Indirect rule was a system of governance used by imperial powers to control parts of their empires. This was particularly used by colonial empires like the British Empire to control their possessions in Africa and Asia, which was done through pre-existing indigenous power structures. Indirect rule was used by various colonial rulers such as: the French in Algeria and Tunisia, the Dutch in the East Indies, the Portuguese in Angola and Mozambique and the Belgians in Rwanda and Burundi. These dependencies were often called "protectorates" or "trucial states". Through this system, the day-to-day government and administration of both small and large areas were left in the hands of traditional rulers, who gained prestige and the stability and protection afforded by the Pax Britannica. Consequentially done at the cost of losing control of their external affairs, and often of taxation, communications, and other matters. It was usually carried out with a small number of European "advisors" effectively overseeing the government of large numbers of people spread over extensive areas.

The influence and imperialism of Western Europe and associated states peaked in Asian territories from the colonial period beginning in the 16th century and substantially reducing with 20th century decolonization. It originated in the 15th-century search for trade routes to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia that led directly to the Age of Discovery, and additionally the introduction of early modern warfare into what Europeans first called the East Indies and later the Far East. By the early 16th century, the Age of Sail greatly expanded Western European influence and development of the spice trade under colonialism. European-style colonial empires and imperialism operated in Asia throughout six centuries of colonialism, formally ending with the independence of the Portuguese Empire's last colony Macau in 1999. The empires introduced Western concepts of nation and the multinational state. This article attempts to outline the consequent development of the Western concept of the nation state.