A coherent imperial ideology need not produce effective rule

Evidence

The outstanding similarity between Rhodes’s rule in South Africa and Cromer’s domination of Egypt was that both regarded the countries not as desirable ends in themselves but merely as means for some supposedly higher purpose. They were similar therefore in their indifference and aloofness, in their genuine lack of interest in their subjects, an attitude which differed as much from the cruelty and arbitrariness of native despots in Asia as from the exploiting carelessness of conquerors, or the insane and anarchic oppression of one race tribe through another. — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 547 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Researchers associated with the subaltern studies school have shown that even where political mobilization is highly restricted, a substantial reservoir of cultural resistance necessarily confronts racist regimes, peripheral or metropolitan, colonial or postcolonial. In their studies of colonial and postcolonial systems of rule ina variety of spatiotemporal contexts- India, Latin America, Southeast Asia, as well as the American South- they have demonstrated that where rule is highly despotic and racially exclusive, it cannot “go too deep.” It generally must rely on “{ndirect” strategies of domination: collaborators, colonial administrators, agents, informers, rights legislation, many black activists considered that their underlying ideals had not only gone unfulfilled, but had been betrayed. — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 163 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Socialism lacks an intrinsic art of government and must invent one — Michel Foucault, The Birth of Biopolitics: Lectures at…, 586; Empire alone does not automatically generate racial regimes.; Empire must keep reworking itself and can fail to secure racial regimes — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of…, 105 (+5 more)

Broader Connections

• Instrumental imperial rule generated hallmark indifference and aloofness toward subjects #exemplifies (1.00) — Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, 547
• The Chinese example proves imperial capacity does not inevitably produce empire #corroborates (0.95)
• Highly despotic regimes cannot dominate too deeply and rely on indirect rule #complicates (0.90) — Michael Omi, Howard Winant, Racial Formation in the United States, 163
• Ideologies are not what is shaped at power’s base #complicates (0.85)