Write a few sentences explaining why the British Empire declined in the 20th century.
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From the Great Exhibition to the Festival of Britain: the decline and fall of the British empire
When the Great Exhibition opened in 1851, Britain was the greatest imperial power in history. At the launch of the Festival of Britain in 1951, that empire was crumbling before the nation's eyes. Denis Judd explains why the intervening century saw a slump in the nation's fortunes
【January 18, 2021 at 8:05 am】
1851: The Great Exhibition
The Great Exhibition of 1851 was Britain’s glittering shop window and showcase for the world’s attention and admiration. The first and greatest industrial power, the greatest imperial power, and the greatest naval power was, in effect, showing off its extraordinary achievements and at the same time advertising its manufacturing and industrial wares.
Although William Morris and others were to react negatively to the mass production of everyday utensils, furniture and textiles as depressingly lacking in beauty and originality, the tide could not be turned.
Within the Crystal Palace some 100,000 objects were displayed – taking up ten miles of space – the work of 15,000 contributors. Over half the display came from Britain and its empire, but other nations were invited to participate. In fact, the event was tactfully entitled “The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations”.
The largest foreign contributor was France, which produced a particularly impressive array of textiles, and was an increasingly worrying competitor in Britain’s overseas markets. Russia was another significant contributor, even though its exhibits arrived late, having been held up by ice in the Baltic Sea.
For the vast majority of the British visitors, however, it was sufficient to bask in the reflected glow of the amazing diversity, quality and inventiveness of Britain’s industrial and manufacturing output. There was, as Queen Victoria wrote in her diary, “every conceivable invention”.
Yet within a few years, there were signs that the nation that had so triumphantly mounted the Great Exhibition was far from infallible. Not only was domestic reform urgently needed to combat inequalities and deprivation, but the Crimean War (1854–56) became a byword for military inefficiency and the 1857–58 Indian Rebellion shook British rule from the Punjab to Bengal.
Indeed, during each decade that linked the Great Exhibition with the Festival of Britain a century later, there is ample evidence that the self-confident superpower of 1851 was in slow decline.