On Settler Colonialism: Ideology, Violence, and Justice

by Adam Kirsch

Attributing those evils to an abstraction called settler colonialism, however, creates a serious obstacle to effective political action. It suggests that every desirable social outcome—economic equality, environmental conservation, sexual liberation, an end to racism—is not only compatible but in a sense identical. If settler colonialism is a hydra—or, as a group of public health experts wrote in 2023, “a shapeshifter with tools and technologies that evolve in conjunction with other oppressive structures (e.g., heteropatriarchy and white supremacy)”13 —then once the monster is slain, all these evils will disappear at the same time. The great appeal of radical ideologies has always been this promise of a final solution. But history shows that once it becomes clear that slaying the hydra has not solved all problems—that different goals appeal to different constituencies and often require incompatible policies—the only solution radicalism can offer is to keep looking for shapeshifters, this time in its own ranks.