View source for Civilizing mission

{{Expand French|date=May 2023}}
{{short description|Rationale or justification for colonialism}}
{{Use American English|date=December 2021}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=December 2021}}
{{Indigenous rights}}
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The '''civilizing mission''' ({{langx|es|misión civilizadora}};  {{langx|pt|Missão civilizadora}}; {{langx|fr|Mission civilisatrice}}) is a political rationale for [[military intervention]] and for [[colonization]] purporting to facilitate the cultural assimilation of [[indigenous peoples]], especially in the period from the 15th to the 20th centuries. As a principle of [[Western culture]], the term was most prominently used in justifying French<ref name="Burrows1986">{{cite journal |last1=Burrows |first1=Mathew  |title='Mission civilisatrice': French Cultural Policy in the Middle East, 1860–1914  |journal=The Historical Journal |date=1986 |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=109–135 |doi=10.1017/S0018246X00018641 |jstor=2639258 |s2cid=154801621 |issn=0018-246X}}</ref> [[colonialism]] in the late-15th to mid-20th centuries. The civilizing mission was the cultural justification for the colonization of [[French rule in Algeria|French Algeria]], [[French West Africa]], [[French Indochina]], [[Portuguese Angola]] and [[Portuguese Guinea]], [[Portuguese Mozambique]] and [[Portuguese Timor]], among other colonies. The civilizing mission also was a popular justification for the British{{Sfn|Mitchell|1991|pp=}} and German{{Sfn|Tezcan|2012|pp=21–33}}{{Sfn|Thurman|2016|p=}} colonialism. In the [[Russian Empire]], it was also associated with the [[Russian conquest of Central Asia]] and the [[Russification]] of that region.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Hofmeister |first=Ulrich |date=2016|title=Civilization and Russification in Tsarist Central Asia, 1860–1917|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/44631473|journal=Journal of World History|volume=27|issue=3|pages=411–442|jstor=44631473|issn=1045-6007}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1176325685|title=Civilizing missions in the twentieth century|date=2020|first1= Boris |last1=Barth |first2= Rolf |last2=Hobson|isbn=978-90-04-43812-5|location=Leiden|pages=6, 95–97|oclc=1176325685}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Shlapentokh|first=Dmitry|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EnsHyxPZfOIC&pg=PA23|title=Russia Between East and West: Scholarly Debates on Eurasianism|date=2007|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-15415-5|page=23|language=en}}</ref> The Western colonial powers claimed that, as Christian nations, they were duty bound to disseminate [[Western culture|Western civilization]] to what they perceived as heathen, [[primitive cultures]]. It was also applied by the [[Empire of Japan]], [[Korea under Japanese rule|which colonized Korea]].<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Palmer |first=Brandon |date=December 2020 |title=The March First Movement in America: The Campaign to Win American Support |url=https://www.dbpia.co.kr/Journal/articleDetail?nodeId=NODE10504563 |journal=[[Korea Journal]] |language=en |volume=60 |issue=4 |pages=209–214 |issn=0023-3900 |via=[[DBpia]]}}</ref><ref name="YNA 2019 1">{{Cite web |last=김 |first=상훈 |date=2019-02-14 |title=[외신속 3·1 운동] ① 그 날 그 함성…통제·조작의 '프레임' 뚫고 세계로 |url=https://www.yna.co.kr/view/AKR20190207090000009 |access-date=2024-04-30 |website=[[Yonhap News Agency]] |language=ko}}</ref>

==Origins==
In the eighteenth century, Europeans saw history as a linear, inevitable, and perpetual process of [[sociocultural evolution]] led by Western Europe.<ref>See [[Gilbert Rist]],''Le développement. Histoire d'une croyance occidentale''. Chapter 2: «Les métamorphose d'un mythe occidental», Paris 1996, pp. 48–80; ''The History of Development'', 3rd ed., 2008</ref> From the [[Reductionism|reductionist]] cultural perspective of Western Europe, colonialists saw non-Europeans as "backward nations", as people intrinsically incapable of socioeconomic [[progress]]. In France, the philosopher [[Marquis de Condorcet]] formally postulated the existence of a European "holy duty" to help non-European peoples "which, to civilize themselves, wait only to receive the means from us, to find brothers among Europeans, and to become their friends and disciples".<ref>{{cite book |author1=Condorcet |author1-link=Marquis de Condorcet  |title=Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès historique de l'esprit humain |date=1988 |orig-date=1795 |publisher=GF Flammarion |location=Paris |isbn=9782080704849  |page=269 |edition= |url=https://editions.flammarion.com/esquisse-d-un-tableau-historique-des-progres-de-l-esprit-humain/9782080704849 |access-date=20 February 2022 |language=fr |chapter=chapter 10}}</ref>

