Hello, welcome back to Conversations with
Stephen Kamugasa. This is the third podcast
episode in our Genocide series. Today's guest
is Dr. Jochen Lingelbach, a postdoctoral
research assistant at the Chair of African
History in the Cluster of Excellence at the
University of Bayreuth. Dr. Lingelbach is
a graduate of the University of Leipzig where
he obtained a PhD in African Studies in 2018.
Jochen is the author of On the Ages of Whiteness,
Polish Refugees in British Colonial Africa
During and After the Second World War. In
this episode, We discuss the topic, genocide,
how to challenge identity politics in the
21st century. Dr. Jochen Lindgobar, welcome.
Yeah, thank you for the kind introduction,
Stephen. And thank you for inviting me here
and your interest in my work. Thank you.
It would seem that the old adage, when America
sneezes, the rest of the world catches a
cold. is accurate after all. Following his
campaign on the platform of America First,
Donald Trump was initially elected President
of the United States of America in 2017.
Immigration was one of Trump's platform's
evocative themes. Immigration is a pressing
political issue throughout Europe, with some
fearing that it would turn liberal democracies
into illiberal hotbeds of bigotry. Europe
is now on the verge of descending into a
new dark age that would make a mockery of
the 70 million plus lives lost during the
Second World War in the effort to rid the
world of the supremacist ideology of the
Nazis. Jochen, why is a nice German boy interested
in the subject of immigration so much so
that you have made a career of it as a scholar
and is there something in your childhood
you wish to share with us to help us understand
your interest in the trials and tribulations
of immigrants generally speaking?
Thank you Stephen for the question. First
of all Apart from many others who are interested
in this particular history of Polish refugees
in Africa, I have no direct personal connection
with this, so I rather came by accident to
it. But still, I think on a deeper level,
there's an interest that comes also from
my childhood and my family history. So my
grandparents on my mother's side were refugees
or ex-Polish at the end of the Second World
War, came from the eastern part that is now
Poland, but was then, before the war, eastern
part of Germany. So there's... And my mother
grew up as a refugee child, so to say. So
I think that's something that comes from
there, and a general interest in immigration
and in displacement also. And a general interest
in inequality. But... Coming to this topic,
I was rather coming from my interest that
is all connected to this. That's an interest
in colonial history, in German colonial history,
and then in colonial history in East Africa.
So that's the detour I took, and then I came
rather by accident to this, but I come to
this next.
On page one of On the Ages of Whiteness,
under the heading of introduction, you write,
and I quote, White refugees are not the expected
inhabitants of the African colonies. From
1942 to 1950, however, nearly 20,000 Poles
lived in refugee camps in the British colonies
of East and Central Africa. They were hosted
in such diverse societies as Uganda, Kenya,
Tanganyika, and Northern and Southern Rhodesia.
and lived in over 20 camps ranging in size
from a few hundred to nearly 4,000. How did
they fit into the racial hierarchies of colonial
societies? Were they part of the colonizers
due to that European origin or had they more
in common with the colonized? Your book raises
many fascinating questions. made of which
you answer persuasively. Please tell us how
it came about and its true background.
Yeah. Maybe I start first how I came to the
topic. And this is, as I said, rather by
accident. I was studying in Dar es Salaam
in Tanzania and did my master thesis on the
colonial history and segregation in the town.
And in the course of this, I was interviewing
old residents of Dar es Salaam and asking
them just about how was it in the past, how
was it under British colonial rule, and so
on. And then one old man just told me that
there were some Polish refugees in town.
I was like, okay, it's not possible. I think
he makes up something. But then I started
researching on it and asking other people,
and I learned about this history. And it
was, yeah, I thought no one has ever written
about it. this immediately drew my interest
because I was just curious how this worked
out because all of the things that I knew
about colonial history was that there was
quite a strong difference between rather
powerful, rich, white people ruling people
and poorer, less powerful Africans. So that's
like the basic social hierarchies were there
and then you have about 20,000 white poor
refugees coming in. So I was just interested
in what happened then. And so I started to
learn more about this history, more about
Polish history, which I was not aware of
very much before. So let me maybe give a
brief background because usually people don't
know how they ended up there. And it's like
the prehistory to my main interest, but I
think it's important to know that. All this
started in 1939 when Germany attacked Poland,
and at the same time the Soviet Union occupied
the eastern part of Poland, which was agreed
at that time in the Hitler-Stalin Pact. Then
the people I look at came from the eastern
part of Poland, and they were part of a larger
group that was deported mainly in 1940-41,
deported to the Soviet interior, to labor
camps there, had to endure quite hard times
there. Until 1941, the Germans attacked the
Soviet Union and suddenly broke this pact.
