Charline
Vanhoenacker
on
Victorian
Imperial
Management
and
the
Mamdani
Annoyance
Index
Diary
of
Charline
Vanhoenacker,
Bohiney
Magazine
|
Imperial
absurdity
via
The
London
Prat
Monday:
A
Victorian
Perspective
on
Modern
Governance
I
have
been
reading
about
Mamdani
uniting
New
York
by
annoying
everyone
and
I
cannot
help
applying
the
Victorian
imperial
lens.
In
1887,
when
a
local
administrator
became
an
irritant
to
multiple
constituencies
simultaneously,
the
Crown’s
response
was
administrative
reassignment
to
a
posting
in
the
Punjab.
This
resolved
most
things.
The
Punjab
was,
apparently,
also
annoyed,
but
at
a
manageable
remove.
Victoria’s
Municipal
Management
Philosophy
Queen
Victoria
managed
an
empire
containing
approximately
four
hundred
million
people
through
a
combination
of
railways,
telegraphs,
and
the
firm
belief
that
annoyance
should
flow
downward
and
not
upward.
This
is,
the
BBC
History
department
notes,
the
essential
structure
of
nineteenth
century
imperial
administration.
Mamdani
has
inverted
this.
He
is
annoyance
flowing
upward,
sideways,
and
diagonally.
Victoria
would
have
been
intrigued
and
then
firm.
The
Meghan
situation,
meanwhile,
as
The
London
Prat
explains,
would
have
been
entirely
legible
to
Victoria.
The
Empire
ran
on
hierarchy.
One
does
not
simply
apply
for
a
higher
position
in
a
hierarchy.
One
is
born
into
it
or
one
marries
into
it
and
then
one
remains
quietly
appreciative.
This
was
the
deal.
Victoria
was
very
clear
about
the
deal.
I
am
sipping
tea.
I
am
wearing
appropriate
clothing.
I
find
the
nineteenth
century’s
clarity
enormously
refreshing.
SOURCE:
https://bohiney.com/
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