Modernization theory{{snd}}progressive transition from [[Traditional society|traditional]], premodern society to modern, industrialized society{{snd}}proposed that the economic self-development of a non-European people is incompatible with retaining their culture (mores, traditions, customs).<ref>{{cite book |first=Wolfgang |last=Knöbl |chapter=Theories That Won’t Pass Away: The Never-ending Story |editor-first=Gerard |editor-last=Delanty |editor-link=Gerard Delanty |editor2-first=Engin F. |editor2-last=Isin |title=Handbook of Historical Sociology |year=2003 |pages=96–107 [esp p. 97] }}</ref>  That breaking from their old culture is prerequisite to socioeconomic progress, by way of practical revolutions in the social, cultural, and religious institutions, which would change their collective psychology and mental attitude, philosophy and way of life, or to disappear.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Sadie |first1= J.&nbsp;L. |title=The Social Anthropology of Economic Underdevelopment |journal=The Economic Journal |date=1960 |volume=70 |issue=278 |pages=294–303 |doi=10.2307/2228729 |jstor= 2228729 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2228729 |access-date= |issn=0013-0133|url-access=subscription }}</ref>{{Rp|page=302}}<ref>{{cite book |last1=Berthoud |first1=Gérald |editor1-last=Sachs |editor1-first=Wolfgang |title=The Development Dictionary |date=1992 |publisher=Zed Books |location=London |isbn=978-1-85649-044-3 |pages=70–87 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2bi_kf7QAq4C&pg=PA70 |access-date= |language=en |chapter=Market}}</ref>{{Rp|pages=72–73}}<ref> About the disappearance of indigenous people as the 'price' of modernization, see John H. Bodley, ''Victims of progress'', 3rd ed., Mountain View, Calif:Mayfield Pub. Co., 1990</ref> Therefore, [[development criticism]] sees economic development as a continuation of the civilizing mission. That to become civilized invariably means to become more "like us", therefore "civilizing a people" means that every society must become a capitalist [[Consumerism|consumer society]], by renouncing their native culture to become [[Westernization|Westernized]].<ref>Rostow, Walter. ''The Stages of Economic Growth: A non-communist manifesto'' (1960); on Rostow, see Rist 1996, Chapter 6.</ref> ''Cultivation'' of land and people has been a similarly employed concept, used instead of ''civilizing'' in German speaking colonial contexts to press for colonization and [[cultural imperialism]] through "extensive cultivation" and "culture work".<ref name="Zollmann 2020 pp. 109–142">{{cite book | last=Zollmann | first=Jakob | series=Global Histories of Education | title=Education and Development in Colonial and Postcolonial Africa | chapter=Becoming a Good Farmer – Becoming a Good Farm Worker: On Colonial Educational Policies in Germany and German South-West Africa, Circa 1890 to 1918 | publisher=Springer International Publishing | publication-place=Cham | year=2020 | isbn=978-3-030-27800-7 | doi=10.1007/978-3-030-27801-4_5 | pages=109–142| s2cid=212940487 }}</ref>

According to Jennifer Pitts, there was considerable skepticism among French and British liberal thinkers (such as Adam Smith, Jeremy Bentham, Edmund Burke, Denis Diderot and Marquis de Condorcet) about empire in the 1780s. However, by the mid-19th century, liberal thinkers such as John Stuart Mill and Alexis de Tocqueville endorsed empire on the basis of the civilizing mission.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Pitts |first=Jennifer |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=szeU8olEDewC |title=A Turn to Empire: The Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and France |date=2005 |publisher=Princeton University Press |isbn=978-1-4008-2663-6 |language=en}}</ref>

==By state==
===Britain===
Although the British did not invent the term, the notion of a "civilizing mission" was equally important for them to justify colonialism. It was used to legitimatize British rule over the colonized, especially when the colonial enterprise was not very profitable.{{Sfn|Mitchell|1991|pp=}}

The British used [[British sports|their sports]] as a tool to spread their values and culture among native populations, as well as a way of emphasizing their own dominance, as they were the owners of the rules of these sports and were naturally more experienced at playing these games. [[Test cricket]], for example, was seen as a sport that inherently involved values of fair play and civilizedness. In some cases, British sports served a purpose of providing exercise and integration across social boundaries for native populations.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-07-20 |title='The Revenge of Plassey': Football in the British Raj |url=https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lseih/2020/07/20/the-revenge-of-plassey-football-in-the-british-raj/ |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=LSE International History}}</ref> The growth of British sports led to a natural decline of the colonized peoples' sports, creating fear amongst some that a loss of their native culture might hamper their ability to resist colonial rule. Over time, colonized peoples ended up seeing British sports as a venue to prove their equality to the British, and victories against the British in sports gave momentum to nascent independence movements.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Batting for the British Empire: how Victorian cricket was more than just a game |url=https://www.historyextra.com/period/cricket-colonialism-role-british-empire/ |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=HistoryExtra |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last1=Love |first1=Adam |last2=Dzikus |first2=Lars |date=2020-02-26 |title=How India came to love cricket, favored sport of its colonial British rulers |url=http://theconversation.com/how-india-came-to-love-cricket-favored-sport-of-its-colonial-british-rulers-132302 |access-date=2023-09-17 |website=The Conversation |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Sen |first=Ronojoy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=O5mACgAAQBAJ |title=Nation at Play: A History of Sport in India |date=2015 |publisher=Columbia University Press |isbn=978-0-231-53993-7 |language=en}}</ref>

The idea that the British were bringing civilization to the uncivilized areas of the world is famously expressed in [[Rudyard Kipling]]'s poem ''[[The White Man's Burden]]''.

