The Anthropology Of Genocide - WNLibrary

confronting genocide of indigenous peoples 65
Kuper (1985:151) is emphatic that a major cause of the destruction of indigenous
peoples has been colonization, especially in the “conquest” and “pacification”
of indigenous groups. He does remind us, however, that “[s]ome of the annihilations
of indigenous peoples arose not so much by deliberate act, but in the course
of what may be described as a genocidal process: massacres, appropriation of land,
introduction of diseases, and arduous conditions of labor” (Kuper 1988:156). He
draws a distinction (1985:150) between what he calls “domestic genocides,” those
arising from internal divisions within a society, and those genocides that occur in
the context of international warfare.
Domestic genocides can be subdivided on the basis of the nature of the victim
group and the social contexts in which they are perpetrated (Kuper ibid.:150). Domestic
genocides, he says (ibid.:150–55), include the following: (a) those against indigenous
peoples; (b) those against what he terms “hostage groups,” vulnerable minorities
who serve as hostages to the fortunes of the dominant groups in the state;
(c) those against groups in a two-tiered state structure following the end of colonialism;
and (d) those committed against ethnic, racial, or religious groups seeking
power, autonomy or greater equality. The latter type of genocide, according to Kuper
(ibid.:155–56), would include the victimization of Guatemala’s Indians, who
constitute more than half of the country’s population.
Cases of genocide in the context of international warfare include those that
occurred when the Chinese invaded Tibet and the occupation by Indonesia of East
Timor. Kuper (ibid.:157) also cites the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
in 1945 and the widespread destruction caused by the United States in Vietnam,
Laos, and Cambodia during the Vietnam War as examples of genocide. Some
scholars disagreed adamantly with Kuper that either the atomic bombings or the
Vietnam War constituted genocide, since there was arguably no intent on the part
of the United States to “destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or
religious group, as such.” In light of the fact that political mass murder is not included
in the United Nations Convention on Genocide, Kuper (ibid.:26) argued for
the reinstatement of political mass murder, in part because that form of mass murder
takes substantial numbers of lives and because in some cases political mass murders
tend to be tied in with ethnic and religious massacres, the Holocaust being a
classic example. Another example of a political mass murder that was brought
about by policies that led to starvation is the Soviet treatment of the peoples of
the Ukraine (Mace 1997).
Minority groups that are in areas where there is competition for resources frequently
face the threat of intimidation, oppression, and destruction, especially if
they actively oppose the efforts of outside agencies and individuals (Gurr 1993, 2000;
Hitchcock 1997). Kuper (1985:151) sees contemporary small-scale indigenous societies
as “the so-called victims of progress, victims, that is, of predatory economic development”
(see also Bodley 1999). Smith (1987:24–25) distinguished three types of
genocide, one of which, utilitarian genocide, was characterized by indigenous peoples
being subjected to “genocidal attacks in the name of progress and develop