The debate was characterised by disagreement between the academic historians Bernard Porter and John MacKenzie, beginning in 2004.
Porter argued that ordinary British people between 1800 and 1940 were largely indifferent to empire: there can be no presumption that Britain [...] was an essentially 'imperialist' nation in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
[5] The book received mixed reviews, with the American historian Antoinette Burton rejecting it as not "worth arguing either with or about".
[3] Some academics argued that the book, which was received well in the popular press, would appeal to British nationalists as absolving them of responsibility for empire; a claim which Porter rejected.
[8] Historians who are considered to support the MacKenzie position are Catherine Hall, Antoinette Burton and Jeffrey Richards.