A Committee or a Conference?

Abstract

This contribution is focused on the analysis of position of the Committee of Imperial Defence and the system of Imperial Conferences in inter-imperial relations in the years 1911–1914. After the Imperial Conference of 1911 rejected the reform proposals, some members of the Round Table Movement and British and Dominion representatives started the campaign for replacing the Conference system with the Committee of Imperial Defence. The Dominion refusing attitude was a final confirmation that the Committee was not going to become an advisory body of the British Empire any time soon, and that the Conference system remained unreformed.