Neither Settler nor Native: The Making and Unmaking of Permanent Minorities

Prospect Top 50 Thinker of 2021British Academy Book Prize FinalistPROSE Award Finalist“Provocative, elegantly written.”-Fara Dabhoiwala, New York Review of Books“Demonstrates how a broad rethinking of political issues becomes possible when Western ideals and practices are examined from the vantage point of Asia and Africa.”-Pankaj Mishra, New York Review of BooksIn case after case around the globe-from Israel to Sudan-the colonial state and the nation-state have been constructed through the politicization of a religious or ethnic majority at the expense of an equally manufactured minority.The model emerged in America, where genocide and internment on reservations created a permanent native minority.In Europe, this template would be used both by the Nazis and the Allies. Neither Settler nor Native offers a vision for arresting this process.Mahmood Mamdani points to inherent limitations in the legal solution attempted at Nuremberg.Political violence demands political solutions: not crimi