11 - Inter-Racial Implications of the Ethiopian Crisis: A Negro View (1935)

Summary

This essay was published in October 1935, the same month Italy invaded independent Ethiopia and met little resistance from other members of the League of Nations. It reviews the conjoined evolution of racism and imperialism from the beginning of the modern era, until the First World War brought about a “revolution of thought in regard to race relations,” and “a new distribution of world power” appeared likely. The invasion of Ethiopia by Mussolini’s Italy will likely succeed despite weak efforts at mediation by the League of Nations. The invasion demonstrates the ongoing dangers for world peace of European imperial rivalry and portends similar expansion by Hitler’s Germany. The essay predicts that the “whole colored world,” seeing that neither Christianity nor international institutions restrain European states in their imperial exploitation, will soon come to the realization that their only hope lies in their solidarity against “race hate” and their willingness to resort to force to resist European exploitation. The gains achieved by Gandhi’s remarkable nonviolent resistance were modest; Italy’s success would destroy Indians’ tenuous faith in “the justice of white Europe.” Italy’s actions confirm that “Economic exploitation based on the excuse of race prejudice is the program of the white world.”