Liberal dreams: Materialism and evolutionary civil society in the projection of nation in Southeast Asia

This article focuses on the introduction of ethnicity into Southeast Asia, as a component of
the nineteenth century British projection of empire. The argument is that rather than projecting
a cosmopolitan vision of community, British liberalism naturalised ethnicity through
the concept of civil society. This presented a global vision of societies being independent and
emerging from the local landscape. These liberal notions of civil society represent an early
incarnation of self-determination. The British Empire in Southeast Asia emerged within this
intellectual climate, and its early construction reflected this vision. In essence, the British
Empire in Southeast Asia was founded on the nebulous idea of providing self-determination to
Southeast Asian nations. This notion of self-determination was a qualified concept of
independence, framed around opening these civil societies to British trading hegemony