Random Quotes

May Ayim (1960-1996) was a German poet, educator and activist in the Afro-German movement.

May Ayim, Part 3, Minute 0:40 – 1:05.

In the documentary Hoffnung im Herz – Mündliche Poesie by Maria Binders, May Ayim describes how, with the self-empowering designation “Afro-German” or “Schwarze Deutsche”, she refused negative racial epithets, which were still quite common in everyday language in the late 1980s. But she noted that even with these more positive developments, little had changed for Afro-Germans. Even today, the prevailing idea is that being German means being white. As a result, the fact of having lived in Germany for several generations still does not mean that people of colour, Black people or people with a migration history can (discursively) be considered German. Last but not least, the media and discourses about the “other” also make it clear who is German and who has yet to be integrated. Within this framework, people of colour or people with a migration background cannot by definition be German. This is despite the fact that the law on nationality was changed in 2000 in such a way that one no longer needs to have “German blood” in order to be German but can, under certain conditions, be German by virtue of having been born in Germany.

*May Ayim (2003): Blues in Black and White. A Collection of Essays, Poetry, and Conversations. Cape Town etc: Africa World Press.

Orlando Letelier (1932-1976) was Chile’s ambassador to the US under President Salvador Allende. He was assassinated by a car bomb ordered by General Pinochet in 1976.

Naomi Klein (2007: 99)

In the 1970s, many socialist governments in Latin America (e.g. Chile), Asia (e.g. Indonesia) and Africa (e.g. Congo) were overthrown with the support of Western secret services and replaced by dictatorships. In this way, it was made perfectly clear that if a country dared to take an alternative third way, it would have to pay for it with state terror (cf. Klein 2010: 159, German edition). For many, the dictatorship in Chile was a laboratory for neoliberalism. For Letelier, neoliberal economist Milton Friedman was partly responsible for dictator Pinochet’s crimes. Western companies benefited directly from Pinochet’s military regime: Ford had internment camps for rebellious workers on its factory premises (cf. Klein 2010: 155). Claudia Acuña, a journalist who experienced the dictatorship in neighbouring Argentina, stresses how difficult it was to see that violence was only a means and not the end: the aim was to impose a new economic order. In this, they succeeded: ‘We were able to destroy the secret torture centres, but not the economic system that the military had started’ (quoted in Klein 2010: 178).

*Orlando Letelier (1976): “The Chicago Boys in Chile: Economic Freedom’s Awful Toll.” In: The Nation 223, Nr. 28, p. 137-142.
*Naomi Klein (2007): The Shock Doctrine. The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Toronto: Knopf Canada.

From the Declaration of Independence of the Philippines.

Ambrosio Rianzares Bautista (1898): Declaration of Independence.

The Philippines was a Spanish colony from 1571 until, as an outcome of anti-colonial liberation struggle, it declared independence in 1898. At the time, however, the USA wanted to incorporate the islands, and a fifth of the population lost their lives in the ensuing Philippine-American War of 1899 to 1902. The islands then became a US colony until 1942 when they were occupied by Japanese troops. The left-wing anti-Japanese People’s Liberation Army was then formed, a partisan movement made up of 30,000 fighters and 70,000 reservists. They collaborated with the US against the Japanese, but opposed US colonial rule. According to writer Ricardo Trota Jose, 80% of Filippin@s were in the resistance or supported it: ‘One million Filipinos fought in various guerrilla movements’ (RJB & recherche international 2008: 132). Although the Philippines gained independence in 1946, a US-friendly government was then installed. It was only in 1990, under President Corazon Aquino, that the resistance fighters were finally recognised as such (ibid.: 100f.).

*Rheinisches JournalistInnenbüro & recherche international (2008): Die Dritte Welt im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Unterrichtsmaterialien zu einem vergessenen Kapitel der Geschichte. Köln.

Frankie Boyle (born in 1972) is a Scottish comedian.

