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British empire was historically surprisingly insular, especially when it comes to colonies. In 1841 there were only 0.25% of foreign born people in UK, in 1901 it increased to 1.5% - and vast majority of those were French, German as well as Russian Jews etc. The total African/Indian population of UK could be of around 10,000 people. By the way the same goes the other way around. British ruled with a very small bureaucratic elite, the whole Indian Civil Service never exceeded much beyond 1,000 people. Pre rebellion in 1856, the whole white military in India was around 40,000 people for the population of over 200 million in Raj and even post-rebellion the numbers were never too outrageous - it only doubled. Brits took the divide and conquer tactics very seriously, majority of military as well as administration was actually local population.
It was not until after WW2 and especially after de facto dissolution of the empire that the immigration really picked up pace. It is a very new phenomenon for Britain. I know it looks different with constant propaganda about black people in historical dramas, but it is just that - a new myth for new multicultural UK.
What I found amazing is that, the hands off approach of British colonial management style actually provided a good integration strategy for their colonial subject, the existing elite want to become the British upper class, or at least be associated as such, so they slowly adopted British culture and Britishfy their local culture to suit this need, this then slowly osmose to the lower class and thus change the entire culture, I believe this is how people like Gandhi become respected figure in modern UK, he is the cultural representative of India who know how the British system work, and his action is being seens as acceptable in European Christian cultural standard, unlike many other decolonization movements in africa/asia.
On a side note, I had once read some comment about MLK on why he is such a respected figure in the US, compare to other black American civil rights activist at the time, the author opinion is that MLK's image is a Baptist minister who wears suit, this make him feels more in group to Christian white Anerican at the time. While I agree with this opinion I am not American, please correct me if this is not the case.
While we're on this topic, may I point to something new and interesting I learnt recently?
The Criminal Tribes Act of 1871 was passed by the British Raj that designated entire castes/tribes/communities and their members as habitual criminals.
We really ought to give the Brits an A+ for cultural integration and their ability to work within the acceptable cultural standards of the colonies!
Given the context of 1871, this is just legislated collective punishment and extended concept of original sin applied to a bloodline
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Yeah. The British model arguably thrived on generally not displacing too much of the existing structures of power inside their colonies in populated societies. Find the strongest, most amiable caste or clan who are already doing the merchant/bureaucracy stuff (ideally being lightly oppressed by the existing rule/martial class) and then build a layer on top of them (or ship Indians in if the society in question has nobody sufficiently established). Also the whole Westerners dying horribly of tropical diseases factor meant that actual boots on the ground weren't as common as people typically imagine throughout Asia and Africa.
Always the hilarious imaginings of the Slave Trade with random White People running around with nets in deepest darkest Africa as if that wasn't going to get everybody involved killed instead of just taking advantage of pre-existing Slave trading societies.
This was actually fixed in the remake of Roots, one rare example of retellings for the modern audience improving something by trying to historicize the section in Africa.
I'd suggest it was a response to a shift in the general audience's view of the slave trade but it was pre-2020 and whatever progress that represented may have gotten wiped.
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And because people slowly adopt the culture of elites, local culture start to change to a more British + local mix, dropping cultural practice non acceptable by British, which is what we mean by culture integration and also what most right wing movement in the west currently want, I believe
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