What is indirect rule

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Britain's method of administering many of its colonies. Its most notable proponent was Frederick Lugard, who developed indirect rule in Nigeria during —19, and expounded the idea in his Dual Mandate in British Tropical Africa As colonies were developed, it was applied elsewhere in Africa, and in Malaya.

The policy was most successful in monarchical or hierarchically structured societies, where Britain could back an existing ruler or a ruling caste. In more fragmented or unstable societies, indirect rule became more difficult to apply as it was not always clear whom the British should support. British Empire. In the earlier days of British administration in Africa, it was assumed, perhaps too readily and without intensive anthropological inquiry, that each local unit must be subordinated to a headman or chief, and ruled by him with or without a council of elders.

In either event, it was assumed to be a system susceptible of individual representation. In default of a more penetrating examination, it was not realized that local sovereignty, to use an expressive, if not a fully applicable, term, was bound up with religious ritual, belief and organization, upon which the native was not only reticent, but also incapable of expounding the ramifications except in response to the patient inquiry of an experienced and trained observer.

Reprints and Permissions. Indirect Rule and the Anthropologist. Nature , — The system was indeed a huge success in the north unlike the eastern part of Nigeria where it failed woefully. This was mainly because of their decentralized pre-colonial political administration and the introduction of the warrant chiefs who met the wrath of the easterners.

The warrant chiefs were ruthless and high-handed in the process of executing their duties. When the taxation system was introduced into eastern Nigeria, the way it was man-handled by the warrant chiefs brought about the fear of women paying tax which later culminated in the Aba women riot of It should be noted that the Indirect rule system was partially successful in the western part of Nigeria due to the check and balance system that existed in their political administration.

Later on, the Nigerian educated elites began to oppose the indirect rule for some reasons. As a result of this, nationalism sprang up among Nigerians and the demand for the liberation of the country was accelerated.