On Settler Colonialism: Ideology, Violence, and Justice

by Adam Kirsch

In exploring the ideology of settler colonialism, we will see that it falls into many of the errors to which radical ideologies are traditionally prone. It attributes many different varieties of injustice to the same abstraction and promises that slaying this dragon will end them all. It cultivates hatred for people and institutions it sees as obstacles to redemption, and even justifies violence against them. And it offers a distorted account of history, to make it easier to divide the world into the guilty and the innocent. These ways of thinking have traditionally produced disastrous results, and the ideology of settler colonialism is already leading idealistic, educated young people down a similar path. That makes it urgent to understand where the idea comes from and where it is likely to lead.