The British experience with federations is not a happy one. Attempts to combine its smaller and poorer colonies into some form of larger political and economic union as part of its decolonization process are generally reckoned to have failed. Almost without exception, the individual colonies decided to go it alone, to seek independence on their own, that is.The former West Indian colonies are a case in point. Notwithstanding several attempts to bring them closer together, they have shown a remarkable tenacity to retain their individual existence and identity. The 1958 Federation, the most ambitious attempt to weld them into a nation, ended in failure after only three years and much internal wrangling. The larger islands of Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago went on to become independent on their own. A further attempt to amalgamate the remaining units, the so-called "Little Eight" into a Federation of the Eastern Caribbean also failed, after which Barbados sought independence on its own.
