“Colonial Psychology†and Race

If “colonial politics†denotes the objectives of a metropolitan power vis-à -vis its colony, then, for purposes of this paper, we may define “colonial psychology†as the frame of reference that determines the attitudes of “metropolitans†vis-à -vis the “colonial problem.†By “metropolitans†we mean the inhabitants of those Western societies that are linked to part of the non-West by the historical, political, economic and psychological ties that have always accentuated the dominance of the West. By “colony†we shall here mean only the areas with a multiracial population of which a white element considers itself so integrally a part that it feels itself more strongly associated with its own “colonial†society than with the metropolitan country of its origins.