y
revolution, oppression interrupted by savage reprisals, is not {88} an
approved economic stimulus. The difficulty in Mexico to-day, as also
in Venezuela and in Colombia, is the laming of industry by frequent
revolutions. It is the same difficulty that was encountered in India,
Persia and Morocco. The East Indian is as unflagging as the French or
Italian peasant, but not until the British occupation could he secure
the legal protection necessary to a higher economic development.
Peace, sanitation, industrial promotion and an economic or legal
compulsion to work constitute the tools of imperialism, as they are
applied to agricultural countries in the tropical and sub-tropical
world.

There is one outstanding difference between temperate and tropical
countries, which gives to modern imperialism its essential character.
Given a low stage of civilisation, temperate lands are likely to be
thinly populated, while tropical countries, however rudimentary their
economic processes, may maintain large, low-grade populations. In the
temperate climes, therefore, the intruder, who is more highly developed
economically, soon outnumbers the natives, while in tropical countries,
the white immigrant, even when he withstands the climate, is scarcely
able to hold his own, and the very improvements which he introduces
lead to an increase in the indigenous population. The white man either
remains above and in a sense outside the population, or loses his
identity by mixing his blood with that of the natives. The result is
the maintenance of a people ethnically distinct from that of the nation
exercising political control.

To just what extent such control is necessary and effective constitutes
a difficult question. It cannot be denied that the export from many
colonies is far greater than would be the case if these had remained
independent. The naturally rich country of Haiti is far less valuable
to the industrial nations than the poorer island of Porto {89} Rico.[4]
In many parts of the world large agricultural resources are unavailable
because owned by uncivilised nations or tribes maintaining their
political independence. Indeed, if an immediate increase in production
and export were the only factor to be considered, a government of all
tropical America by a capable industrial nation, like England or
Germany, would be of distinct advantage. Other considerations,
however, do enter. Even a semi-efficient nation, like Chili or B