The ‘German nation’ and the ‘black Other’: social Darwinism and the cultural mission in German colonial discourse

Abstract

ABSTRACT The construction of the ‘black Other’ can perhaps best be characterized as a politically motivated pattern of argumentation in colonial discourse. It was crystallized in the reality of German colonial rule in Africa between 1884 and 1914–18. The achievement of German colonial rule in Africa was considered a task of national importance; and colonial rule could be justified by employing an image of the Other. However, this deployment of the Other should not be seen as merely a political strategy in the context of the power politics of colonization. It also brought into focus widely held racist views of the world. The history of German colonization was characterized by the use of repressive violence in the name of ‘culture’ and ‘civilization’, concepts that had their origins in the Enlightenment. This cultural-missionary project declared colonial expansion to be a type of humanitarian intervention and an educational endeavour. This was in sharp contrast to the racism, based on social Darwinism, that claimed Germany's undeniable right to acquire colonial territories as a matter of the ‘survival of the fittest’.