Majority settler countries

[jake williams]

A recent trip to South Africa has made me think a lot about how to deal with settler colonial states. In places like Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Palestine, one can generally propose the abolition of exclusion from the settler "democracy" of the native majority, and replace it with a democratic state with the whole population, perhaps with protections for national minorities.

In places like Canada and the United States this seems more problematic. Democracy for the whole population usually means no effective political power for what's left of the native population whatsoever. In Canada in particular there is a history of basically genocidal attempts at "assimilation" that were themselves predicated on the notion that native peoples would be integrated into Canadian democracy.

Thoughts? Is there something categorically different about majority-native and majority-settler countries? Is there a democratic solution to the problem of settler states in majority-settler countries? What do/should national minority rights look like in this context?

[RedSonRising]

Ideally, every working member of society should be able to control the decision-making processes within their community regardless of colonially inherited racial makeups within the territories defined today.

Mobilizing around ideas of anti-colonial democracy could certainly help fulfill that fundamental goal, but as a principle it should not be viewed as a political priority, as it would distort the universally proletarian mission of the establishment of a truly classless society.

[Comrade Wolfie's Very Nearly Banned Adventures]

Ideally, every working member of society should be able to control the decision-making processes within their community regardless of colonially inherited racial makeups within the territories defined today.

Mobilizing around ideas of anti-colonial democracy could certainly help fulfill that fundamental goal, but as a principle it should not be viewed as a political priority, as it would distort the universally proletarian mission of the establishment of a truly classless society.

In what would hopefully be a classless society, it would be largely pointless to blame various ethnic groups/nations/racial groupings former bourgeois leaderships actions, the proletariat of these groups had only a minimal role to play in the crimes of colonialism and imperialism.

[RedSonRising]

In what would hopefully be a classless society, it would be largely pointless to blame various ethnic groups/nations/racial groupings former bourgeois leaderships actions, the proletariat of these groups had only a minimal role to play in the crimes of colonialism and imperialism.

Very true. With proper class analysis, ethnic conflicts can become properly reduced to a matter of class warfare with a racial colonial element.

[blake 3:17]

It's very nice to propose a worker's democracy in place of the reality.

To get to the OP: There is no blueprint, let alone a perfect blueprint. For Canada, I'd recommend This is not a Peace Pipe by Dale Turner. It's an example of pretty interesting and creative use of liberal political thinking around First Nations. The irony that indigenous peoples face in Canada is that the foundation of the Red Power movement was a defence of the racist Indian Act.


Is there a democratic solution to the problem of settler states in majority-settler countries? What do/should national minority rights look like in this context?

There's more useful liberal thought on this than Marxist, although many Marxists have changed their tune.. I know socialists who were active in the 50s and 60s who assumed that aboriginal peoples had been completely defeated and that Canada was purely capitalist. On occasion some Canadian Marxists have been hostile to indigenous sovereignty on progressivist myths and ideologies. The primary strategy of the Canadian State to dominate First Nations peoples is to delay delay delay, pass the buck, delay and push another even more confusing direction.

I was involved in solidarity work with one fairly small case and every level of government claimed that it wasn't their jurisdiction, it was somebody else's, who also claimed it wasn't their jurisdiction.

I think it would be worth closely examining the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission as well as the ways in which the Sandinistas dealt with their national minorities. I don't think abstract calls for class unity or national self determination are very useful. As broad principles, yes, in reality...