This study surveys the growth of European intervention outside Europe between 1860 and 1914. It treats its subject, 'imperialism', as a process of increasing contact, influence and control, rather than as the nature and consequences of colonial rule. The problems of defining 'imperialism' are considered alongside various analytical approaches to the term. In examining the controversial historiographical literature surrounding this subject, the book criticises particular explanations, and introduces readers to some of the new directions in research and inquiry currently being explored by historians.

Andrew Porter is Rhodes Professor of Imperial History at King's College, London, UK.

Abbreviations
Definitions and Theories
Metropolitan Explanations: Political Metropolitan Explanations: Social and Economic Peripheral Explanations
Other Recent Approaches
Expansion and Empire
Select Bibliography.