Frankie Boyle (2015): Britain’s criminally stupid attitudes to race and immigration are beyond parody.

The quote is from a discussion about anti-migration policies in Great Britain. Boyle claims that poverty and migration have to be associated with the colonial past and exploitation by the British Empire. He also parodies British development aid: “Thanks for the gold, guys, thanks for the diamonds. We did a fundraiser and got you fishing rods.”

Timo Kiesel / Carolin Philipp (2011): white charity. Blackness and whiteness on charity add posters..

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (Déclaration des Droits de l’Homme et du Citoyen) is one of the fundamental texts of the French Revolution.

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.

The French Revolution’s motto was liberté, egalité, fraternité (liberty, equality, fraternity). It abolished the absolutist monarchy (Louis XIV: ‘I am the state’) and established a new system of rule. Feudal power structures were replaced with governance by the majority population and the royal family was executed. The revolution is seen as one of the Enlightenment’s decisive events, and its importance extends to how it addressed human rights, democracy and forms of government. However, the period of revolutionary terror, which sent all perceived enemies of the revolution within France to the guillotine, is usually judged critically. For example, Olympe de Gouges was executed in 1793 when she demanded universal human rights for women as well as men. In 1799, General Napoléon Bonaparte assumed the rank of First Consul of the republic, asserting absolute dictatorial power, which he later confirmed by declaring himself Emperor. At the same time, France had colonies. In fact, in the 19th century, it was the second largest colonial power in the world. Neither equality nor inalienable human rights applied to these areas.

*Edmundo Murray (2008): Review of Jean Ziegler’s “La haine de l’Occident”.

Paul Bremer (born 1941) was a US civilian administrator in Iraq employed by the US government from 2003-2004.

Washington Post (28.06.2003): Occupation Forces Halting Elections Throughout Iraq.

Bremer’s policy of delaying elections, together with the Americans’ authoritarian occupation strategy, led to an increase in violence between religious groups and violent interpretations of religion (Klein 2010: 508). From the spring of 2004 onwards, the number of violent incidents rose steadily (Klein 2010: 489). With its policy of “regime change”, support of military and other coups throughout the 20th century, the USA as a hegemonic force distinguished itself from Great Britain’s hegemonic policies which had followed classic colonial power.

*Naomi Klein (2007): The Shock Doctrine. The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Toronto: Knopf Canada.

Achille Mbembe (*1957) is a post-colonial theorist, philosopher and historian. He is a professor at the Witwatersrand University in Johannesburg.

Quote: Achille Mbembe (2017): Critique of Black Reason. Durham and London: Duke University Press, pp. 176-177.
Picture: Wikimedia. Creative Commons.

Mbembe develops a critical reflection on the Western notion of reason and rationality. He examines current dynamics of colonialism, racism and resistance and attempts to explore possibilities for a more just and solidary world order. He attempts to show the extent to which the goal of anti-colonial liberation struggles, the right to equal participation for all, remains relevant for the present day.

*Achille Mbembe (2017): Critique of Black Reason. Durham and London: Duke University Press.
*Achille Mbembe (July 1, 2021): Notes on Late Eurocentrism. Translated by Carolyn Shread. Critical Inquiry.

Hwang Kum-Ju (born ca. in 1920) was a Korean forced into prostitution in a brothel for Japanese soldiers. She had been promised work in a factory, but was instead deported to Manchuria.

Quoted in Rheinisches JournalistInnenbüro; recherche international e.V. (2008: 111). Original from Hwang Kum-Ju (2002/2003): Script for the Korean Council for the rehabilitation for victims of violence during WWII as well as Interviews on 20.10.2002 and 03.12.2003, Seoul. The Year (2002) is an approximation.

