Imperialism and Racial Divisions

37.4.2: Imperialism and Racial Divisions

European imperialists used power disparities and pseudo-science to perpetuate the myth of divergent Tutsi and Hutu racial identities.

Learning Objective

Explain how European imperialists encouraged categorizing Rwandans on the basis of ethnicity

Key Points

  • The construction of divergent ethnic “Tutsi” and “Hutu” identities occurred during the era of European colonization from the late 1880s to the 1950s.
  • The Germans were not interested in disrupting social affairs – their sole concern was the efficient extraction of natural resources and trade of profitable cash crops. Therefore, their strategy was to reaffirm Tutsi chiefdoms over Hutus to maintain administrative order.
  • The German presence had mixed effects on the authority of Rwandan governing powers, not only helping the Mwami increase control over Rwandan affairs, but also weakening Tutsi power due to the introduction of capitalist forces and increased integration with outside markets.
  • Germany’s defeat in World War I allowed Belgian forces to conquer Rwanda, and Belgian involvement was far more intrusive than German administration.
  • Influenced by racialized attitudes, Belgian social scientists declared that Tutsis must be descendants of the Hamites, who shared a purported closer bloodline to Europeans, and that the Tutsis and Hutus composed two fundamentally different ethno-racial groups.
  • The Belgians’ pseudo-scientific perspective justified Tutsi racial superiority and Hutu oppression for decades to come.

Examples

Key Term

Mwami
A chiefly title usually translated as “king.”

Unlike much of the rest of Africa, Rwanda and the Great Lakes region was not divided up during the 1884 Berlin Conference. Instead, the region was divided in an 1890 conference in Brussels. Rwanda and Burundi were given to the German Empire as colonial spheres of interest in exchange for Germany renouncing all claims on Uganda. The poor-quality maps referenced in these agreements left Belgium with a claim on the western half of the country, and after several border skirmishes, the final borders of the colony were not established until 1900. These borders contained the kingdom of Rwanda as well as a group of smaller kingdoms on the shore of Lake Victoria.

 

German and Belgian Colonization

Germany

The construction of divergent ethnic “Tutsi” and “Hutu” identities occurred during the era of European colonization from the late 1880s to the 1950s. German colonialism did little to alter the existing stratified social system. The Germans were not interested in disrupting social affairs – their sole concern was the efficient extraction of natural resources and trade of profitable cash crops. Colonial bureaucrats relied heavily on native Tutsi chiefs to maintain order over the Hutu lower classes and collect taxes. Thus, the German affirmation of the stratified social structure was utilized by the Tutsi aristocracy as justification for minority rule over the lower-class Hutu masses.

The German presence had mixed effects on the authority of Rwandan governing powers. The Germans helped the Mwami increase their control over Rwandan affairs, but Tutsi power weakened with the introduction of capitalist forces and via increased integration with outside markets and economies. Money came to be seen by many Hutus as a replacement for cattle, in terms of both economic prosperity and for purposes of social standing. Tutsi power was also weakened by Germany through the introduction of the head-tax on all Rwandans. As some Tutsis feared, the tax made the Hutus feel less bonded to their Tutsi patrons and more dependent on European foreigners. The head-tax also implied equality among those counted. Thus, despite Germany’s attempt to uphold traditional Tutsi domination of the Hutus, the Hutu began to shift their ideas surrounding this concept.

Mwami Palace

Mwami Palace: A reconstruction of the traditional Mwami’s palace at Nyanza, Rwanda.

Belgium

Germany’s defeat in World War I allowed Belgian forces to conquer Rwanda. Belgian involvement in the region was far more intrusive than German administration. In an era of Social Darwinism, European anthropologists claimed to identify a distinct “Hamitic race” that was superior to native “Negroid” populations. Influenced by racialized attitudes, Belgian social scientists declared that the Tutsis, who wielded political control in Rwanda, must be descendants of the Hamites, who shared a purported closer bloodline to Europeans. The Belgians concluded that the Tutsis and Hutus composed two fundamentally different ethno-racial groups. Thus, the Belgians viewed the Tutsis as more civilized, superior, and most importantly, more European than the Hutus.

This perspective justified placement of societal control in the hands of the Tutsis at the expense of the Hutus, establishing a comprehensive race theory that would dictate Rwandan society until independence: Tutsi racial superiority and Hutu oppression. The institutionalization of Tutsi and Hutu ethnic divergence was accomplished through administrative, political, economic, and educational means. Initially, Belgian administrators used an expedient method of classification based on the number of cattle a person owned – anyone with ten or more cattle was considered a member of the aristocratic Tutsi class. However, the presence of wealthy Hutu was problematic. Then in 1933, the colonial administration institutionalized a more rigid ethnic classification by issuing ethnic identification cards, officially branding every Rwandan as Tutsi, Hutu, or Twa.

Tutsis began to believe the myth of their superior racial status and exploited their power over the Hutu majority. A history of Rwanda that justified the existence of these racial distinctions was written. No historical, archaeological, or linguistic traces have been found to date that confirm this official history. The observed differences between the Tutsis and the Hutus are about the same as those evident between the different French social classes in the 1950s. The way people nourished themselves explains a large part of the differences observed; for instance, the Tutsis, who raised cattle, traditionally drank more milk than the Hutu, who were farmers.

Post-Colonial Framework

As Belgium’s era of colonial dominance over Rwanda drew to a close during the 1950s, Hutu and Tutsi racial identities had become firmly institutionalized. Manipulative racial engineering by the Belgians and the despotic practices of the Tutsi chieftains they empowered helped to drive together the disparate Rwandan sub-classes under the “Hutu” moniker. When the Belgians finally left Rwanda in the early 1960s, the politics of racial and ethnic division remained. In the decades that followed, regimes under both Hutu ultra-nationalists and moderate conciliators would demonstrate how the labels of Hutu and Tutsi could be molded to fit political expediency.

Attributions