===France===
Alice Conklin explained in her works that the French colonial empire coincided with the apparently opposite concept of "Republic".{{cn|date=January 2022}}

===United States===
The concept of a "civilizing mission" would also be adopted by the [[United States]] during the age of [[New Imperialism]] in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Such projects would include [[Philippine–American War|US annexation of the Philippines]] during the aftermath of the [[Spanish–American War|Spanish-American War]] in 1898. The [[McKinley administration]] would declare that the US position within the [[Philippines]] was to “oversee the establishment of a civilian government” on the model of the United States.{{Sfn|Adas|2006|p=129}} That would be done through adopting a civilizing process that would entail a "medical reformation" and other socioeconomic reforms.{{Sfn|Anderson|1995|pp=640–669}} The Spanish health system had broken down after the 1898 war and was replaced with an American military model, which was made up of public health institutions.<ref name="Anderson2006">{{cite journal |last1=Anderson |first1=Warwick |title=Immunization and hygiene in the colonial Philippines |journal=Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences |date=January 2007 |volume=62 |issue=1 |pages=1–20 |doi=10.1093/jhmas/jrl014 |pmid=16877715 |url=https://academic.oup.com/jhmas/article-abstract/62/1/1/724958 |access-date= |issn=0022-5045|doi-access=free }}</ref> The "medical reformation" was done with "military rigor"<ref name="Anderson2006"/> as part of a civilizing process in which American public health officers set out to train native Filipinos the "correct techniques of the body."{{Sfn|Anderson|1995|p=648}} The process of "rationalized hygiene" was a technique for colonizing in the Philippines, as part of the American physicists assurance that the colonized Philippines was inhabited with propriety. Other "sweeping reforms and ambitious public works projects" {{Sfn|Adas|2006|p=135}} would include the implementation of a free public school system, as well as architecture to develop "[[economic growth]] and civilizing influence" as an important component of McKinley's "[[benevolent assimilation]]."<ref>{{Cite book|last=Brody|first=David|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226075303.001.0001|title=Visualizing American Empire|date=2010|publisher=University of Chicago Press|doi=10.7208/chicago/9780226075303.001.0001|isbn=978-0-226-07534-1}}</ref>

Similar "civilizing" tactics were also incorporated into the [[Politics of Puerto Rico|American colonization of Puerto Rico]] in 1900. They would include extensive reform such as the legalization of divorce in 1902 in an attempt to instill American social mores into the island’s populace to "legitimatize the emerging colonial order."{{Sfn|Findlay|1999|p=111}}

Purported benefits for the colonized nation included "greater exploitation of natural resources, increased production of material goods, raised living standards, expanded market profitability and sociopolitical stability". {{Sfn|Adas|2006|p=12}}

However, the [[United States occupation of Haiti|occupation of Haiti]] in 1915 would also show a darker side to the American "civilizing mission." The historian Mary Renda has argued that the occupation of Haiti was solely for the "purposes of economic exploitation and strategic advantage,"{{Sfn|Renda|2001|p=180}} rather than to provide Haiti with "protection, education and economic support."{{Sfn|Renda|2001|p=136}}

===Portugal===
After consolidating its territory in the 13th century through a [[Reconquista]] of the [[Al-Andalus|Muslim states]] of Western Iberia, the [[Kingdom of Portugal]] started to expand overseas. In 1415, [[Caliphate|Islamic]] [[Ceuta]] was occupied by the Portuguese during the reign of [[John I of Portugal]]. Portuguese expansion in [[North Africa]] was the beginning of a larger process eventually known as the [[Portuguese Empire|Portuguese Overseas Expansion]], under which the Kingdom's goals included the expansion of [[Christianity]] into [[Muslim]] lands and the desire of [[nobility]] for epic acts of war and conquest with the support of the [[Pope]].

As the Portuguese extended their influence around the coast to [[Mauritania]], [[Senegambia]] (by 1445) and [[Guinea]], they created [[trading post]]s. Rather than become direct competitors to the Muslim merchants, they used expanding market opportunities in [[Europe]] and the [[Mediterranean]] to increase trade across the [[Sahara]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hodder |first1=B. W. |title=Some Comments on the Origins of Traditional Markets in Africa South of the Sahara |journal=Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers |date=1965 |issue=36 |pages=97–105 |doi=10.2307/621456 |jstor=621456 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/621456 |access-date= |issn=0020-2754|url-access=subscription }}</ref> In addition, Portuguese merchants gained access to the African interior via the [[Senegal river|Senegal]] and [[Gambia river|Gambia]] rivers, which crossed long-standing trans-Saharan routes. The Portuguese brought in [[copper]] ware, [[cloth]], [[tool]]s, [[wine]] and [[horse]]s. Trade goods soon also included [[weapon|arms]] and [[ammunition]]. In exchange, the Portuguese received gold (transported from mines of the [[Akan people|Akan]] deposits), [[Black pepper|pepper]] (a trade which lasted until [[Vasco da Gama]] reached [[India]] in 1498) and [[ivory]]. It was not until they reached the [[Kingdom of Kongo|Kongo]] coast in the 1480s that they moved beyond Muslim trading territory in Africa.

