IS the U.S. Still A Settler Colony*?
Should We Celebrate July 4th?
*(a settler colony is one in which foreign settlers displace a significant portion of the native population. It differs from more typical colonization where the invaders dominate as a thin layer at the top without expelling and displacing a large section of the native population.)
This article argues that there is a great political and strategic difference between typical modern capitalism and Settler Colonialism. It also argues that the working class can be the revolutionary agent even in societies like the U.S. that were founded as settler colonies. Giving up on white workers as “settlers” is giving up on the potential of revolution. Abstract moralism is not an adequate guide to politics.
“Colonization of the Americas killed millions of Natives. It also resulted in the death of millions of Africans in the Middle Passage and after.”
Too often morality is the only guide to politics among many on the left. Oppression and exploitation are obviously disgusting. However, overcoming them takes analysis, and strategy, not just outrage.
One example of this is the widespread dismissal of U.S. workers as “settlers” who it is claimed have a continuing material commitment to the oppressive and genocidal policies that founded the U.S. Unfortunately, this attitude is widespread on the U.S. Left. Too many dismiss American workers as beneficiaries of U.S. capitalism and imperialism.
The American colonies of course were founded on genocide and slavery. The European settlers engaged in murderous policies toward the Natives almost from day one. The project of the settler population was to steal the land of the Natives, expel them and kill them if they got in the way. This was a project of the whole settler population. Though there were developing class contradictions within the settler society, the fundamental contradiction was between the settlers and the Natives. Primitive accumulation for capitalism was based on stealing native land and exploiting African slaves and indentured servants. This was parallel to the expulsion of peasants from the land in England.
This process in the colonies and England differed. In England from the late Middle Ages on, peasants were expelled from the land and turned into a proletariat for rising capitalism. In the American colonies, the creation of a proletariat was longer and more convoluted. The Natives expelled from their land did not become the primary basis of the proletariat needed by capitalism. The American colonies were not predominantly capitalist. The Southern population was primarily planters, slaves, and white small farmers. In the North, the population was predominantly small farmers both subsistence and commercial. Merchant capital dominated In the cities where the proletariat was a minority. Most of the manual workers were petit bourgeois artisans. It would take decades of development within settler society before the proletariat became a major portion of the urban population, much less the majority.
The American Revolution gave a push to the development of capitalism in the U.S. by eliminating stifling British colonial regulations. The Revolution also spurred further intense colonization of Native land. It also buttressed slavery. Independence from the British Empire created a new American empire which was also based on genocide, colonialism, displacement, and slavery. Those who base their politics on American patriotism beginning with the American Revolution need to realize what they are supporting.
See what the great abolitionist and ex-slave Frederick Douglass had to say about the celebration of July 4:
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/what-slave-fourth-july-frederick-douglass/
Colonization of the Americas killed millions of Natives. It also resulted in the death of millions of Africans in the Middle Passage and after. Colonization destroyed thousands of Native societies and laid the basis for the underdevelopment of Africa as well. European colonization disrupted and destroyed the societies on 3 continents, Africa, North and South America and later Australia and Asia as well. Colonization was the foundation of the development of capitalism in Europe. Capitalism dispossessed European peasants. As Marx said capitalism came into existence “dripping from every pore with blood and dirt”.
Settler Colonialism Serves the Interests of the Settler Population
“in a fully functioning colonial settler society, the key to transformation is outside the settler population: the Black population in South Africa, the Palestinian/Arab masses in the Middle East.”
In Colonial Settler society, internal class contradictions are secondary. The overwhelming project of dispossession of the natives takes priority for all the contending classes in settler society. This was true of the Colonies/U.S. until the Civil War and is still true of Israel and South Africa today. This means that in a fully functioning colonial settler society, the key to transformation is outside the settler population: the Black population in South Africa, the Palestinian/Arab masses in the Middle East. Those who want to transform Settler Colonial societies need to focus on organizing the colonized rather than on the class contradictions in settler society.
The fundamental contradiction of exploitation sets up a different dynamic in typical modern capitalist states than in Settler Colonial states. In Colonial Settler states the economic interests of the settlers are with the genocidal project. In developed capitalist economies, the economic interests of the vast majority oppose capitalist interests. The whole working class is oppressed and exploited by ruling class policies and can be won to oppose them. The whole working class can be the agent of social transformation in capitalist societies. Marxists and others opposing capitalist policies need to orient to the working class as change agent.
“For Marxists, unifying the working class to oppose capitalism requires opposing all forms of oppression.”
For Marxists, unifying the working class to oppose capitalism requires opposing all forms of oppression. Lenin laid this out clearly in What Is to be Done. He said workers only have real class consciousness when they respond to every example of oppression in society no matter what class it is aimed at. As Marx said, “A people that oppresses another cannot itself be free”. The whole working class can be the agent of socialist transformation. But to achieve this, it must oppose racism, sexism, and all forms of oppression. Otherwise, it will never have the unity necessary to overthrow capitalism. Revolutionaries can appeal to workers based on their material interests in overthrowing the system as well as their disgust at oppression and exploitation.
Revolutionary Trotskyist James Cannon said the most important question a political party needs to answer is “What to do Next?” Political strategy must consider the structure of society. If activists focus on what would be the proper change agent in Colonial Settler society in a modern capitalist society, they will go astray and be ineffective. If they focus only on those outside or on the edges of the working class they will never develop the potential revolutionary agent.
