internal colonialism

(or domestic)

A term used widely to characterize exploitative relationships between a ‘centre’ and ‘periphery’ within a single nation-state or society. It has been applied to White-Black relations in the United States, Indian-White and Indian-Mestizo relations in Latin America, and has also been used to describe the exploitative relationship between the Soviet state and Soviet society (particularly the conditions of the peasantry under forced collectivization and the working class under imposed industrialization). The situation of the Celtic fringe in British national development during the past four centuries has also been depicted in these terms (see, Internal Colonialism, 1975). The term is now largely discredited, mainly because of the obvious difficulties in drawing parallels with colonialism strictly defined. For example, the latter involves the control and exploitation of the majority of a nation by a minority of outsiders, whereas in America the Black population is a numerical minority and was, originally, the ‘outside’ group. However, advocates of the theory argue that these sorts of differences are less significant than the core stock of common experiences that have been shared by oppressed (often racialized) minorities throughout the world, and have defended the use of the term vigorously (see, for example,’s Racial Oppression in America, 1972).