Forts and [[Factory (trading post)|trading posts]] were established along the coast. Portuguese sailors, merchants, cartographers, priests and soldiers had the task of taking over the coastal areas, settling, and building churches, forts and factories, as well as exploring areas unknown to Europeans. A ''[[Company of Guinea]]'' was founded as a Portuguese governmental institution to control the trade, and called ''Casa da Guiné'' or ''Casa da Guiné e Mina'' from 1482 to 1483, and ''Casa da Índia e da Guiné'' in 1499.

The first of the major European trading [[fort]]s, [[Elmina]], was founded on the Gold Coast in 1482 by the Portuguese. [[Elmina Castle]] (originally known as the "São Jorge da Mina Castle") was modeled on the [[Castelo de São Jorge]], one of the earliest royal residences in [[Lisbon]]. Elmina, which means "the port", became a major [[trade|trading center]]. By the beginning of the colonial era, there were forty such forts operating along the coast. Rather than being icons of colonial domination, the forts acted as trading posts{{snd}}they rarely saw military action{{snd}}the fortifications were important, however, when arms and ammunition were being stored prior to trade.<ref>H. Kuper, ''Urbanization and Migration in West Africa'',  1965, Berkeley, Calif., U. of California {{ISBN?}}{{page?|date=December 2024}}</ref> The 15th-century Portuguese exploration of the [[Africa]]n coast, is commonly regarded as the harbinger of [[European colonialism]], and also marked the beginnings of the [[Atlantic slave trade]], [[Christian missionary]] [[evangelization]] and the first [[globalization]] processes which were to become a major element of the European colonialism until the end of the 18th century.

Although the [[Portuguese Empire]]'s policy regarding native peoples in the less technologically advanced places around the world (most prominently in [[Brazil]]) had always been devoted to [[enculturation]], including [[teaching]] and [[evangelization]] of the indigenous populations, as well as the creation of novel infrastructure to openly support these roles, it reached its largest extent after the 18th century in what was then [[Portuguese Empire|Portuguese Africa]] and [[Portuguese Timor]]. New cities and towns, with their Europe-inspired infrastructure, which included administrative, military, healthcare, educational, religious, and entrepreneurial halls, were purportedly designed to accommodate Portuguese settlers.

[[File:Queen Nzinga 1657.png|thumb|right|[[Queen Nzinga|Queen Ana de Sousa Nzingha Mbande]] in peace negotiations with the Portuguese governor in [[Luanda]], 1657]]

The [[Portugal|Portuguese]] explorer [[Paulo Dias de Novais]] founded [[Luanda]] in 1575 as "São Paulo de Loanda", with a hundred families of settlers and four hundred soldiers. [[Benguela]], a Portuguese fort from 1587 which became a town in 1617, was another important early settlement they founded and ruled. The Portuguese would establish several settlements, forts and trading posts along the coastal strip of Africa. In the [[Island of Mozambique]], one of the first places where the Portuguese permanently settled in Sub-Saharan Africa, they built the [[Chapel of Nossa Senhora de Baluarte]], in 1522, now considered the oldest European building in the [[southern hemisphere]]. Later the hospital, a majestic neo-classical building constructed in 1877 by the Portuguese, with a garden decorated with ponds and fountains, was for many years the biggest hospital south of the [[Sahara]].<ref>Patrick Lages, [http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1310/is_/ai_19557190 The island of Mozambique], [[UNESCO]] Courier, May, 1997.</ref>

====''Estatuto do Indigenato''====
The establishment of a dual, [[racialized]] civil society was formally recognized in ''Estatuto do Indigenato'' (The Statute of Indigenous Populations) adopted in 1929, and was based in the subjective concept of [[civilization]] versus [[tribalism]]. Portugal's colonial authorities were totally committed to develop a fully [[multiethnic]] "civilized" society in its African colonies, but that goal or "civilizing mission", would only be achieved after a period of [[Europeanization]] or [[enculturation]] of the native black tribes and ethnocultural groups. It was a policy which had already been stimulated in the former [[Colonial Brazil|Portuguese colony of Brazil]]. Under Portugal's [[Estado Novo (Portugal)|Estado Novo]] regime, headed by [[António de Oliveira Salazar]], the ''Estatuto'' established a distinction between the "colonial citizens", subject to [[Portuguese law]] and entitled to citizenship rights and duties effective in the "[[metropole]]", and the ''indigenas'' (natives), subject to both colonial legislation and their customary, tribal laws.

