Agriculture and 'Improvement' in Early Colonial India: A Pre-History of Development

The doctrine of 'improvement' has often been identified with the introduction – and presumed failure – of the Permanent Settlement in Bengal in 1793. Although recognized as central to British agrarian policies in India, its wider impact and significance have been insufficiently explored. Aesthetic taste, moral judgement and botanical enthusiasm combined with more strictly economic criteria to give an authority to the idea of improvement that endured into the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Concern for improvement also reflected dissatisfaction with India's apparent poverty and deficient material environment; it helped stimulate data-collection and ambitious schemes of agrarian transformation. A precursor of later concepts of development, not least in its negative presumptions about India and the search for external agencies of change, improvement yet shows many of the false starts and intrinsic limitations early attempts to transform rural India entailed. This article reassesses the significance of improvement in the first half of the nineteenth century in India, especially as illustrated through contemporary travel literature and through the aims and activities of the Agricultural and Horticultural Society of India.     

What Was Left of the Groundnut Scheme? Development Disaster and Labour Market in Southern Tanganyika 1946–1952

The East African Groundnut Scheme in Tanganyika is probably the most dramatic and most cited failure of the ambitions of British late colonial developmentalism. Issues of labour supply in the scheme's short history, and the relationship of labour supply with the peasant economy of Southern Province, have received almost no attention, a gap which this article aims to begin to fill. It suggests that the implementation of the scheme gave rise to a political battle over labour market control between the colonial state in Tanganyika and scheme managers. The paper documents how, without any support from the colonial administration, the scheme attempted to recruit the large numbers of workers it required, and its frustrations in doing so. It investigates the factors that prevented labour supply satisfying demand, how peasants in the area engaged with the labour market (and were able to adjust their participation in it), and the impact of labour market growth on the household farm economy.     

Socialism,Liberalism and Inequality: The Colonial Economics of the Saint-Simonians in 19th-Century Algeria

This article examines the foundations of the colonial economics of the Saint-Simonians that were developed in Algeria after the French invasion in 1830. Saint-Simonian colonial economics may be seen as a leading contributor to the development of French orientalism. This article illustrates the ambiguous position of Saint-Simonian economics in the colonial project, especially in relation to the role of equality. According to the Saint-Simonians, collective socialism was the best economic system for Algeria. This article notes, however, the contradiction inherent in the Saint-Simonians' project with regard to the racial argument they used to justify their position.     

入世十年来中国与LDC国家贸易新发展及展望

中国与最不发达国家间的经贸关系日益紧密,但是针对中国在这些国家的"新殖民主义"活动的指责声日益高涨,在中国加入世界贸易组织十周年之际,文章通过对比分析中国、美国以及欧盟与最不发达国家间的贸易商品结构的演变,发现中国自LDC国家的进口商品结构严重偏向于资源类商品的事实,探讨了中国在未来经贸合作中更应注重对LDC国家自我发展能力的培养以及中方的投资开发行为应遵循的原则,从而构建新型的双边经贸合作前景。     

Tourism knowledge and neocolonialism – a systematic critical review of the literature

Despite the official end of colonialism in the twentieth century, neocolonial structures of power have kept influencing the political, socio-cultural and economic arenas worldwide. Within this scenario, the tourism academy has seen its landscape develop with its own set of power structures, which have shaped its knowledge production and dissemination. However, whether and how neocolonial forces have exerted their influence on tourism knowledge production and dissemination is still a subject of debate among scholars. This paper was conceived as an attempt to cast additional light on the nexus between tourism knowledge and neocolonialism. More specifically, through a systematic review of the articles published in tourism journals in the last decade (2007–2017), this work assesses the status of the current tourism knowledge through the lens of neocolonialist theory. Overall, this critical review highlights that with some exceptions, most of the previous reviews concerning tourism knowledge only evaluate the work published in English in highly ranked tourism journals and tend to neglect knowledge systems outside the English-speaking global centres. Furthermore, previous studies exploring structures of power affecting tourism knowledge production and dissemination present limitations in terms of the themes and perspectives identified.     

