colonizers (1511-1824)’, Dong Yue Tribune, 22(5): 85-91.
  3. Smith, J. (2023) 'Malaysia's Geostrategic and National Interest', Journal of Geopolitics, 15(2), pp. 123-145.
  4. White, N. J., “Gentlemanly Capitalism and Empire in the Twentieth Century: The Forgotten Case of Malaya, 1914-1965”, in Dumett, R. E. (ed.), Gentlemanly Capitalism and British Imperialism: The New Debate on Empire (London: Routledge, 2016).
  5. P.J. Marshall, ed., The Cambridge History of the British Empire, trans. Fan Xinzhi (Beijing: World Knowledge Press, 2004), 19.
  6. Barbara Watson Andaya and Leonard Y. Andaya, A History of Malaysia, 2nd ed. (Houndsmill: Palgrave, 2001), pp. 111–112, 125.C. E. Wurtzburg, Raffles of the Eastern Isles (Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1984), pp. 17-18.
  7. Bi Shihong, ed. Singapore Overview. Beijing: World Book Company, 2012.
  8. Lee, 'Conflicting Modes of Colonial Occupation in British Malaya, 1874–95', in Baillargeon and Taylor (eds.), Spatial Histories of Occupation, pp. 77-92.
  9. Rajaram, K. 'Labour Brokers in Migration: Understanding Historical and Contemporary Transnational Migration Regimes in Malaysia.' International Review of Social History, vol. 68, no. 3, 2023, pp. 1-23.
  10. Sotelo Valencia, Adrián. Sub-imperialism Revisited: Dependency Theory in the Thought of Ruy Mauro Marini. 2017. pp. 58-72.
  11. Attard, Bernard. “Informal Empire: The Origin and Significance of a Key Term.” Modern Intellectual History 20 (2023): 1219–1250.
  12. Xu, Jun Yao. "The Historical Background of British Invasion of Malaya." Journal of Southeast Asian Studies (2023): 1219–1250.
  13. Arifin, Azmi. "Perak Disturbances 1871-75: British Colonialism, the Chinese Secret Societies and the Malay Rulers." Jebat: Malaysian Journal of History, Politics & Strategic Studies 39, no. 1 (July 2012): 50-75.
  14. Winstedt, Richard Olaf. A History of Malaya. Translated by Yao Ziliang. Beijing: The Commercial Press, 1958.
  15. Mills, Lennox A. Malaya: A Political and Economic Appraisal. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1958.
  16. Chen Xiaolü, Wang Cheng, et al. Malaysia: Democracy and Authority in a Multicultural Context. Chengdu: Sichuan People's Publishing House, 2000.