And the Soviet Union was in dire need of
support against this massive attack from
the Germans. So they agreed, the Polish exile
government that was sitting at that time,
because they had to flee the country, they
were sitting in London, They agreed a British-brokered
agreement with the Soviet government, and
that included the release of all Polish civilians
in the Soviet Union at that time in order
to form a Polish army that was supposed to
fight against the Germans with the Allies.
And this army was eventually, and the people
who were released, was eventually transferred
to Iran, where the British army was sitting
and also was quite, in heavy need of support
of additional fighters there because the
Germans were threatening to go across there
as well. So they formed the Polish Army in
Iran, but with the evacuation of the Polish
soldiers, there also came civilians. And
then the British didn't really know what
to do with them. They had just had these
40,000 people sitting in Iran in camps and
had to find a place anywhere in the world.
because they knew if they want the army,
they have to take care of their relatives
and civilians. So that's, then they went
around, tried to find any place and the only
place and the only governments that could
not say no to this group of refugees were
in the British colonies. So there were, some
went to India and the 20,000, roughly 20,000
people I look at, went to Eastern African
colonies. So they went mainly, as I said,
mainly to what is today Tanzania and Uganda,
and some to Kenya, some to Zambia, some to
Zimbabwe, at that time it was northern and
southern Tunisia, and some few to South Africa.
So there they lived in some 20 refugee camps
until the end of the war, and as most of
them didn't want to go return voluntarily
back to Poland, because at that time after
the war Poland was part of the Soviet sphere
of influence, so it was communist dominated,
they didn't want to go back to Poland. So
in the end, most of them resettled to the
UK, some in other countries, some also voluntarily
went back, and in 1951, the last refugee
camp was eventually closed. So this is briefly
the background history. And the main reaction
of the colonial administration was They couldn't
say no to the refugee influx, but they were
not happy with it. It was just, okay, they
had to contribute to the war effort, they
had to contribute to what London was calling
them, so they had to take them in, but they
were all the time saying, yeah, we just take
them for the time of the war, we don't want
them permanently here. And they mainly did
three things with the refugees. On the one
hand, they were isolating them, in refugee
camps, trying to have them not mingle too
much with other people, which nevertheless
happened, but they tried to reduce it to
the lowest amount. And the second was that
they were materially supporting them, to
lift them up, because they were quite poor,
peasant class, rural background, where they
came from, completely, yeah, they lost everything
in the deportation, so they were largely
quite poor people. And to increase the difference,
the social hierarchy, and to keep up this
image of supposed white superiority, that
white people are more richer, better established,
the British supported them quite well in
the refugee camps. I mean, it was not luxuries,
but nevertheless, they were given pocket
money, good food and medical supplies. And
the third thing that after the war, they
were quite clear that they don't want to
keep them there and want to get rid of them
as soon as possible. So they all the time,
the colonial governments pushed and said,
okay, when do they go? When do they go? So
we don't want them here for sure. So that's
maybe briefly. in this. Thank you.
Again, under the heading of introduction,
you write on page 10 the following, and I
quote, this study is not only about colonial
whiteness, but about forced migration as
well. In the scholarly writings about migration,
identity and the possibilities of renegotiating
and remaking identities is a central topic.
The entry into a new social setting necessitates
a renegotiation of the migrant's social position.
But I caution here against the use of the
term identity. Jochen, the issue of identity
is one that features prominently in this
book. Please define what you mean by identity,
and why the quotient?
positions, and this can change, and there
are people who don't fit into the categories,
and that's what interests me here, because
this group of Polish refugees were white,
but they were, on the other hand, still not
the same as the British, and didn't have
the same position of the colonizer. So it
was like this in between groups, and I think
that there's a danger if we take identity
for granted, that it's, that we, yeah, people
just have to fit into one box and people
don't necessarily fit into boxes. What I
built on in my book is a text by Rogers Brubaker
and Fred Cooper that is called Beyond Identity.
