British statesman, a liberally inclined member of Conservative Party governments, who tried, with varying success, to establish federal self-government in British overseas possessions.

He was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, inheriting his father's earldom in 1849. He was undersecretary for the colonies in 1858–59 and served two terms as colonial secretary (1866–67 and 1874–78). In his first term he realized his greatest achievement—passage of the British North America Act (1867), which gave Canada its federal system and dominion status. In his second term of office, however, his 1875 proposal for a South African federation on the Canadian pattern failed. In 1878 he proposed the so-called Carnarvon Terms, which a few years later provided the settlement of a major dispute between Canada and the British that had delayed the construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

In the 3rd marquess of Salisbury's first ministry (1885–86) Carnarvon served as lord lieutenant (viceroy) of Ireland, despite his having voted for Liberal Party legislation intended to conciliate Irish nationalists. On Aug. 1, 1885, he and the Irish leader Charles Stewart Parnell (Parnell, Charles Stewart) held a secret and futile discussion of the possibility of Irish Home Rule. Parnell had been misled into believing that Ireland might be conceded the status of a self-governing province within a federal United Kingdom. In the end, Carnarvon could not find a settlement acceptable to both Salisbury and Parnell.