“Ongoing harm under a prettier,brighter umbrella”: A critical analysis of reconciliation talk in Canadian settler philanthropy

Engagement with the concept of reconciliation, broadly understood as the process or goal of transforming relations among Canada's Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples, became commonplace in the philanthropic sector after the 2015 release of the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC). Institutional responses to the TRC (e.g., by universities, businesses, healthcare institutions, governments, etc.) have been widely discussed in the academic literature—lauded by some as pivotal to the transformation of Indigenous/settler relations, and critiqued by many as no more than a shift in rhetoric covering over ongoing racialized colonial violence. Through a critical analysis of reconciliation talk as articulated through blog posts, press articles, conference recordings, webinars, and professional development resources produced by and for progressive settler philanthropy from 2012 to 2020, this essay analyses the hearty uptake of reconciliation in the sector. I bring these texts into dialog with the larger body of critiques of reconciliation, with the aim of interrogating settler philanthropy's place and roles in Canada's settler colonial order, past, and present. I focus on common terms and concepts that appear in conjunction with reconciliation talk such as diversity and inclusion; community-engagement and relationship building; learning and listening. I also explore instances of obfuscation and renaming, such as a scarcity of explicit references to race and racism, colonialism and white supremacy and a tendency to relegate colonialism to the past in texts produced by non-Indigenous authors. The themes I identify across these texts resemble those apparent in other institutional contexts. Reconciliation talk has potential to transform how settler philanthropy engages with Indigenous communities. Yet, many of the most urgent critiques raised in other fields apply to this context. Ultimately, I conclude, reconciliation talk may elevate and uphold—and indeed conceal—the white supremacist, colonial status quo in settler philanthropy and in Canada more broadly. Occlusions and renaming common to settler philanthropy's reconciliation talk contribute to what Vimalassery et al. describe as “colonial unknowing” and what Tuck and Yang call “settler moves to innocence.” In these ways, reconciliation serves a mystifying function for settler philanthropy, masking ongoing coloniality, absolving settler guilt, and avoiding more radical, transformative possibilities.     

后殖民批评视域下的鲁滨逊

以后殖民批评为视角,结合欧洲殖民主义历史,对英国18世纪小说家丹尼尔·笛福的代表作《鲁滨逊漂流记》的主人公进行重新解读,探索其作为殖民主义者的特征以及与欧洲殖民主义扩张的联系。认为鲁滨逊是殖民主义的探险英雄,其荒岛拓殖活动充满了难以想像的困难和凶险,并且以获得所有权和统治权为终极目的,体现了殖民主义的理想人格,他的成功激活了殖民主义征服世界的欲望,有助于殖民主义推行文化霸权。     

《两骑士》的后殖民主题解读

乔伊斯认为《两骑士》是《都柏林人》中最好的故事之一,它揭露了爱尔兰社会的堕落。但该小说还未被充分认识。运用葛兰西霸权理论和法农及斯皮瓦克的后殖民理论剖析该小说,从政治社会、市民社会、属下阶层三个层面,可以揭示英国殖民者是如何通过＂政治高压＂和＂主动赞同＂来维护权力统治的。研究表明,殖民者的价值观变成全民共识,这种文化诱使被统治的爱尔兰人认同殖民者,有助于维护殖民统治地位而不是反抗压迫。     

《两骑士》的后殖民主题解读

乔伊斯认为《两骑士》是《都柏林人》中最好的故事之一,它揭露了爱尔兰社会的堕落。但该小说还未被充分认识。运用葛兰西霸权理论和法农及斯皮瓦克的后殖民理论剖析该小说,从政治社会、市民社会、属下阶层三个层面,可以揭示英国殖民者是如何通过"政治高压"和"主动赞同"来维护权力统治的。研究表明,殖民者的价值观变成全民共识,这种文化诱使被统治的爱尔兰人认同殖民者,有助于维护殖民统治地位而不是反抗压迫。     

From creating to confronting racial hierarchies: The evolving role of the US state in land policy

From systemically dispossessing Indigenous people of their territory for Euro-American settlement to routinely denying African American farmers operating loans in the 20th century, the US government's complicity in creating racial hierarchies in terms of land access is well documented. Less understood is how land policies oriented towards racial equity, namely, the Justice for Black Farmers Act (JBFA), and other initiatives that deal with land access as well as addressing racism more broadly, emerged during recent decades. In this article, we argue that such initiatives resulted from Black-led organizations and other farmer advocacy allies responding to neoliberal policy reforms. Concretely, even as these reforms destabilized farm economies, they also led to a decentralization of agricultural policy administration, which, in turn, created opportunities for community-based organizations to influence land governance. We make this argument after presenting a three-part periodization of the evolution of US land policy, starting with the emergence of racial hierarchies, then the period of partial reforms that began during the New Deal and, finally, the era of neoliberal reform.