Asianism and the Fall of Empire: India’s Road to Freedom

by Mithi Mukherjee

English 272 pages 1 edition

Offering a new global perspective on India’s freedom struggle, Asianism and the Fall of Empire identifies the rise of Asianism in the early twentieth century as the origin and primary driving force of the resistance movements that brought down the British Empire. Thoroughly researched and thought-provoking, the book ties together into a single sweeping narrative two contrasting, conflicting forms of anticolonialism: the nonviolent resistance movement under Mahatma Gandhi in South Africa and the militant movement that culminated in the war on British India by the Indian National Army under Bose in alliance with the Japanese army. Asia emerges in this breakthrough retelling not as an inert geographical category, but as a singular agent of change in modern world history. As Asian powers become central to global politics once again in the twenty-first century, Mithi Mukherjee’s timely and perceptive book traces India’s historical relations with its neighbours and presents a strong case for transnational solidarities against ethnonationalist discourses.