Raphael Lemkin, “Threatened People” and the Concept of Genocide

Referent/in: Dirk Moses, Sydney/Köln/Berlin

No term captures the notion of a “supreme humanitarian emergency” for a threatened people more than “genocide.” Raphael Lemkin, who coined the concept in the 1940s, wanted to protect human groups by criminalizing genocidal actions and advocating humanitarian intervention. And sure enough, groups claiming to be threatened or imperiled often have recourse to the rhetoric of genocide to gain attention in the international public sphere. Given Lemkin’s importance in coining this new concept, it is worth exploring his thought about “threatened,” Indigenous peoples more closely, especially in view of the fact that most of his writing remains unpublished and unknown. I wish to explore three issues.

1. To what extent is the new discipline of “genocide studies” a continuation of the long-standing European debate about the morality and legality of occupying and dominating other peoples. European theologians, philosophers, and lawyers like Las Casas have been debating the morality of occupation since the Spanish conquest of the Americas in the sixteenth century.
2. How did Lemkin distinguish between “organic” cultural change and illegitimate “cultural genocide,” a concept he also favoured?
3. To what extent can Lemkin be counted as a critic of empire like Fanon?