I have no idea…but Ferguson is now threatening to sue writer Pankaj Mishra and the London Review of Books for suggesting as much.

From the Guardian:

At the heart of the controversy is Mishra’s interpretation of not only Ferguson’s latest book but also his body of work in general, which has sought to challenge the view that western empires were entirely negative in their impact, and argues that colonialism could have positive effects as well.

And this is from Mishra’s takedown of Ferguson, which, one must say, is pretty dishy reading:

The reception a writer receives in a favourable political context can be the making of him. This applies particularly well to Ferguson, whose books are known less for their original scholarly contribution than for containing some provocative counterfactuals. In Britain, his bluster about the white man’s burden, though largely ignored by academic historians, gained substance from a general rightward shift in political and cultural discourse, which made it imperative for such apostles of public opinion as Andrew Marr to treat Ferguson with reverence. But his apotheosis came in the United States, where – backed by the prestige of Oxbridge and, more important, a successful television series – he became a wise Greek counsellor to many aspiring Romans. He did not have to renounce long-held principles to be elevated to a professorship at Harvard, primetime punditry on CNN and Fox, and high-altitude wonkfests at Davos and Aspen. He quickly and frictionlessly became the most conspicuous refugee from post-imperial Britain to cheerlead Washington’s (and New York’s) consensus.

Later in his essay, Mishra quotes F. Scott Fitzgerald as a means of characterizing Ferguson:

‘Something,’ Nick Carraway says of Tom Buchanan, ‘was making him nibble at the edge of stale ideas as if his sturdy physical egotism no longer nourished his peremptory heart.’

Ouch.

Feguson promptly fires back, calling Mishra’s piece “a personal attack that amounts to libel.” And they’re off….

I don’t know Ferguson’s work well enough to judge Mishra’s claims that Ferguson is an apologist for white-centric empire, but I do know that Ferguson hasn’t learned one thing yet from his time in America: We don’t sue people here over negative book reviews. Why? Because threatening to sue someone for libel for allegedly implying that you are racist makes you look like an ass.

I understand: It’s a very painful charge. But a libel suit isn’t the way to rebut it.

One final note: Reading this vicious intellectual back and forth reminds me of a question I’ve wondered for decades: Why does the NYT Book Review have to be so goddamn dull?