And they are the caution against the use
of identity that it's quite blurry and quite
a lot of things are put under this term and
they argue for, and I find it quite convincing
for using more precise terms, especially
analytically in scholarly work. And one example
is identification. So that is how people
identify on the one hand, identify themselves,
if they identify with others. And there's
categorization that is putting people into
boxes. And that's not necessarily the same,
that people who are categorized as such and
such, that they really feel and identify
with this category. And then there's a third
thing, and that I also think is quite important,
that the feeling of groupness, what they
call it, that people feel connected. And
that's, I think, what makes identity strong.
It's not the category where you put it. I
mean, all of this interacts with each other,
but it's different things if you look precisely.
And this feeling of groupness and connectedness,
feeling connected to others who are on the
same level. Yeah. So, and I think that's
the way I try to approach it, to not say
it's identity, but to look precisely what
is doing and seeing it as what is happening
there, who is identifying whom. So who is
categorizing, who is putting whom into category.
And I think that's this process real terms
of identification, categorization and so
on. And I think that's important to not take
it for granted, but to see who is doing this
actually.
Yeah. Speaking of identity, You write on
page 188 the following, and I quote, one
day he was sitting with some white men on
the veranda having a drink before lunch.
When an African woman servant passed by and
entered the house, there was no reaction
by the white men at all. And the conversation
went on uninterrupted. Next, a Polish woman
servant entered the house. This time the
conversation was interrupted shortly. The
men shifted uneasily in their seats, but
did not greet her. When finally a white woman
who was not Polish passed the main, they
stood up and exchanged greetings with her.
Please talk to us about the colonial notion
that domestic servants operate smoothly in
situations where servants and employers are
considered different from each other. And
how did the arrival of poor Polish refugees
challenge this notion?
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for pulling out
this anecdote, which I really like. It's
from anthropologist John Barnes, who wrote
this, like his own observations back then.
And I think this scene captures quite well
this in-between position of the Polish refugees
in that case. And I think that as a basic
thing, that social hierarchies and exploitation
and domestic work is very often built on
the assumption of difference, that the people
doing the domestic work are a different social
group than the people employing them. And
in this anecdote, you see that there's no
problem. Like this white man sitting in the
veranda, they are used to African servants
and they just ignore them completely. They
are not social beings for them in that regard.
So they don't have to greet. They don't,
yeah, they invisibilize them, so to say.
And the same for this white woman, which
I think was British. She's clearly part of
their group, so they greet her. So, yeah.
But then this Polish woman is bringing an
unease, and I think that's the uneasiness
of when people don't fit into the categories.
And for them, in that situation, they didn't
fit into the category because she was obviously
white, so they're supposed to be part of
her group. But on the other hand, she was
a domestic servant, and I think that comes
out quite clearly, the uneasiness they have
with her. And I think that's what I like
about this anecdote and found interesting.
And I think that, yeah, this assumption of
difference is like a base for exploitation
for social hierarchies to say, okay, these
people are others, are different from us,
so to say. And that's what makes it so powerful,
the different identifications in that case.
On page 93 of the book, you write thus, and
I quote, Despite the universalist rhetoric
and the dedication to principles of non-discrimination,
the humanitarian activities of the IRO and
the early UNHCR were largely limited to European
refugees and DPs. The privileged position
of the Polish refugees in Africa shows that
this limitation was based on racial are not
regional categorization. While the international
refugee regime operated in Africa in the
1940s, its assistance was limited to the
white refugees there. Jochen, please take
us through the UNHCR's founding history.
First of all, how does race fit into the
narrative around the UNHCR's professionalism.
That is, is there a problem with race today?
Yeah, thank you. On your last question, sure.
I mean, racism is a global problem as it
was then and it still is. So it's also a
problem within humanitarian organizations
and UNHCR. So I think this is quite clear.
go a bit through the founding history. To
simplify it a bit, UNHCR had two predecessor
organizations. The first was the United Nations
Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.
It was founded in 1943, so when the Second
World War was still going on, but it was
with the intention to plan for the post-war
period. to take care of displaced persons
and also to rebuild the countries in Europe.
