Postcolonialism Flashcards
What does the word post highlight? (3)
- Nothing post about post colonialism
- Highlights impact that colonial histories still have in shaping a colonial way of thinking about the world
- And how Western forms of knowledge + power marginalise the non-Western world
Postcolonialism is not only interested in understanding the world as it is…
But also as it ought to be
What are Western perceptions of the non-West a result of?
A result of the legacies of European colonisation + imperialism
How did discourses help justify European domination? (3)
- Discourses constructed non-Western states + peoples as ‘other’, so they appeared inferior
- So helped justified European domination in the name of bringing civilisation or progress
- These discourses made certain power relations seem natural or inevitable
Postcolonialism views key issues in IR as constituting discourse of power. What does this move away from?
The empirically verifiable and ‘fact’-based inquiry that drives traditional IR theories
In order to better understand how global class relations emerge and are maintained, what must we do?
We must address ideas about why these relations appear normal
What often accompanies characterisations of global poverty?
Images and narratives of non-Western governments + societies as
- Primitive
- Hypermasculine
- Aggressive
- Childlike
What makes it difficult for Western policymakers to shed their biases? What is the impact of this? (3)
- Representations of the ‘other’ make it difficult for Western policymakers to shed their biases
- And address underlying global structural factors of global inequality
- Such as how capital + resources are accumulated, + flow around world generating inequality
Why do Western solutions often not address underlying causes of global inequality?
Solutions to global inequalities often focus only on intervening to support a less developed state, rather than addressing the underlying causes of global inequality
What do key concepts of IR, such as power, the state and security reproduce?
Reproduce the status quo
How does postcolonialism challenge the Westphalian model, of a sovereign modern state?
- Concepts of sovereignty + the modern state were imposed on colonial world by European powers
- Yet is a concept taken for granted by realists + liberalists
How does postcolonialism challenge the Marxist perspective that class struggle is at the root of historical change? (2)
- Instead demonstrates how race shapes history
- Analyses that focus only on class fail to consider how identification of ‘Third World’ as ‘primitive’ + ‘non-rational’ are linked to persistent economic marginalisation
What do postcolonialists see instead of anarchy (3)
- See the international system as a hierarchy
- Colonialism has fostered a long process of continued domination by the West over the rest of world
- Cultural, economic and political domination still characterise global politics
What is Edward Said’s Orientalism? (4)
- Western media rely on a distorted lens to describe history + culture of Arab peoples
- Ascribes ‘Orient’ + its peoples with characteristics that are opposite of the West
- Characterised as exotic, emotional, feminine, backward, non-rational
- In contrast to West: rational, masculine, civilised, modern
What is the power of othering? (5)
- The ‘black man’ made to believe in his inferiority, through imposition of coloniser’s language, culture, religion + education systems
- Through such impositions, colonised believe they are a culturally inferior ‘other’
- This internalisation helps justify + maintain coloniser’s rule
- These racial binaries continue even after end of colonial rule
- Racialised othering still frames contemporary debates e.g. immigration, security, nuclear politics
In what ways is racialised othering found in discourses around nuclear non-proliferation? (2)
- States in Global South not trusted w. nuclear weapons
- Dominant discourses construct these states as dangerous, unpredictable, unaccountable
Why are North Korea and Iran’s portrayals as rogue states hypocritical? (4)
- NK + Iran have pursued nuclear proliferation
- Both portrayed as rogue states in US foreign policy discourse
- Yet West has consistently disregarded human rights in uranium mining on indigenous land around world, that has caused death, illness + environmental degredation
- US is only power to have ever used WMDs, against Nagasaki + Hiroshima in 1945
What does postcolonialism argue in the context of nuclear proliferation? (2)
- That some states can be trusted + others cannot (as less developed…) is a radicalised discourse
- Postcolonialism asks not who can be trusted, but instead “who determines who can be trusted - and why?”
Significant overlap between postcolonialism and third wave feminism because prominent in…
The 1990s
What did bell hooks observe and call for? (3)
- ‘second wave’ feminism of mid to late 20th century emerged from women in a position of privilege
- did not represent African American women who remain on margins of society, politics + the economy
- called for an alternative, critical + distinctive feminist politics
Does a black woman from a poor neighbourhood in Chicago experience sexism in the same way as a white woman from its wealthier suburbs? (2)
- women w. same ethnic identity might experience sexism in different ways because of their class
- the same might be true for women of colour + white women from same social class
What is central to third wave feminist approaches?
The idea of intersectionality
What do postcolonial feminist scholars call for, and what is the result of this? (2)
- Call for more attention to intersections of race, ethnicity, class + gender
- So address ways that different aspects of one’s identity intersect to create multiple + distinct forms of oppression
Why do postcolonial feminists question the idea of universal solidarity in women’s movements?
Give an example. (4)
- Argue that the struggle against patriarchy as well as social inequality must be situated in relation to racial, ethnic + sexual privilege
- e.g. Western feminism has often portrayed the veil as symbol of oppression of women
- But many Algerian adopted the veil when protesting French rule
- To them, it was a symbol of opposition to white, colonial patriarchy
Postcolonial feminism asserts that women of colour are triply oppressed due to their… (3)
- Race/ethnicity
- Class status
- Gender
Popular Western clothing lines profit from low wages, exploitation + sweatshop conditions by…
Producing their clothes in countries w. lax building codes + inadequate labour standards
Postcolonial scholars argue that exploitative conditions + a disregard for safety of these workers shows.. (2)
That lesser value is ascribed to brown bodies compared to white ones
There has been little sustained effort to right the wrongs in the operations of multinational firms
What happened to Rana Plaza?
- Garment factory
- Dhaka, Bangladesh
- Killed 1135 workers
- Mostly women
What is the race to the bottom? (3)
- Quest for highest profit margins forces developing countries into a race to the bottom
- In which they have to compete to have the cheapest labour + production costs to attract investment from MNCs
- Results are low wages, exploitation + low safety standards
Almost impossible to imagine that a tragedy of a similar scale to Rana Plaza in a Western state would…
Would prompt so little action against those responsible
