British planners had considered dominion status and gradual decolonisation since the late nineteenth century, with a notional completion date around 1970. The First World War, the Depression, and the Second World War disrupted the long institution-building process behind that timetable. The abrupt end of Lend-Lease added another severe economic shock. Even dominion transitions in Canada and Australia had not served Indigenous peoples equally, so the model was never a universal success. The charter and Britain's weakened finances compressed an already difficult transition.
Notable Point · 1:44:28-1:46:25
War and economic shocks compressed Britain's dominion timetable
A transition once imagined as lasting into the late twentieth century was forced forward by two world wars, the Depression, and the abrupt end of Lend-Lease.