raghu wrote: > ... imperialism has never existed > without racism. > > A hypothetical "imperialism without racism" would be an entirely new > phenomenon and it is in no way the inevitable consequence of the > empowerment of exploited races.
As I understand it, ancient Roman imperialism wasn't racist. Any man, no matter what his race and religion, could become a Roman citizen.[*] The Persian empire under Cyrus was similar. Amy Chua's _Day of Empire_ argues that racial, ethnic, and religious tolerance helps keep an empire together. We're used to the type of imperialism that arose in Western Europe, which centered on a pretty new phenomenon at the time, the nation-state. Many if not almost all of those nation-states were based on ethnic nationalism, either officially (as with the Kaiser's Germany) or unoffically (the good ol' US of A). Belgium springs to mind as an exception: but is it possible that King Leopold was more bloody than most imperialists partly as an effort to reconcile the Flemings and the Walloons? But imperialism has changed a lot since 1900. The main story during the last 50 years or so has been a political-economic hierarchy of countries with the US as hegemon. Though clearly WASPs such as myself[**] dominated the government of this system and racism has been central to the normal operations of the US economy, it's simplistic to say that it was a racist empire: the US pulverized Vietnam not because it was populated by an "inferior race" as much as because the North and many people in South Vietnam were trying to break from the system that the US was ruling (and strengthening the competing Soviet bloc). Anti-Vietnamese racism probably had its main role in motivating the soldiers at the front; however, I have a hard time seeing it as central to LBJ's world-view. To look at another example, Gabriel Kolko argued that a lot of the nasty imperialist things that the US did to other countries were also done to England, even though it was a very WASP nation at the time. Just as it's arguable that the US has to some extent enjoyed a "declining significance of race" (to use William Julius Wilson's phrase) while remaining capitalist, I don't see why we can't have a similar declining significance while remaining imperialist. In this case, its leadership is struggling to gain its status as hegemon back. Further, when race becomes less significant that doesn't mean that class goes away. It's easy to imagine an empire based on class. Of course, it does matter how one defines "imperialism." What's your definition, raghu? I see imperialism as a political-economic system of domination, not a type of government policy. [*] I found this: >>Is history repeating itself? Note quite 2000 years ago, the Roman hegemony got its first black leader - a former senator whose father was African and mother was white. Septimius Severus inherited a failed military campaign in Iraq and an ailing economy. He first resolves the situation in Iraq, undertakes a number of new building projects, stamps out governmental corruption, raises taxes to pay for wage increases (and kicks British arse a few times). Ultimately though, it all might have only hastened the Empire's decline.<< from: http://www.metafilter.com/77225/Septimius-Severus-the-Barack-Obama-of-the-Roman-Empire [**] actually, I'm a VWMIEU, a very white mostly Irish excommunicated Unitarian. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
