Colonialism
News
The Many Ends of the Second World War
The end of the Second World War was not a single moment defined by victory and defeat. Rather, it was a pluriform and drawn-out process perpetuated by colonial power politics in the Global South. By Thomas W. Bottelier This article is the third in our series commemorating the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. It is sometimes said that the Second World War began in the Horn of Africa, in 1935, with Italy’s war of aggression on Ethiopia. It is almost never said that it ended there. And yet, it was the first place in the world where the fighting came to an end. Hostilities in Eritrea, then an Italian colony, ceased when the country was occupied by troops from the British Empire in the spring of 1941. Italian Somaliland, which covered the eastern seaboard of modern Somalia, was taken at the same time. Ethiopia, which the Italians had themselves occupied since 1936, was fully liberated that November, when the remnants of the Forze armate dell’Africa Orientale [...]
9.05.2025
News
Colonialism and European Integration – In Conversation with Hanna Eklund
In this conversation with Kasia Krzyżanowska, Hanna Eklund discusses her recent article, “Peoples, Inhabitants and Workers: Colonialism in the Treaty of Rome”, published in the European Journal of International Law. She talks about the “coded language” of colonialism in the Treaty of Rome, explains the approach of the Treaty drafters to the African independence movements, and reflects on the colonial legacies of contemporary EU law.
14.03.2024
The Colonial Origins of Modern Social Thought: George Steinmetz on French Sociology and the Overseas Empire
In this conversation with RevDem editor Ferenc Laczó, George Steinmetz – author of the major new monograph "The Colonial Origins of Modern Social Thought. French Sociology and the Overseas Empire" – sketches the manifold entanglements of French sociology with the French Empire and colonialism; discusses the key ideas and innovations that have emerged in this context; dissects how indigenous scholars fared within the vast network of French institutions over time; illuminates his own approach to intellectual history he calls a historical socio-analysis of the social sciences; and reflect on how contemporary agendas of decolonization could be made more convincing and fruitful, not least by drawing on what French sociologists of colonialism have “partially and tentatively foreseen.”
11.05.2023
Down-to-Earth Machines of Exploitation. Andreas Eckert on Colonialism, Slavery, and Current Debates
In this conversation with Norman Aselmeyer, Andreas Eckert – author of German-language overviews of the history of colonialism and of slavery – presents his approach to the history of colonialism.
24.09.2022
