Colonial rulers framed nationalist leaders as misguided and unable to grasp their own interests

Evidence

What then if the ungrateful native should choose self-rule over the enlightened colonial overlord? What was Balfour’s Britain to make of the movements for national liberation then starting to emerge in Egypt, India, and other colonized nations? Such struggles for self-determination had to be explained away. One way this was done was to assert that the leaders of these movements were misguided agitators who could not understand what was in their own best interests. As Cromer argued, “the real future of Egypt … lies not in the direction of a narrow nationalism, which will only embrace native Egyptians … but rather in that of an enlarged cosmopolitanism.” In other words, the subject people should shut up and realize that they are better off as members of the global British Empire. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 204 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Nevertheless the Oriental, en soi, was incapable of appreciating or understanding himself. Partly because of what Europe had done to him, he had lost his religion and his philosophie; Muslims had “un vide immense” within them; they were close to anarchy and suicide. It became France’s obligation, then, to associate itself with the Muslims’ desire to defend their traditional culture, the rule of their dynastic life, and the patrimony of believers. — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 694 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Colonial powers cast nationalist leaders as misguided agitators to dismiss self-rule — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 204; Colonialism delegitimized anticolonial leaders as misguided agitators; Colonial powers justified intervention by portraying colonized subjects as incapable of self-understanding — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 694

Broader Connections

• Colonial powers cast nationalist leaders as misguided agitators to dismiss self-rule #corroborates (0.95) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 204
• Colonialism delegitimized anticolonial leaders as misguided agitators #corroborates (0.93)
• Colonial powers justified intervention by portraying colonized subjects as incapable of self-understanding #qualifies (0.75) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 694