Information and Political Decision-Making. Understanding the British Decision to Intervene in the Taiping Civil War through the ‘Grand Perspective’ of Information History.
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2017-08-15
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en
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Between 1853 and 1865 the largest Civil War in history raged in China, within historiography called the Taiping Civil War. The victor in this conflict would eventually be decided when the British Parliament chose to intervene. Previous research has examined this intervention from multiple angles but through in larger structures. This thesis examines the decision not through large structures but by using the perspective of information history. By examining the information available, using both newspapers and correspondence, to the British parliament, the decision to intervene gain a new dimension. The information steered the political debate into two polarising sides, which stimulated confusion among the remaining Members of parliament. The decision to intervene was thus not based on detailed intelligence and reasoning but on opposing facts and confusion. By approaching this case-study through the perspective of information, our understanding of this concept of information and its consequence is hopefully enlarged.
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