The Anarchy: The East India Company, Corporate Violence, and the Pillage of an Empire

by William Dalrymple

The corporation – the idea of a single integrated business organisation stretching out across the seas – was a revolutionary European invention contemporaneous with the beginnings of European colonialism that upended the trading world of Asia and Europe, and which helped give Europe its competitive edge. It is, moreover, an idea that has continued to thrive long after the collapse of European imperialism. When historians debate the legacy of British colonialism in India, they usually mention democracy, the rule of law, railways, tea and cricket. Yet the idea of the joint stock company is arguably one of Britain’s most important exports to India, and the one that has for better or worse changed South Asia as much any other European idea. Its influence certainly outweighs that of communism and Protestant Christianity, and possibly even that of democracy.