Between the two groups, there was a third small group, the ''assimilados'', comprising native blacks, mulatos, Asians, and mixed-race people, who had at least some formal education, were not subjected to paid forced labor, were entitled to some citizenship rights, and held a special identification card that differed from the one imposed on the immense mass of the African population (the ''indigenas''), a card that the colonial authorities conceived of as a means of controlling the movements of forced labor (CEA 1998). The indigenas were subject to the traditional authorities, who were gradually integrated into the colonial administration and charged with solving disputes, managing the access to land, and guaranteeing the flows of workforce and the payment of taxes. As several authors have pointed out (Mamdani 1996; Gentili 1999; O'Laughlin 2000), the ''Indigenato'' regime was the political system that subordinated the immense majority of native Africans to local authorities entrusted with governing, in collaboration with the lowest echelon of the colonial administration, the "native" communities described as tribes and assumed to have a common ancestry, language, and culture.

After [[World War&nbsp;II]], as [[communist]] and [[anti-colonial]] ideologies spread out across Africa, many clandestine political movements were established in support of independence. Regardless it was exaggerated anti-Portuguese/anti-"Colonial" propaganda,<ref>Alice Dinerman, [http://www.ipri.pt/publicacoes/revista_ri/artigo_rri.php?ida=173 "Independence redux in postsocialist Mozambique"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090624032003/http://www.ipri.pt/publicacoes/revista_ri/artigo_rri.php?ida=173 |date=2009-06-24 }}</ref> a dominant tendency in Portuguese Africa, or a mix of both, these movements claimed that since policies and development plans were primarily designed by the ruling authorities for the benefit of the territories' ethnic Portuguese population, little attention was paid to local tribal integration and the development of its native communities. According to the official guerrilla statements, this affected a majority of the indigenous population who suffered both state-sponsored discrimination and enormous social pressure. Many felt they had received too little opportunity or resources to upgrade their skills and improve their economic and social situation to a degree comparable to that of the Europeans. Statistically, Portuguese Africa's Portuguese whites were indeed wealthier and more skilled than the black indigenous majority, but the late 1950s, the 1960s and principally the early 1970s, were being testimony of a gradual change based in new socioeconomic developments and equalitarian policies for all.{{Citation needed|date=September 2023}}

====Colonial wars====
[[File:Portuguese colonial war blank map.svg|thumb|right|Portuguese overseas territories in Africa during the [[Estado Novo (Portugal)|Estado Novo]] regime (1933–1974): [[Angola (Portugal)|Angola]] and [[Mozambique (Portugal)|Mozambique]] were by far the two largest of those territories]]

The [[Portuguese Colonial War]] began in [[Portuguese Angola]] on 4 February 1961, in an area called the ''Zona Sublevada do Norte'' (ZSN or the Rebel Zone of the North), consisting of the provinces of [[Zaire (province)|Zaire]], [[Uíge Province|Uíge]] and [[Cuanza Norte]]. The U.S.-backed UPA wanted national [[self-determination]], while for the Portuguese, who had settled in Africa and ruled considerable territory since the 15th century, their belief in a multi-racial, assimilated overseas empire justified going to war to prevent its breakup and protect its populations.<ref>George Wright, ''The Destruction of a Nation: United States' Policy Towards Angola Since 1945'', Pluto Press, 1997,  {{ISBN|9780745310299}}</ref> Portuguese leaders, including [[António de Oliveira Salazar]], defended the policy of multiracialism, or [[Lusotropicalism]], as a way of integrating Portuguese colonies, and their peoples, more closely with Portugal itself.<ref>[http://www.barnard.edu/history/sample%20thesis/Fine%20thesis.pdf Colorblind Colonialism? Lusotropicalismo and Portugal’s 20th. Century Empire. in Africa.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100531000147/http://www.barnard.edu///history/sample%20thesis/Fine%20thesis.pdf |date=2010-05-31 }} Leah Fine. Barnard College Department of History, Spring 2007</ref> For the Portuguese ruling regime, the overseas empire was a matter of [[national interest]]. In Portuguese Africa, trained Portuguese black Africans were allowed to occupy positions in several occupations including specialized military, administration, teaching, health, and other posts in the [[civil service]] and private [[business]]es, as long as they had the right [[skill|technical]] and human qualities. In addition, [[interracial marriage|intermarriage]] of black women with white Portuguese men was a common practice since the earlier contacts with the Europeans. The access to basic, secondary, and technical education was being expanded and its availability was being increasingly opened to both the indigenous and European Portuguese of the territories.

Examples of this policy include several black Portuguese Africans who would become prominent individuals during the war or in the post-independence, and who had studied during the Portuguese rule of the territories in local schools or even in Portuguese schools and universities in the mainland (the [[metropole]]) – [[Samora Machel]], [[Mário Pinto de Andrade]], [[Marcelino dos Santos]], [[Eduardo Mondlane]], [[Agostinho Neto]], [[Amílcar Cabral]], [[Joaquim Chissano]], and [[Graça Machel]] are just a few examples. Two large state-run universities were founded in Portuguese Africa in the early 1960s (the ''[[Universidade de Luanda]]'' in Angola and the ''[[Universidade de Lourenço Marques]]'' in Mozambique, awarding a wide range of degrees from engineering to medicine<ref>{{in lang|pt}} [https://web.archive.org/web/20091023001454/http://geocities.com/Athens/Troy/4285/ensino52.html 52. Universidade de Luanda]</ref>), during a time that in the European mainland only four public universities were in operation, two of them in Lisbon (which compares with the 14 Portuguese public universities today). Several figures in Portuguese society, including one of the most idolized sports stars in Portuguese football history, a black football player from [[Portuguese East Africa]] named [[Eusébio]], were other examples of assimilation and multiracialism.

