Journal of Genocide Research (2008), 10(4),

December, 475– 477

Settlers, imperialism, genocide.

Introduction: apologies and the need
to right historical wrongs
JÜRGEN ZIMMERER and DOMINIK J. SCHALLER

During a state visit in Libya at the end of August 2008, Italian Prime Minister
Silvio Berlusconi promised Libya financial investments of E3.4 billion over the
next 25 years as compensation for Italian atrocities committed during occupation
and war in Libya between 1911 and 1942.1 In a document handed to Libyan leader
Muammar al-Gaddafi, Italy formally apologised for colonial injustices, bringing to
an end a dispute from which Italian –Libyan relations had suffered for more than
four decades. In Italy, however, the apology and the promised reparations
were met with some critical responses. A veteran organization of former colonial
soldiers and settlers for example, representing some 20,000 people, demanded
compensation for their own losses when the colonial empire collapsed.
Italy seemed quite an unlikely candidate for this kind of apology, since Italian
colonialism had been a rather short-lived affair and is commonly considered as
somewhat insignificant, both for Italian history, and for that of colonialism gener-
ally. In addition, Berlusconi can certainly not be accused of being a leftist liberal,
whose conscience demanded an apology. The apology was rather a rational politi-
cal choice. At the heart of it apparently lay Italy’s need to secure Libya’s goodwill
in the fight against illegal African immigrants, not to mention the desire for econ-
omic cooperation between the countries, especially regarding the supply of Libyan
gas and oil. Italy has Europe’s longest coastline and thousands of African refugees
try to cross the Mediterranean Sea every year to reach Italy and with that the
sanctuary of the European Union. Since it has proven virtually impossible to
seal off Italy’s long coast by police or military forces, now Libya is being
asked to prevent the refugees from reaching the Mediterranean in the first place.
There is neither time nor space here to discuss the deep irony in the fact that an
apology for colonial crimes was issued to gain a former colony’s support for a
policy which aims again at securing Europe’s exceptional status and wealth,
and which, by doing so, again excludes the majority of those people who suffered
most under colonialism. It is, however, a good example of the increased import-
ance and power of the former colonies, which has started to dictate a change in

ISSN 1462-3528 print; ISSN 1469-9494 online/08/040475-3 # 2008 Research Network in Genocide Studies
DOI: 10.1080/14623520802563630
JÜRGEN ZIMMERER AND DOMINIK J. SCHALLER

the way global colonialism is remembered and how it is dealt with retrospectively.
Postcolonial theory has repeatedly expressed that colonialism was to a not small
extent built on the shaping and control of various bodies of knowledge of the
world. It now seems that former colonised countries are reshaping and decolonis-
ing the epistemological systems of the modern world. The increasing debate on
colonial atrocities certainly adds to this.
The Italian example is also the last in a series of apologies that touch upon the
issues of colonial mass violence and genocide, although without expressis verbis
accepting this claim. This seems to be the trend thus far. Where governments are
forced to accept colonial guilt and apologise, they try to circumvent the issue of
genocide. The apology by the Australian Prime Minister Rudd on February 13,
2008 is an almost classic example.2 Whereas he accepted responsibility for
the ‘Stolen Generation’, he did not mention the genocide against indigenous
Australians in the early days of colonisation. Whereas the policies surrounding
the ‘Stolen Generation’ can be explained as an individual error, an aberration
within a functioning political and social system, the questions surrounding the
violent and genocidal white settlement of Australia challenge the moral legitimi-
zation of the entire project of white Australia. And this is not only tangent to
Australian history: the question of colonial genocide is particularly disturbing,
since it calls into question the Europeanization of the globe as a modernizing
project. It undermines the moral justification of the ‘West’ as such.
Politically it is very difficult to find a consensus—and therefore support for a
policy of apology—as the descendants of the ‘perpetrators’ (the white settlers)
still comprise the majority or a large proportion of the population of former
settler colonies, and therefore control political life and public discourse. Further-
more, recognition of colonial genocides undermines the image of the past on
which national identity is built.
So far the only explicit apology for colonial genocide comes from Germany.3
It relates to the attempted murder of the Herero people between 1904 and 1908
in German Southwest Africa (Namibia). There, on the eve of the centenary
commemorative events, the German Minister for Economic Cooperation and
Development, Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, declared:
“A century ago, the oppressors—blinded by colonialist fervour—became agents of violence,
discrimination, racism and annihilation in Germany’s name.
The atrocities committed at that time would today be termed genocide—and nowadays a
General von Trotha would be prosecuted and convicted. We Germans accept our historical
and moral responsibility and the guilt incurred by Germans at that time.
And so, in the words of the Lord’s Prayer that we share, I ask you to forgive us our
trespasses.”4

In a semi-official conference aimed at reconciliation in Germany a few months

later, Wieczorek-Zeul referred directly to the genocide in Namibia, without the
limiting remarks, as something that would “nowadays be called genocide”.5
As was to be expected, this admission fuelled the Herero’s demands for repara-
tion.6 Why is it, the Herero representatives asked, that Germany admitted one

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genocide, the Holocaust, and paid reparations, and then finally admitted to a
second one, yet refused reparation? Continuing racism was the answer by
Kuaima Riruako, the Paramount Chief of the Herero.7 The matter of reparation
is still unresolved at the end of the year 2008. It reveals, however, those
debates the former colonial powers and the majority white population in the
former settler colonies will have to face in the near and medium future.
First of all, however, it is historical reconstruction and analysis that is the task
of the moment. Only after one knows exactly what has happened will one be able
to assess and debate forms of acknowledgement, commemoration and righting
historical wrongs.
To contribute to this is the hope of the editors of this issue, as it was with the
previous edition on “Settlers, Imperialism, Genocide”.

Notes and References

1 Die Welt, September 1, 2008, available at: http://www.welt.de/welt_print/article2377797/Berlusconi-
entschuldigt-sich-fuer-Verbrechen-der-Kolonialzeit.html (accessed October 6, 2008).
2 See Tony Barta, “Sorry and not sorry, in Australia: how the apology to the stolen generations buried a history of
genocide”, Journal of Genocide Research, Vol 10, No 2, 2008, pp 201 –214.
3 See Juergen Zimmerer, “Colonial Genocide: The Herero and Nama War (1904–1908) in German South
West Africa and its Significance”, in Dan Stone (ed.), The Historiography of Genocide, (London: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2007), pp 323– 343.
4 Speech of Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, Omahakaris, Namibia, August 14, 2004, available at: http://
www.windhuk.diplo.de/Vertretung/windhuk/en/03/Bilaterale__Beziehungen/seite__rede__bmz__engl__
okakahandja.html (accessed October, 6 2008).
5 The German Herero War—One Hundred Years After. 1904–2004: Realities, Traumas, Perspectives. Bremen,
Germany, November 18– 21, 2004.
6 Dominik J. Schaller, “The Struggle for Genocidal Exclusivity. The Perception of the Murder of the Namibian
Herero (1904– 08) in the Age of a New International Morality”, in: Jürgen Zimmerer and Michael Perraudin
(Eds.), German Colonialism and National Identity (London: Routledge, forthcoming).
7 Motion on the Ovaherero Genocide introduced in the Namibian Parliament by the honourable Kuaima Riruako,
paramount chief of the Ovaherero people, September 19, 2006, p 7. The text can be found on the website of the
Association of the Ovaherero Genocide in the U.S.A., available at: http://ovahererogenocideassociationusa.
org/images/Document%20pdfs/MOTION%20ON%20THE%20OVAHERERO%20GENOCIDE.pdf (accessed,
October 6, 2008).

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