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A review by clairealex
Neither Settler Nor Native: The Making and Unmaking of Permanent Minorities by Mahmood Mamdani
4.0
While I was fascinated by the book, an "original argument" was probably not the best place to be introduced to political theorizing. Still, I could follow the overall arguments. However, I have no background from which to critique the finer points. The book is well ordered: Analyses of four settler colonized countries were well explained and compared/contrasted so that it wasn't only "more of same" as each was introduced, and the conclusion ties the four together with the author's theory. Where I knew some history, it rang true, and that causes me to assume fidelity in the others.
Mamdani explores in detail decolonization, a concept I'd previously heard in passing. I gather it is a contested definition, so will explore more. He rejects mere casting off the control of the colonizer and explores casting off forms of organization that the colonizer created and made seem natural and eternal, claiming rather that they are historical and malleable. His major point there is that colonizers created politicized tribes and decolonizing must not simply continue that politicization. He says that decolonization is not a return to an imagined pre-colony state nor should it perpetuate the colonized patterns.
Further, I have been so used to hearing "nation-state" as a single concept, that it was startling to read a book long argument for separating the two, startling but convincing at first encounter. And I have heard passing references to weaknesses in human-rights defenses, and Mamdani explains some of those weaknesses.
There is much more to be reading on these subjects, and I probably will do so.
Mamdani explores in detail decolonization, a concept I'd previously heard in passing. I gather it is a contested definition, so will explore more. He rejects mere casting off the control of the colonizer and explores casting off forms of organization that the colonizer created and made seem natural and eternal, claiming rather that they are historical and malleable. His major point there is that colonizers created politicized tribes and decolonizing must not simply continue that politicization. He says that decolonization is not a return to an imagined pre-colony state nor should it perpetuate the colonized patterns.
Further, I have been so used to hearing "nation-state" as a single concept, that it was startling to read a book long argument for separating the two, startling but convincing at first encounter. And I have heard passing references to weaknesses in human-rights defenses, and Mamdani explains some of those weaknesses.
There is much more to be reading on these subjects, and I probably will do so.