Since 1961, with the beginning of the colonial wars in its overseas territories, Portugal had begun to incorporate black Portuguese Africans in the war effort in Angola, [[Portuguese Guinea]], and [[Portuguese Mozambique]] based on concepts of multi-racialism and preservation of the empire. African participation on the Portuguese side of the conflict ranged from marginal roles as laborers and informers to participation in highly trained operational combat units, including platoon commanders. As the war progressed, the use of African counterinsurgency troops increased; on the eve of the [[Carnation Revolution|military coup of 25 April 1974]], Africans accounted for more than 50 percent of Portuguese forces fighting the war. Due to the technological gap between both civilizations and [[Portuguese Empire|the centuries-long colonial era]], [[Portugal]] was a driving force in the development and shaping of all [[Portuguese Empire|Portuguese Africa]] since the 15th century.

In the 1960s and early 1970s, in order to counter the increasing insurgency of the nationalistic guerrillas and show to the Portuguese people and the world that the overseas territories were totally under control, the Portuguese government accelerated its major development programs to expand and attempted to upgrade the infrastructure of the overseas territories in Africa by creating new roads, railways, bridges, dams, irrigation systems, schools and hospitals to stimulate an even higher level of [[economic growth]] and support from the populace.<ref name="Portuguese Mozambique development">{{in lang|pt}} [[Kaúlza de Arriaga]] (General), [http://www.cidadevirtual.pt/k-arriaga/desenvol.html O Desenvolvimento De Moçambique e a Promoção Das Suas Populações – Situação Em 1974, Kaúlza de Arriaga's published works and texts] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923203446/http://www.cidadevirtual.pt/k-arriaga/desenvol.html |date=September 23, 2015 }}</ref> As part of this redevelopment program, construction of the [[Cahora Bassa Dam]] began in 1969 in the [[Overseas Province of Mozambique]] (the official designation of Portuguese Mozambique by then). This particular project became intrinsically linked with Portugal's concerns over security in the overseas colonies. The Portuguese government viewed the construction of the dam as a testimony to Portugal's "civilizing mission"<ref>Allen Isaacman. [http://www.kyle.aem.cornell.edu/lusopaps/isaac_sned_M.Cornell.doc ''Portuguese Colonial Intervention, Regional Conflict and Post-Colonial Amnesia: Cahora Bassa Dam, Mozambique 1965–2002''], cornell.edu.  Retrieved on March 10, 2007
</ref> and intended for the dam to reaffirm Mozambican belief in the strength and security of the Portuguese colonial government.

====Brazil====
[[File:Brazil 16thc map.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Portuguese map by Lopo Homem (c.&nbsp;1519) showing the coast of Brazil and natives extracting brazilwood, as well as Portuguese ships]]
When the [[Portugal|Portuguese]] explorers arrived in 1500, the [[Amerindians]] were mostly semi-[[nomadic]] tribes, with the largest population living on the coast and along the banks of major rivers. Unlike [[Christopher Columbus]] who thought he had reached [[India]], the Portuguese sailor [[Vasco da Gama]] had already reached India sailing around [[Africa]] two years before [[Pedro Álvares Cabral]] reached Brazil. Nevertheless, the word ''índios'' ("Indians") was by then established to designate the peoples of the [[New World]] and remains so (it is used to this day in the Portuguese language, the people of India being called ''indianos'').

Initially, the Europeans saw the natives as [[noble savage]]s, and [[miscegenation]] began straight away. Tribal warfare and [[Human cannibalism|cannibalism]] convinced the Portuguese that they should "civilize" the Amerindians,<ref>Megan Mylan, [https://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/brazil501/indians_trade.html "Indians of the Amazon: Jewel of the Amazon"], Frontline/World, [[Public Broadcasting Service]] (PBS), (24 January 2006)</ref> even if one of the four groups of [[Aché people]] in Paraguay practiced cannibalism regularly until the 1960s.<ref name=clast3>Clastres, P. (1974) ''Guayaki cannibalism. In Native South Americans: Ethnology of the Least Known Continent'', P. Lyon, ed., pp.&nbsp;309–321. Boston: Little, Brown.</ref> When the [[Kingdom of Portugal]]'s [[Exploration|explorers]] discovered Brazil in the 15th century and started to [[colonize]] its new possessions in the [[New World]], the territory was inhabited by [[Indigenous peoples of Brazil|various indigenous peoples and tribes]] which had developed neither a [[writing system]] nor [[school]] education.

