The Two Legacies: How European and Islamic Expansion Shaped Our World Differently
When we talk about the history of empire, it’s tempting to paint with a broad brush. One narrative, popular today, condemns all imperial ventures as equally evil. But a closer look at the historical record reveals a more complex picture—a stark contrast in the long-term legacies left by two of history’s great expansive forces: European colonialism and Islamic imperial expansion.
It’s crucial to clarify that we are discussing political and imperial systems, not faiths themselves. Both European and Islamic empires committed terrible acts—slavery, massacre, and repression are stains on both records. However, their ultimate impact on the world, particularly on the conquered territories, diverges dramatically.
#### The Mixed, Yet Foundational, Legacy of European Colonialism
Even the most ardent defenders of the West, like scholar Nigel Biggar, insist we must acknowledge the grave wrongs of European colonialism. But they argue its record is mixed, not monolithic. Beyond the exploitation, a framework was built that much of the modern world still relies upon.
1. **The Gift of Institutions and Law:** European powers often left behind stable legal and administrative structures. Many former colonies inherited common law or civil codes that outlasted the empires themselves. In India, for instance, the British built a bureaucratic state and legal system that still forms the backbone of Indian governance today. This echoes earlier imperial reforms, like those of Napoleon, which spread concepts of equality before the law and created integrated economic spaces across Europe.
2. **Infrastructure and the "Pax" Empires:** European powers connected the globe through trade, building ports, railways, and telegraph lines. They also imposed a form of order, such as the "Pax Britannica" in East Africa, which, while serving strategic interests, also worked to suppress inland slave trades and militant incursions. The post-colonial era has been tragically less stable for some nations. As noted by commentators like Douglas Murray, countries like Uganda, once a net exporter of food, became economic "basket cases" after independence, with wages in Egypt sometimes falling below colonial-era levels in real terms.
3. **The Transmission of Empowering Ideas:** However hypocritically applied at the time, European expansion exported the seeds of its own transformation: Enlightenment ideals of constitutionalism, individual rights, and the rule of law. These concepts, born from Europe’s own internal struggles, provided the very vocabulary that anti-colonial movements later used to win their freedom. Alongside these ideas came transformative technologies—modern medicine, industrial methods, and printing—that reshaped societies.
4. **The Containment of Predatory Powers:** A often-overlooked aspect of European naval dominance was its role in suppressing older, predatory systems. For centuries, North African Barbary corsairs enslaved Europeans on a massive scale—estimates suggest between 1 and 1.25 million Europeans were captured from 1530–1780. The broader Muslim slave trade, which transported an estimated 17 million people (outstripping the Atlantic trade), was eventually constrained by European sea power.
In short, European imperialism, for all its brutality, laid down institutional, economic, and intellectual frameworks that many nations have used as a foundation for modern statehood.
#### The Predatory Legacy of Islamic Imperial Expansion
In contrast, the historical record of Islamic imperial expansion, as highlighted in works like Raymond Ibrahim’s *Sword and Scimitar*, tells a story of permanent conquest and cultural displacement, with benefits that were largely internal to the Islamic world.
1. **A Millennium-Long Jihad:** The primary legacy for non-Muslims was often devastation. Islamic conquests swallowed two-thirds of Christendom’s original territory—including the great patriarchates of Jerusalem, Antioch, and Alexandria—placing Christian Europe under constant threat for nearly a thousand years. The archeological record shows a trail of destruction in the formerly Roman world, marking a violent and abrupt end to classical civilizations in those regions.
2. **The Scale of Slavery and Raiding:** The Islamic slave trade was a vast and enduring enterprise. Its demand for European slaves was so great that it even helped fuel Viking raids, as "white slaves [were] a particularly desirable commodity." This created a relentless cycle of predation on neighboring civilizations.
3. **A Hierarchy of Tolerance, Not Equality:** While Islamic rule theoretically tolerated Christians and Jews as "dhimmis," this was a system of legal inferiority and special taxes. Historical comparisons suggest that Muslims living under Christian rule often enjoyed better treatment and fewer discriminatory laws than Christians under Islam. There are even accounts of Muslims finding life under Christian rule tempting because it offered freedom from the "draconian dictates of sharia."
4. **An Identity Resistant to Reform:** A key argument is that early Islam effectively "deified tribalism," creating a powerful, sacralized in-group identity that is highly resistant to assimilation or secular reform. While this has provided a durable civilizational cohesion, it has often come at the cost of internal modernization and integration with global norms. This contrasts sharply with a self-critical West that, for better or worse, often questions its own heritage.
#### Conclusion: A Tale of Two Impacts
When we compare these legacies, a clear distinction emerges:
* **European colonialism** exported a package of modern institutions, infrastructure, and ideas—however unevenly and unjustly applied. Its long-term impact, while mixed, included elements that conquered peoples could eventually adapt and use for their own advancement.
* **Islamic imperial expansion**, according to this historical view, functioned primarily as a long-term jihad. Its benefits—such as the preservation of classical knowledge and internal cultural unity—were largely confined within its own civilization. For the conquered, the legacy was often demographic decline, cultural erasure, and centuries of predation.
The world today is still living with the consequences of these two very different imperial models. One, for all its flaws, helped build the framework of the modern international order. The other, according to this assessment, established a pattern of conquest and civilizational division that continues to echo in conflicts today. Understanding this contrast is essential to moving beyond simplistic historical judgments.