International Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition)

No.3, 2021

 

Serfdom and protection: the logic and paradox in Western colonial expansion

(Abstract)

 

Aisong Wang

 

Western colonial empires often adopted the strategy of “carrot plus stick” and showed a dual face of serfdom and protection throughout the long history of colonial expansion. Under the academic background of “archival turn” in recent years, researchers of imperial, colonial and global histories have made full use of archival materials left over from the colonial period and conducted multi-faceted studies on Global Genealogies and local practices of protection. However, only with reference to serfdom can we accurately understand protection, and disclose the colonial logic and inherent paradox of the Western civilisation’s barbaric conquests. The freedom and equality of the colonists came at the expense of the unfreedom and inequality of the colonized. The humanitarianist ideas and their practices in institutions related with protection had influence on changing the colonised’s situation, but could not change the latter’s “inhuman” fate. In a post-colonial context, protection still has a long way to go.