Forced migration in Asia is often associated with Japanese colonial rule. By 1910, Korea had been fully colonised by Japan, with colonial rule ending in 1945 with the end of World War II and Japan’s surrender. During World War II, Korean women were abducted and enslaved as forced prostitutes for the Japanese army. According to estimates by Asian NGOs, between 1932 and 1945 the Imperial Japanese Army abducted a total of 200,000 women from Korea, China, the Philippines, Malaya, Burma, East Timor and Indonesia and sent them to work in military brothels. In 1991, the Korean Council was formed to investigate the sexual abuse of conscripted women by the Japanese military. In 1993, the Japanese government apologised, but rejected claims for compensation (Rheinische Journalistinnenbüro & recherche international e.V. 2008: 109).

*Rheinisches JournalistInnenbüro & recherche international e.V. (2008): Die dritte Welt im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Unterrichtsmaterialien zu einem vergessenen Kapitel der Geschichte.
*Björn Jensen (2015): Forgotten Sex Slaves – Comfort Women in the Philippines. Dokumentarfilm, 46min.

Mary Clarke, (date of birth unknown – 1984) was a Koori Aboriginal activist. The quote comes from a speech recorded at a meeting with journalists. The meeting was organised to speak out against the eviction of a woman and her children of multiracial decent from their home in Framlingham Settlement, Victoria, Australia.

Original source: Newspaper Melbourse Argus (22.02.1951). Reprinted in: Jan Chritchett (1998): Untold Stories: Memories and Lives of Victorian Kooris. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, p. 4.

Australia was one of Great Britain’s settler colonies. In 1770, James Cook claimed eastern Australia for the British Crown. He also put forward the idea of a prison colony to relieve overcrowded British prisons. In 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip landed in Sydney with 1,500 prisoners. It is estimated that between 1788 and 1900 up to 90% of Australia’s indigenous people were killed by introduced diseases, land dispossession and violent conflict. There were mass shootings, people were thrown in groups off cliffs or offered land poisoned with arsenic or other substances (Behrendt 2012: 274). George Reid, a politician from the Free Trade Party, said in an election speech in 1903 that ‘we should have a white Australia’ (he became Prime Minister in 1904). Forging a white Australia was a key political goal not only for him, however, but for European settlers in general over the centuries. The protests of the Aboriginal population also go back a long way. In 1938 a silent march was held to commemorate 150 years of land grabbing and colonization (creativespirits.info).

*Foley, Gary (1999): ATSIC: Flaws in the Machine. The Koori History Website.
*John Harris (2003): Hiding the Bodies: the myth of the humane colonisation of Australia. In: Aboriginal History Journal. Canberra: Australian Centre for Indigenous History, S. 79-104.
*Larissa Behrendt (2013): Indigenous Australia for Dummies. Canberra: International Journal of Critical Indigenous Studies, S. 53f. (Rezension)
*creativespirits.info: Aboriginal timeline: Protest.

Karl Marx (1818-1883) was a social theorist, philosopher and economist and is considered an important theorist of the workers’ movement.

Quote: Karl Marx (1843-1844): On the Jewish Question. Karl Marx, Frederick Engels: Collected Works, Vol. 3, 1843-1844, p. 185.
Picture: By John Jabez Edwin Mayal – International Institute of Social History in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Public Domain, Wikimedia, Creative Commons.

In “On the Jewish Question”, Marx deals with the struggle of Jews for equal rights in modern society. He interprets liberal human rights as defensive rights intended to protect against state encroachment or conflict. In this respect, from Marx’s point of view, they implicitly assume a primarily hostile relationship between people and are an expression of the bourgeois social order characterized by competitive relationships. Human rights thereby cement such a society instead of helping to overcome it. Against liberal human rights that conceale economic exploitation, Marx therefore advocated their abolition. Both the workers’ movement and anti-colonial liberation movements refer to Marx’s critique.

*Stephen Brown (2003): The problem with Marx on rights. Journal of Human Rights, 2(4), 517–522.
*David McLellan (2006): Karl Marx. A Biography. London: Papermac.