And this was quite limited to Europe. They
also had a program in China. But look here
on the European side. UNRRA was followed
in 1947, was then ended and was followed
by the UN International Refugee Organization,
IRO, which was like the first specialized
UN organization. And then out of IRO, again,
the UNHCR evolved in 1951. It gets a bit
more complicated if we go into the details,
but that's like roughly the line. And generally
in the historiography, in history writing,
it's UNRRA and IRO were very much focused
on Europe. on especially the DP operations
were focused on Europe and regionally limited.
So it was, yeah, just for the countries that
were, had been occupied by the Nazis more
or less. But as I learned from my own, in
my work is that they also operated in Africa
as well. Because the Polish refugees then
did come under the mandate of UNRRA and the
IRO. before UNHCR was founded, they were
already not in the refugee status anymore,
but they did come under this mandate, and
other refugees in Africa did not come under
the mandate, and as well Indian refugees
from India and Pakistan in 1948, the millions
of people who were the partitioned refugees,
they did not come under IRO. And so I argue,
based on this, I argue that it was not only
the regional limit to Europe, but they were
taking care of refugees who were in Africa,
but they were only taking care of the European
refugees who had found their way to Africa.
So, yeah. Setting aside your book, you wrote
the following in an article that was published
in the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth
History. on June 22nd, 2022, and I quote,
historians of the international refugee regime
rightly identify the European post-war era
as a crucial site for the emergency of the
United Nations refugee organizations, legislation,
and procedures. International organizations
like UNRRA and its direct successor, the
United Nations International Refugee Organization,
were set up to care for and control Europe's
displaced persons. They developed procedures
and policies that formed the basis of the
1951 Geneva Convention and the UNHCR core
pillars of today's international refugee
regime. Please share with us the little-known
fact about how the British colonial experience
shaped the UN refugee system that you speak
of. Furthermore, how crucial is it that we
both particularize and universalize the history
of refugees?
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for that. Maybe
I start with the second question, and I think
particular rise and to universalize. I think
the important thing in writing refugee history
is on the one hand to say people are always
fleeing from war and from misery to places
that are safer. And that was during the Second
World War that was from Europe to Africa.
And today it's from some African countries
or countries to Europe or in the Americas
from the south of the north. So I think that's
That's important to keep in mind that it's,
what is today maybe a place of refuge or
a place people fleeing to can tomorrow be
a place where people flee from because there's
conflict. We also saw this with Ukrainian
refugees, for example, who came to Europe.
And I think that's important to keep this
in mind that this is a general condition
and that's why it's important to always be
open to people fleeing. Because on the next
day, this could be you. And, but on the other
hand, as a historian, I think it's always
important to particularize, so to say, okay,
to look at the specific context and to say,
okay, not every refugee is the same. So people
have different abilities and different resources
and are differently treated according to
different forms of where they stand in terms
of discrimination and so on. And I think
that's, what can be seen here if you see
how rather well the refugee camps were. And
maybe going back to the article, you said
that it's about a group of Greek refugees
who then ended up in the Eastern Congo in
refugee camps there. And observers described
at that time these were some of the best
refugee camps in the world. So because they
were rather well treated by the Belgian colonial
authorities there, And if you contrast this
with current day refugee camps in Greece,
then you see that it's quite a difference
in treatment of people. So that's the particular.
But going back to the colonial experience,
the British colonial experience, as I said
in this text, I'm looking at this Greek group,
and they were part, like the Polish, and
also some from Yugoslavia who stayed in the
Middle East, people who were hosted by the
British Colonial Administration in the colonies
in Africa. And the United Nations Relief
and Rehabilitation Administration, UNRRA,
they had their very first field mission in
the Middle East. And this was with refugee
camps that were set up by the British Imperial
Refugee, I call it Imperial Refugee Regime.
in connection to the international refugee
regime, what we have today. It built on this.
And so these first UN refugee professionalizing
humanitarians, they were working in camps
and together with British colonial administrators.
And that's where I think that some of the
ways of treating refugees and the infrastructure
is in place so that this transferred from
the colonial into the so-called international
or the UN system. And I think that's an important
point to look at. And that's what I do in
some of my work now. So, yeah.