Is the U.S. a Colonial Settler society?
“By the end of the Civil War, capitalism dominated the economy.”
Is the U.S. a Colonial Settler society? It is historically. However, its economic structure has fundamentally changed since colonial times. In 1776 it was not predominantly capitalist. It was still in the stage of primitive accumulation. The primary method of accumulation was stealing native land and exploiting slave labor. Over the next 90 years it developed a capitalist sector which became predominant by the end of the Civil War. Over that period the class contradiction within the settler population became more and more pronounced. Workers in the cities were no longer directly involved in the expulsion of Natives. Their class interests against capitalists grew more prominent. The accumulation of capital by exploitation of workers dominated the economy more over time.
By the end of the Civil War, capitalism dominated the economy. The fundamental contradiction became the class conflict between labor and capital. Ruling class accumulation was based primarily on the exploitation of workers. The working class became the force that had the interest in and ability to overthrow capitalism. Certainly, by that point if not before, revolutionaries had to focus on the working class as the force that could transform society. The primary change agent was inside the former settler population as well as among those originally colonized. Those who see white workers as inevitable racist settler colonizers miss this transformation. Those who support that proposition are reversing historical reality. The majority of the white population in the U.S. ceased to be colonial settlers in the classic sense when they became part of the American working class as capitalism became dominant. No matter their ideology, their economic interests were no longer with the genocidal and slave based colonial economy which had ceased to exist.
“Writing off white workers as settlers will be as ineffective as going to the opposite extreme and ignoring the fight against racism, sexism etc.”
The ideology of the Colonial Settler state persisted even after the economic structure made it obsolete. It still deforms politics in the U.S.
Colonial Settler institutional racism morphed into new forms of structural racism: Jim Crow, Mass Incarceration, Immigrant deportation and oppression, housing, education, health care etc. discrimination. Though it is no longer a Colonial Settler society, the U.S. is still based on institutional racism in many forms. U.S. capitalism and its ruling class depend on institutional racism. The only way to end institutional racism is to end capitalism. The only way to end capitalism is to destroy institutional racism.
The identification of whites and other patriots with the U.S. state is in part a legacy of the ideas of the colonial settler past. Class struggle and political organizing can break through this legacy. The economic structure of modern capitalism undercuts the basis of the reactionary settler legacy. It is no longer in the interests of most whites to uphold the U.S. state and capitalist class. Settler patriotism now only represents the interests of the ruling class. Settler patriotism among the working class is now pure ideology, false consciousness.
Again, this did not mean and does not mean ignoring the issue of oppression! As noted before, the working class can only succeed if it combines the fight against oppression with the fight against exploitation. However, the whole working class can be won to this fight. The fight against oppression today includes the struggle for special demands such as Land Back for the descendants of the original inhabitants. It includes reparations for descendants of slaves.
It is no longer the case as in classic Colonial Settler society, that only those outside it can effectively oppose it. It is no longer the case that the livelihood of the majority relies on the oppression of the original inhabitants as it did in the 13 colonies. Writing off white workers as settlers will be as ineffective as going to the opposite extreme and ignoring the fight against racism, sexism etc.
In the world today, Israel and South Africa are the primary examples of Colonial Settler Societies. In these countries, the primary change agent will be the colonized populations. In the U.S., Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, original Colonial Settler societies have been transformed into modern capitalist societies. The fight against capitalism can be a project of the vast majority in all those states.
Colonial Settler regimes have similarities with each other, but also important differences. Israel for example was based on the expulsion of most of the Palestinian population and its replacement by Zionist settlers in all class positions. South Africa instead installed a settler population on top of the social structure. Apartheid South Africa based itself on the exploitation of the Black working class. Because of this dependence, Apartheid in South Africa was less stable than Israel. In both cases, however, the agent of change was outside the settler population. While formal South African apartheid is gone, the economic structure it was based on is still largely intact. Economically if not politically it is still a settler colony.
The most important issue for Marxists is identifying the potential agent of social change. Understanding the structures of different societies is a key part of this identification.
Rejection of all whites as racist settlers based on racist actions by white people through history is moralistic. It ignores the many instances of cross-race solidarity in U.S. history: abolitionism, the Civil War, Reconstruction, Southern Populism, CIO organizing in the 30s, the Civil Rights Movement and the recent upsurges against racist police brutality. It also ignores the structural basis for cross-race working class unity that exists today. It focuses on immoral action in the past rather than the potential economic basis of anti-racism.
The best way to mobilize workers is to appeal to their class interests. Overthrowing capitalism can improve life for the vast majority. Revolution is needed not just to advance economic and social conditions for all but to ensure survival for humanity. Guilt tripping white workers about their relative privilege is not productive. Instead, revolutionaries should stress that everyone’s lives can improve with the overthrow of capitalism. The point is to raise the conditions of the specially oppressed, not demand that whites lower their conditions. This will involve winning white workers to support the special demands of people of color. It will involve winning male workers to support the special demands of women, straight and cis workers to support the demands of LGBTQ and trans workers etc.
Moral outrage can be a good motivator of political struggle. However, it is never enough as a guide to political action. Failure of political analysis will result in defeat and the continuation of oppression and exploitation.
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