Tupac Katari (1750-1781) was an Aymara leader in the rebellion against Spanish colonisers in present-day Bolivia. He took the names of earlier resistance fighters (Tomás Katari and Túpac Amaru) who were killed by the Spanish in 1572.

Quoted by Thomas Guthmann (2017): Körper im Zeichen des Zeitstrahls. In glokal: Connecting the Dots. Lernen aus Geschichte(n) zu Unterdrückung und Widerstand, p. 98

Tupac Katari assembled an army of 40,000 fighters and besieged La Paz. His wife, Bartolina Sisa, commanded the siege and played an important role after Katari’s capture. However, the overthrow of European colonialism in most Latin American countries in the 19th century did not mean that free and equal societies could develop. This was because the formal end of European colonialism did not mean the end of power relations. New hierarchies were created, and the distribution of wealth in many countries was tied to class, race and gender. Aníbal Quijano argued that global capitalism replaced colonialism as the system of domination and that the main beneficiaries of this system continued to be Europeans and their descendants in other countries (Quijano 2007: 168). Tupac Katari’s remarks were taken up again in 2003 when the people of Bolivia opposed the sell off of their natural gas. ‘When neoliberal President Sanchez de Lozada was ousted from the presidency, the slogan echoed through the streets of El Alto’ (Guthmann 2017: 98). Former Bolivian President Evo Morales also sees himself as an inheritor of Tupac Katari’s tradition of resistance (Morales’ inaugural speech reported in the New York Times, 23 January, 2006).

*Thomas Guthmann (2017): Körper im Zeichen des Zeitstrahls. In glokal: Connecting the Dots. Lernen aus Geschichte(n) zu Unterdrückung und Widerstand.
*Anibal Quihano (2007): Coloniality and Modernity/Rationality, Cultural Studies 21 (2-3); 168-178.
**The New York Times (23.01.2006): “Bolivia Indians Hail the Swearing In of One of Their Own as President.”

Poland, Leon Pinsker (1821-1891)
Pinsker was born in a small town in what is now Poland, the son of an orientalist.

Leon Pinsker, “Autoemancipation!”, Berlin 1882, 13

Pinsker gave up his desire to pursue a career as a lawyer due to the restrictions on admission for Jews to universities. This experience, as well as the impressions of the pogroms that flared up at the end of the 19th century, led him from his former assimilationist attitude to a Zionist position, which he described in his book “Autoemancipation! – Reminder to the tribal comrades “formulated. Today the work is considered to be one of the most important early Zionist writings.

Judah Leib “Leon” Pinsker (jewishvirtuallibrary.org)

Chancellor Angela Merkel (born 1954) is a politician of the CDU and was Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany from 2005-2021. She was the first woman to hold this post.

Speech in front of the Young Members of the CDU

As chancellor, Angela Merkel made integration a top priority. “Germans with a migration background” caught the media’s attention because of reports on poverty, social inequality in schools, the labour market and so on. The right-wing conservative camp quickly spoke of self-inflicted poverty and the failure of the “multicultural” approach. Angela Merkel initially relied on state integration policy, for example, seting up the German Islam Conference and Integration Summit which has been held every year since 2006. In the same year as the quote, the former SPD politician Thilo Sarrazin published his book Germany Abolishes Itself. CSU chairman Horst Seehofer referred positively to Sarrazin’s idea of a dominant culture. In this statement, Angela Merkel was supporting Seehofer and an authoritarian integration project.

The Guardian (30.08.2010): Bundesbank executive provokes race outcry with book.

Chanting at a demonstration in Sri Lanka, which was devastated by the 2004 tsunami that destroyed many fishermen’s huts which were never rebuilt because hotels were constructed in their place.