The [[Society of Jesus]] (Jesuits) has been since its founding in 1540 as a [[missionary order]]. [[Evangelization]] was one of the primary goals of the Jesuits; however, they were also committed to an education both in Europe and overseas. Their missionary activities, both in the cities and in the countryside, were complemented by a strong commitment to [[Education in Portugal|education]]. This took the form of the opening of schools for young boys, first in Europe, but soon extended to both America and Asia. The foundation of [[Mission (Christian)|Catholic mission]]s, [[school]]s, and [[seminary|seminaries]] was another consequence of the Jesuit involvement in education. As the spaces and cultures where the Jesuits were presently varied considerably, their evangelizing methods diverged by location. However, the Society's engagement in trade, architecture, science, literature, languages, arts, music, and religious debate corresponded, in fact, to the common and foremost purpose of Christianization.

By the middle of the 16th century, the Jesuits were present in West Africa, South America, Ethiopia, India, China, and Japan. In a period of history when the world had a largely [[illiterate]] population, the [[Portuguese Empire]], was home to one of the first universities founded in Europe – the [[University of Coimbra]], which currently is still one of the oldest universities. Throughout the centuries of Portuguese rule, Brazilian students, mostly graduated in the Jesuit missions and seminaries, were allowed and even encouraged to enroll at [[higher education in Portugal|higher education]] in [[mainland Portugal]]. By 1700, and reflecting a larger transformation of the [[Portuguese Empire]], the Jesuits had decisively shifted their activity from the [[East Indies]] to Brazil. In the late 18th century, the Portuguese minister of the kingdom [[Marquis of Pombal]] attacked the power of the privileged nobility and the church and expelled the Jesuits from Portugal and its overseas possessions. Pombal seized the Jesuit schools and introduced educational reforms all over the empire.

In 1772, even before the establishment of the [[Science Academy of Lisbon]] (1779), one of the first learned societies of both Brazil and the [[Portuguese Empire]], the ''Sociedade Scientifica'',  was founded in [[Rio de Janeiro]]. Furthermore, in 1797, the first botanic institute was founded in [[Salvador, Brazil|Salvador]], [[Bahia]]. During the late 18th century, the ''Escola Politécnica'' (then the ''Real Academia de Artilharia, Fortificação e Desenho'') of Rio de Janeiro was created in 1792 through a decree issued by the Portuguese authorities as a higher education school for the teaching of the sciences and engineering. It belongs today to the [[Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro]] and is the oldest engineering school of Brazil, and one of the oldest in [[Latin America]]. A royal letter of November 20, 1800 by the King [[John VI of Portugal]] established in [[Rio de Janeiro]] the ''Aula Prática de Desenho e Figura'', the first institution in Brazil dedicated to teaching the arts. During [[Colonial Brazil|colonial times]], the arts were mainly religious or utilitarian and were learned in a system of [[apprenticeship]]. A Decree of August 12, 1816, created an ''Escola Real de Ciências, Artes e Ofícios'' (Royal School of Sciences, Arts and Crafts), which established an official education in the fine arts and was the foundation of the current [[Escola Nacional de Belas Artes]].

In the 19th century, the Portuguese royal family, headed by [[John VI of Portugal|João VI]], arrived in [[Rio de Janeiro]] escaping from the [[Napoleon]]'s army invasion of Portugal in 1807. João VI gave impetus to the expansion of European civilization in Brazil.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Gonçalves |first1=Sérgio Campos |title=O pensamento civilizador e a cultura historiográfica brasileira no século XIX |journal=Revista Fazendo História |date=2008 |volume=1 |issue= |pages=128–147 |doi= |url=http://www.dominiopublico.gov.br/pesquisa/DetalheObraDownload.do?select_action=&co_obra=176848&co_midia=2 |access-date= |publisher=CCHLA / [[Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte|UFRN]] |location=Natal |language=pt-br |issn=1983-1439}}</ref> In a short period between 1808 and 1810, the [[Portuguese government]] founded the Royal Naval Academy and the Royal Military Academy, the [[Fundação Biblioteca Nacional|Biblioteca Nacional]], the [[Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden]], the Medico-Chirurgical School of [[Bahia]], currently known as the "Faculdade de Medicina" under the purview of the [[Universidade Federal da Bahia]] and the Medico-Chirurgical School of Rio de Janeiro which is the modern-day Faculdade de Medicina of the [[Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro]].

===Chile===
Nineteenth century elites of South American republics also used a civilizing mission rhetoric to justify armed actions against indigenous groups. On January 1, 1883, Chile refounded the old city of [[Villarrica, Chile|Villarrica]], thus formally ending the process of the [[Occupation of Araucanía|occupation of the indigenous lands of Araucanía]].<ref name=MemCHL>{{Citation | url   = http://www.memoriachilena.cl/temas/index.asp?id_ut=ocupaciondelaaraucaniaenelchilerepublicano(1860-1883) | title = Ocupación de la Araucanía: El fin de la autonomía territorial mapuche | work  = Memoria chilena | publisher  = [[Biblioteca Nacional de Chile]] | access-date = June 30, 2013 }}</ref><ref name=PintoR194>{{cite book |last=Pinto Rodríguez |first=Jorge |author-link=Jorge Pinto Rodríguez |title=La formación del Estado y la nacion, y el pueblo mapuche  |year=2003 |edition=2nd |publisher=Ediciones de la Dirección de Bibliotecas, Archivos y Museos |isbn=956-244-156-3 |page=194}}</ref> Six months later, on June 1, president [[Domingo Santa María]] declared:<ref name=Ferrando583>{{cite book |last=Ferrando Kaun |first=Ricardo |title=Y así nació La Frontera ... |year=1986 |edition=2nd |publisher=Editorial Antártica |isbn=978-956-7019-83-0 |page=583|language=es}}</ref>