The title of our podcast is Genocide, How
to Challenge Identity Politics in the 21st
Century. Now, Emily Arnold-Fernandez, an
adjunct professor with the Refugee Law Initiative
at the University of London School of Advanced
Study, published a paper entitled, The Global
Compact on Refugees, Inadequate Substitute
or Useful Complement? The paper argues that,
and I quote, The substitution of the Global
Compact for Refugee Convention is problematic
from a human rights perspective, because
the Global Compact makes very little provision
for refugees' rights and interests, instead
focusing on the rights and interests of states.
Jochen, in the context of our podcast theme,
please define for us what you understand
by the Global Compact on Refugees. And in
the current age of identity politics and
conservative nationalism, how should the
rights and welfare of migrants be protected?
Yeah, thanks so much. Yeah, I'm not really
an expert in international legal things and
the Global Compact on Refugees, but as far
as I understand it and see it, I think it's
quite important to keep up the human rights
idea and also the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights and the Geneva Refugee Rights
Convention. And I think because, however
insufficiently fulfilled these universal
rights are, they are still And I think it's
important to criticize where they are not
fulfilled. But on the other hand, it still
has the idea and the aspirational ideal that
there should be rights. Every human being
on the world should have universal basic
rights. And I think that's the right to have
rights. And I think that's quite an important
safeguard against abuse. And I think it's
still important to keep up this ideal and
to strive towards it. Although it's clear
that it's not enforced and currently it looks
at the other way. But I think, yeah, as the
author said, it's important to keep up this
rights discourse and that is not something
that is given to people, but people have
it already. They have their rights. And that's
important to insist on this. And people have
the right to flee and they have the right
to not be push back at the borders, although
it happens every day, but I think that's
important to keep this ideal up because that's
what we should strive for.
As a scholar specializing in the study of
refugees, what is your biggest fear?
I think it's connected to the erosion of
refugee protection that we are seeing right
now and the rise of right-wing racist nationalism
in many countries around the world and especially
in Europe, which is the context I know best.
You can see that it's quite a race to the
bottom of different European governments
trying to bring ever more harsh and strict
and bad policies against immigration. I've
just been two weeks ago at the Polish-Belarusian
border at a seminar there where they just
have, the Polish government with EU support
has built a huge fence through the forest,
topped with barbed wire and full of military
installations to keep out people who are
fleeing from misery and from war. I think
that's quite dehumanizing and horrible to
see this trend. People still try to get over
it, but then they get hurt more, and they
take ever more dangerous routes and die.
And I think that's maybe the biggest fear,
that there's an increasingly open dismissal
of basic human rights and basic right for
asylum, and that this trend is getting worse
and worse. And I think that's on the one
hand, it's people are suffering. That's the
worst thing with it. But also it's, it has
repercussions on the societies that are building
the walls. They are getting themselves more
authoritarian inside. And I think that's,
yeah, that's how these both are connected.
And that's part of the research group I'm
currently working in, in Bielefeld. And that's,
looking in the way and to to say that when
when societies build walls around them that
also changes the societies within the walls
and that's not changing them to the better
but but rather uh yeah closing them and making
them more authoritarian and this and this
is a cycle i think that's that's worrying
the most and i think that's what we have
to try to work against yeah finally johan
please advise our listeners where they may
find your book
on the ages of whiteness?
Thank you. Yeah, I think you can, the first
address is the publisher website, that's
barakhan.com. And then I think in all the
larger online book ordering services, you
can get them, can get the book. And if you
live in a region where it's difficult to
order the book, you can still always write
me an email and figure out a way to get you
at least a soft copy of the book. But so,
yeah, I'm happy to to be in conversation
about this.
Dr. Jochen Lingelbach, thank you very much
for being a guest on this podcast.
Thank you so much, Stephen, for organizing
this, for inviting me and for your great
questions and interest in my work. giving
me the platform and yeah, I think it's really
important what you're doing here. Thank you.
This podcast was brought to you by the Kamgassa
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The fourth episode in the series is entitled
Uganda in a Multipolar Brave New World Order,
an interview with Dr. Helen Epstein, a visiting
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health in the Global and International Studies
program at Bard College in the USA. The podcast
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