Naomi Klein (2007: 389)

The 2004 tsunami took the lives of around 35,000 people in Sri Lanka, with the majority of victims being small-scale fishermen. The government subsequently banned construction near the coast. However, it exempted the tourism industry from this requirement, and encouraged hoteliers to build where the fishermen had previously lived. Tourism was to be financed with money that came from the relief fund for tsunami victims (see Klein 2007: 385ff.). In general, one can say that those presumably responsible for the spread of so-called natural disasters (e.g. through lifestyle, work in the industrial sector, etc.) are often not affected by their consequences (e.g. the tsunami), and sometimes even benefit from them.

*Naomi Klein (2007): The Shock Doctrine. The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Toronto: Knopf Canada.

Annual report of the Governor General of the Belgian colony of the Congo.

Nzula et al. 1979 quoted in Henry Bernstein (2000): “Colonialism, Capitalism, Development.” In: Tim Allen and Alan Thomas (Eds): Poverty and Development into the 21st Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 264.

European colonies in Africa, Asia and Latin America economically exploited people and their labour, together with nature and its resources. In addition to direct enslavement and the compulsion to work (e.g. through the introduction of taxes), colonisers always tried to morally justify forced labour, e.g. as character forming. Still today, many people are forced into quasi-slave labour, both in Europe (e.g. 145.000 people in Italy in 2016, GSI) as well as in Asia (e.g. 3, 8 million people in China in 2016, GSI). Conditions in US prisons are also dire. For example, working conditions
for inmates in the former Louisiana plantation known today as “Anglola”
are little better than slave labour (peopeoplesworld.org, May 4th, 2018).

*Henry Bernstein (2000): Colonialism, Capitalism, Development. In: Tim Allen / Alan Thomas (Hrsg.): Poverty and Development into the 21st Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, S. 241–270.
*GSI Global Slavery Index (2016): Country reports

Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793) was a pioneer for the emancipation of women and their civil rights. De Gouges was also an early critic of colonialism. She was executed in 1793, but not for her commitment to women’s rights.

Quote translated after: Olympe de Gouges (1791): Declaration of Women- and Citizen rights, First Article
Picture: Alexander Kucharski – Bonarov, 11. November 2018, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia. Creative Commons.

The “Declaration of the Rights of Women and of the Female Citizen” is a counter-declaration to the Declaration of Human Rights of the French Revolution, which only applied to men. De Gouge’s “Declaration of the Rights of Women and the Female Citizens” is a fundamental text in the history of women’s emancipation. However, women’s suffrage was not introduced in France until a long time later, in 1944. Switzerland was one of the last European countries to grant women full civil rights in 1971. The canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden did not introduce voting rights for women at communal level until 1990. De Gouge’s demands remain relevant. According to UN Women, the risk factor of living in poverty is still around 1.2 times higher for women than for men in the same age group.

*Resources on Olympe de Gouges
*Sophie Mousset (2007): Women’s Rights and the French Revolution. A Biography of Olympe De Gouges. New York: Routledge.

Dr. Stefan Mair (geb. 1964) ist deutscher Ökonom und wird als Afrikaexperte bezeichnet. Er ist seit 2020 Direktor des Deutschen Instituts für Internationale Politik und Sicherheit, Executive Chairman of the Science and Politics Foundation (SWP), and member of the executive board of the Federation of German Industries (BDI).

Stefan Mair (2005): Ausbreitung des Kolonialismus.

The quote from the renowned “Africa expert” Mair reflects the endurance of colonial myths into the present. There are many counterexamples one can call up to discredit Mair’s reasoning:
colonial genocides (e.g. in modern-day Namibia) versus the reduction of the mortality rate during colonialism; the use of infrastructure for colonial resource and human exploitation versus the construction of infrastructure during colonialism; the destruction of previously existing, often non-capitalist forms of society or subsistence economy versus social and cultural change. Mair also describes loyalty to the nation as an abstract identity as preferable to other identities. In this way, he uncritically posits European concepts such as the nation as the norm, without naming the problems inherent in these concepts, e.g. nationalism and the resulting wars. The positive reference to ‘political and cultural change in the region’ indicates a positive understanding of colonisation as a civilising mission.

