Colonialism – especially settler colonialism – is a hot topic these days. Controversial conversations focusing on the subject have become increasingly common as people struggle to explain the on-going crisis in Gaza. These conversations have been spurred, also, by a new biography of the anticolonial revolutionary Franz Fanon. An Afro-Caribbean psychiatrist and philosopher, Fanon became a fervent supporter of the Algerian revolution. Best known for his 1961 book titled The Wretched of the Earth. he is often quoted in current discussions since he is said to have argued that colonized people were justified in using violence to throw off their oppressors.
Adam Schatz, the author of a recently published biography of Fanon titled The Rebel’s Clinic, argues, though, that Fanon’s ideas have been distorted, particularly by those who have emphasized his justification of violence. For Fanon, he says, decolonization did not involve a simple act of violent “cleansing,” but a social transformation that would reorder the relations between colonizer and colonized.
Colonialism
The topic of settler colonialism that seems to be on everyone’s lips these days can be considered as just one variant of colonialism. In A Typology of Colonialism, an article by Nancy Shoemaker published in Perspectives on History (Oct 1, 2015), colonialism is defined as foreign intrusion or domination, and Shoemaker delineates 12 forms that reflect the practice. Excerpts from her definitions can be found below.
(A Typology of Colonialism is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. If you’d like to read the full article click here.
12 Types of Colonialism
Settler Colonialism. Large numbers of settlers claim land and become the majority; they attempt to engineer the disappearance of the original inhabitants everywhere except in nostalgia.
Planter Colonialism. Colonizers institute mass production of a single crop, such as sugar, coffee, cotton, or rubber.. Their labor demands cannot be satisfied by the native population, so they import African slaves or indentured laborers . . .
Extractive Colonialism. All the colonizers want is a raw material found in a particular locale . . . The desire for natural history specimens and ethnographic artifacts might also be included. Extractive colonialism does not necessarily entail permanent occupation, but this often seems to follow. See the Cold War Studies post titled The Manhattan Project: The Congo and the Quest for Uranium.
Trade Colonialism. A good example of this type of colonialism can be found in the early North American colonies. American ships carried products such as lumber, tobacco, rice, and dried fish to Britain. In turn, the mother country sent textiles, and manufactured goods back to America.
Transport Colonialism. Transport colonialism includes hubs such as US built airstrips and troop transfer stations on the Pacific islands during World War II. It doesn’t mandate displacement of native peoples, but it does have a great impact on local economies and cultures by creating contact zones.
Imperial Power Colonialism. Sometimes the purpose of colonialism appears to be simply expansion for its own sake, to aggrandize domains. For example, China reclaimed Hong Kong from the British in 1997.
Not-in-My-Backyard Colonialism. Colonizers sometimes want an empty place far away as wasteland for depositing convicts or conducting dangerous experiments. In the 20th century, US atomic testing relocated Marshall Islands inhabitants, much as settler colonialism might do, but not because anyone else would settle there. France also used distant colonies, first Algeria and then the Tuamotus, as atomic test sites.
Legal Colonialism. Through diplomacy or by force, one people might claim independent or superior legal authority in another’s territory. In 19th-century treaties with peoples deemed barbaric, the United States assumed legal jurisdiction over American nationals.
Rogue Colonialism. Colonialism is not always a state-sanctioned enterprise. Filibusters and private companies can usurp foreign territory. Rogue colonialism has some other colonialism (e.g., settler, imperial power) as its motivating rationale but raises critical questions about how individuals and the state interact in colonizing endeavors.
Missionary Colonialism. As private agents, missionaries could be considered rogue colonizers, but they deserve their own category for the distinctiveness of their purpose. They need native people to justify their existence.
Romantic Colonialism. Some colonizers want to escape to places that contrast environmentally and culturally with their permanent abodes. More often, romantic colonizers—Paul Gauguin, Robert Louis Stevenson, and consumers of mass tourism—hope for native people to join in the fantasy as performers of local culture. French colonization in the Pacific was, as in the title of Matt Matsuda’s 2005 book, an “Empire of Love.”
Postcolonial Colonialism. Former colonies cannot so easily shake off the colonial legacy. Economic dependency and entanglements continue, as do bonds of affinity. Fiji, nearly 100 years a British planter colony and independent since 1970, continues to bear the imprint of its colonial past in its multiethnic, multilingual citizenry; its unusual British-imposed, aboriginal-protectionist landholding regime; and the popularity of rugby among its people.
Summing Up
Nancy Shoemaker, the author of A Typology of Colonialism, concludes by saying:
There are probably more than these 12 forms of colonialism . . . The many varieties of colonialism and their points of intersection suggest that historians could elaborate on the trend started by settler colonial studies and more precisely investigate colonialization processes as multifaceted affairs that affected colonizers, the colonized, landholding, labor, and migration in myriad ways.
The Colonial Legacy Today
Today organizations such as the United Nations are dealing with the effects of colonization. According to their Office of Human Rights, the legacy includes environmental degradation, economic underdevelopment, racial profiling, systemic racism, and poor social infrastructure due to unequal access to health care, education and social justice. Clearly, debate and discussion will continue.
Want to learn more?
If the struggle for independence from a colonial power interests you, stream the film The Battle of Algiers. It’s a gripping portrayal of how, in the 1950s, fear and violence escalate as the people of Algiers fight for independence from the French government. As of this writing you can stream the full movie on YouTube and MAX.
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Photograph by Shallom Johnson (Flickr)
