Decolonizing Britain in the 21st Century?: Chagos Islanders challenge the Crown, House of Lords, 30 June-3 July 2008
This article discusses the anthropological, legal, and political significance of a recent lawsuit before the House of Lords involving the people of the UK-controlled Chagos Archipelago, exiled during creation of the US military base on Diego Garcia. Building on a growing body of anthropological and historical literature about the people and the base, the article reviews the history leading up to the June hearing and describes its proceedings as part of the islander's four-decades-old movement to win a return to their homeland. On the one hand, it represents the closest the Chagossians have come to a return in nearly 40 years. On the other, the case holds implications for the right of return of other displaced peoples, the rights of indigenous peoples more broadly, the limits of government authority, the balance of power in British parliamentary democracy, and the deepening of democracy worldwide. The suit holds significance for anthropologists studying indigenous peoples, displacement and migration, human rights, the law, government officials, and foreign policy.
Militarism in Environmental Disguise: The Greenwashing of an Overseas Military Base
What is the relationship between militarized landscapes, especially overseas military bases, and the natural environment? Scholars have noticed that militarized spaces—permanent bases, demilitarized zones, live fire ranges, training areas, historical battlefields and so forth—are often accompanied by de facto nature reserves. Thus, the unparalleled seclusion that militarization imposes upon delineated geographic spaces can create safe havens for plants and animals that would otherwise suffer from human encroachment. Others retort that military activities cause severe damage to the natural environment. In this article, I problematize attempts to evaluate the environmental impact of militarized spaces in a way that divorces the natural environment from the broader web of social and political relations to which military activities belong. In particular, I argue that environmental issues often serve as “greenwash” to distract attention—lay, scholarly, and official—from the negative aspects of militarism, including instances of environmental degradation, the mistreatment of human subjects, and the perpetuation of colonial forms of government. To illustrate and buttress my argument, I present a detailed case study of the US military base on Diego Garcia in the British Indian Ocean Territory.
Harry Morgan’s Identity Crisis: Orientalism and Slumming during the Great Depression in Hemingway’s To Have and Have Not
This essay places To Have and Have Not in relation to the flow of illegal Chinese immigrants through Cuba and Key West to U.S. Chinatowns during the Great Depression. It also explores the representations of Asians in the novel. The essay argues that Morgan’s interaction with the “Anglomaniac” Chinese human trafficker, Sing, and his outrage against rich American tourists “slumming” in Key West reveal that his identity crisis is the result of his liminal position within the prevailing racial hierarchy.