*Monitor (2017): G20-Gipfel: Wer profitiert vom „Marshall-Plan“ für Afrika?
*glokal (2016): Sustaining Inequality – The Neocolonial Politics of Development Education, North-South Volunteering and Fair Trade in Germany. In: darkmatter – in the ruins of imperial culture.

Milton Friedman (1912-2006) was a Chicago School economist, advocate of neoliberalism, and winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for Economics. The quote comes from a letter Friedman wrote to Chilean dictator Pinochet.

Naomi Klein (2007: 75)

Milton Friedman believed that societies had to be radically changed: economic forces should be allowed to rule freely without any state interference. This concept of freedom has become known in history as neoliberalism. Friedman’s main work is called Capitalism and Freedom (1962). However, this freedom primarily means economic freedom, often at the expense of people and nature (see Klein 2010: 85, German edition). Politicians, he argued, should use shock strategies to bring about change towards neoliberal capitalism. According to him, crisis situations such as natural disasters should be exploited for this purpose: it was when societies were in a state of shock as a result of a catastrophe, that economic changes could best be implemented. This was because in such exceptional situations, people would be too overwhelmed to resist “reforms” such as the privatisation of education, health and social security. Friedman and his Chicago Boys (Economists trained at the University of Chicago) experimented with their theories, especially in dictatorships such as Chile under General Pinochet.

Naomi Klein (2007): The Shock Doctrine. The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Toronto: Knopf Canada.

Moritz Gottlieb Grellmann (1756-1804) is regarded as the founder of “Tsiganology”. In his work he claimed Rom*nja stole and probably ate children. He also described the Romni as extremely sexually permissive. He was appointed professor in Göttingen in 1787.

Gottlieb Grellmann (1787): Historischer Versuch über die Z******* betreffend die Lebensart und Verfassung und Sitten und Schicksale dieses Volkes seit seiner Erscheinung in Europa und dessen Ursprung. Göttingen: Bey Johann Christian Dieterich.

Although Grellmann is considered the so-called founder of Tsiganology, he probably never spoke to Rom:nja himself. His entire body of work was either copied or written in conversation with a priest who worked with Rom:nja. Nor was it Grellmann who proved, through linguistics, their Indian origins. This piece of writing is an example of how social science research talks about, but not with, its “objects of research”.

*Ian F. Hancock (1987): The Pariah Syndrome: An Account of Gypsy Slavery and Persecution. Ann Arbor: Karoma Publishers.

Clara Zetkin (1857-1933) was a German Marxist, women’s rights activist and KPD parliamentarian until 1933. She was a gifted orator and arch enemy of Paul von Hindenbrug, then President of the Reich, whom she described as a servant of capital. She died in exile in Moscow.

Clara Zetkin (1924): Die Intellektuellenfrage. In: Protokoll. Fünfter Kongress der Kommunistischen Internationale, Bd. II, S. 946-982.

The workers’ movement put pressure on the German imperial government, especially in the 19th century. Chancellor Bismarck introduced reforms and improvements for workers in an attempt to placate them. As a Marxist, for Zetkin there was a connection between the prosperity and emancipation of workers in the Global North and the exploitation of workers in the Global South. Marxist historians like Silvia Federici and Walter Rodney further claim that the industrial revolution in Europe would not have been possible without slavery and the plantation system in the Global South, the enslaved workers and export-oriented production (Federici 2014: 129, German edition). Rodney described European workers as being bribed with “colonial profits” (Rodney 1972).

*Walter Rodney (1972): How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. London: Bogle-L’Ouverture Publications.
*Maria Mies (1986): Patriachy and Accumulation on a World Scale. Women in the International Division of Labour. London & New York: Zed Books.
*Silvia Federici (2014): Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation. New York: Automedia (auch in deutscher Übersetzung)
*Anne McClintock (1995): Imperial Leather. Race, Gender and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest. New York: Routledge.