British Indirect Rule
As diplomatic Residents (as diplomatic ranks were codified, this became a lower class than Ambassadors and High Commissioners) were sometimes appointed to native rulers, High Commissioners could likewise be appointed as British agents of indirect rule upon native states. Thus High Commissioners could be charged with managing diplomatic relations with native rulers and their states (analogous to the Resident Minister), and might have under them several Resident Commissioners or similar agents attached to each state. In present Nigeria:
- Northern Nigeria, three incumbents 1900–1907, the last of whom stayed on as first Governor
- Southern Nigeria, three incumbents 1900–1906 (four terms), the last of whom stayed on as first Governor.
In certain regions of particular importance, a Commissioner-General would be appointed, to have control over several High Commissioners and Governors, e.g. the Commissioner-General for South-East Asia had responsibility for Malaya, Singapore and British Borneo.
Read more about this topic: High Commissioner, The Commonwealth, British Colonial Usage
Famous quotes containing the words british, indirect and/or rule:
“Gaze not on swans, in whose soft breast,
A full-hatched beauty seems to nest
Nor snow, which falling from the sky
Hovers in its virginity.”
—Henry Noel, British poet, and William Strode, British poet. Beauty Extolled (attributed to Noel and to Strode)
“If there is a case for mental events and mental states, it must be that the positing of them, like the positing of molecules, has some indirect systematic efficacy in the development of theory.”
—Willard Van Orman Quine (b. 1908)
“Better the rule of One, whom all obey,
Than to let clamorous demagogues betray
Our freedom with the kiss of anarchy.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)