Imperialism is not the last stage of capitalism; rather modern capitalism is creating a second phase of imperialism. And nowhere is this better understood than in Portugal, where the belief is widespread— both on the Right and the Left—that the United States, under cover of a sham liberalism, is intent upon economic expansion at her expense in Africa. Although at times the idea seems to approach a sort of collective paranoia, it is not absurd, and cannot be easily dismissed. In fact, much American writing on the subject unconsciously lends credence to it. Thus it is a welcome change for R. J. Hammond of Stanford to undertake an account of Portugal and Africa in the nineteenth century “viewed [as he says] from a Portuguese standpoint” (p. vii).
To a considerable degree he succeeds. The chapters on great-power diplomacy and the resultant failure of Portuguese hopes to build an empire from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean are masterful and fascinating. The unenviable situation of Portugal is well conveyed: that of a weak power, armed with little more than its wits and some doubtful traditions of friendship, which, through “courage and tenacity” (p. 340), was able to hang on and finally establish itself alongside the imperial giants on the African continent.
In spite of the book’s undeniable virtues, however, it does not achieve an entirely satisfactory unity. In his first chapter the author places excessive reliance on a restricted number of secondary authorities, some of whom (e.g., Oliveira Martins) are notorious for their dramatic but eccentric judgments. The resulting description of Portugal (aside from the excellent sections on cultural geography) is little more than a caricature—hardly a propitious departure for an intelligent portrayal of Portuguese overseas activities.
Indeed, this and the other chapters dealing with the political and economic history of metropolitan Portugal never seem to mesh very well with the detailed account of great-power diplomacy in Africa, and the interrelationship between the two, which is the main burden of the book, is not satisfactorily developed. For much of this the author can be excused, inasmuch as his Portuguese material was restricted to printed works—nothing after 1850 being available in the Ministerio de Negocios Estrangeiros. But what, then, are we to make of his introductory remark: “The writing of recent Portuguese history can hardly be said to have reached the stage at which the absence of this material would be a major handicap” (p. ix)? It is the absence of this documentation which forces him to fall back so heavily on British Foreign Office material, thus giving the whole almost as much a British as a Portuguese emphasis.
Until more detailed monographs can be written from Portuguese diplomatic documents, this book will serve as a useful introduction to Portuguese activity in Africa in the last quarter of the nineteenth century; but we must still await a completely satisfactory account of Portuguese involvement in nineteenth-century Africa written “from a Portuguese standpoint.”
