Colonial land seizure replaced genocide because survivors supplied cheap labor

Evidence

In a sustained effort to convert Algeria into a capitalist creature, the French engaged in direct appropriation and exploitation of the agricultural and mineral resources of the country. The problem, as the French saw it, was that too many Muslims lived in the country and that these “natives” were in control of the lands necessary for commercial exploitation and capitalist economy. As genocide involving a population of over two million natives was—at least at the time—not a practical option for the colonial authorities, freeing the land from the grip of the natives by other means dominated all considerations, in the legal field no less than in the political. This option would also afford the opportunity to exploit cheap labor, which would be lost if genocide were to be carried out. — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 234 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Neither superior technology nor an overwhelming number of settlers made up the mainspring of the birth of the United States or the spread of its power over the entire world. Rather, the chief cause was the colonialist settler-state’s willingness to eliminate whole civilizations of people in order to possess their land. — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the…, 229 (#complicates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Colonial land appropriation was framed as consent with violence as alternative — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection: How Data Is…, 300; Land seizure through genocide, not technology, powered US expansion — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the…, 229; French colonial dispossession of Algerian land substituted for genocide as a practical option — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism: A Critique of…, 234

Broader Connections

• French colonial dispossession of Algerian land substituted for genocide as a practical option #exemplifies (0.95) — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 234
• Land seizure through genocide, not technology, powered US expansion #complicates (0.78) — Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the…, 229