<blockquote>The country has with satisfaction seen the problem of the reduction of the whole Araucanía solved. This event, so important to our social and political life, and so significant for the future of the republic, has ended, happily and with costly and painful sacrifices. Today the whole Araucanía is subjugated, more than to the material forces, to the moral and civilizing force of the republic ...</blockquote>

Chileans also deployed a "civilizatory crusade" discourse against Peru and Bolivia in the [[War of the Pacific]] (1879–1884). Along these lines Peru and Bolivia were seen as representatives of a backward ''[[Viceroyalty of Peru|Ancien régime]]'' that fought its wars with armies of indigenous barbarians.<ref name=ibax>{{Cite journal |title=“Seres aquellos de costumbres depravadas”: cholos e indígenas andinos en los testimonios de chilenos durante la Guerra del Pacífico (1879 - 1884) |journal=[[Estudios atacameños]] |last=Ibarra Cifuentes |first=Patricio |url=https://www.scielo.cl/scielo.php?pid=S0718-10432019000100111&script=sci_arttext&tlng=en |issue=61 |year=2019 |trans-title=“Beings those of depraved customs”: Cholos and Andean Indians in Chilean testimonies during the War of the Pacific (1879 - 1884) |language=es |doi=10.4067/S0718-10432019005000202}}</ref> Negative views of this types also occurred among Peruvians as after the war, the [[indigenous peoples in Peru]] became scapegoats in the [[narrative]]s of Peruvian ''[[criollo people|criollo]]'' elites, exemplified in the writing of [[Ricardo Palma]]:

<blockquote>The principal cause of the great defeat is that the majority of Peru is composed of that wretched and degraded race that we once attempted to dignify and ennoble. The Indian lacks patriotic sense; he is born enemy of the white and of the man of the coast. It makes no difference to him whether he is a Chilean or a Turk. To educate the Indian and to inspire him a feeling for patriotism will not be the task of our institutions, but of the ages.<ref name="Larson196">Larson, Brooke. 2004. Trials of Nation Making: Liberalism, Race and Ethnicity in the Andes, 1810–1910. Page 196.</ref></blockquote>

== Modern day ==
{{See also|Western values (West)}}
''[[Pinkwashing (LGBT)|Pinkwashing]]'', the strategy of promoting [[LGBT rights]] protections as evidence of [[liberalism]] and [[democracy]], has been described as a continuation of the civilizing mission used to justify colonialism, this time on the basis of LGBT rights in Western countries.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Ghosh |first1=Cyril |title=De-Moralizing Gay Rights: Some Queer Remarks on LGBT+ Rights Politics in the US |date=2018 |publisher=Springer International Publishing |isbn=978-3-319-78840-1 |page=12 |chapter=Radical Theory Creep}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Khalidi |first1=Rashid |author1-link=Rashid Khalidi |title=From the Editor |journal=[[Journal of Palestine Studies]] |date=2018 |volume=47 |issue=3 |pages=5–8 |doi=10.1525/jps.2018.47.4.5 |s2cid=240300865 |url=https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/228970|url-access=subscription }}</ref>

== See also ==
{{Portal|History}}
{{col div|colwidth=30em}}
* {{anli|Christian mission}}
* {{anli|Cultural assimilation}}
* {{anli|Cultural backwardness}}
* {{anli|Cultural imperialism}}
* {{anli|Blaise Diagne}}
* {{anli|Development theory}}
* ''{{anli|Discourse on Colonialism}}''
* {{anli|Ethnocide}}
* {{anli|Faccetta Nera}}
* {{anli|French law on colonialism}}
* {{anli|Forced assimilation}}
* {{anli|Indoctrination}}
* {{anli|Lusotropicalism}}
* {{anli|Macaulayism}}
* {{anli|Manifest destiny}}
* [[Colonial amnesia|Postcolonial amnesia]]
* {{anli|Western education}}
* {{anli|White savior}}
* {{anli|The White Man's Burden}}
{{colend}}

==Sources==
{{Reflist|30em}}

==References==

{{Refbegin}}
* {{cite book |last1=Adas |first1=Michael |title=Dominance by Design: Technological Imperatives and America's Civilizing Mission |date=2006 |publisher=Harvard University Press |location=Cambridge, MA |access-date=}}
* {{cite book |last1=Aldrich |first1=Robert |title=Greater France: A History of French Overseas Expansion |date=1996 |publisher=Palgrave MacMillan |location= |isbn=0-312-16000-3 |edition= |access-date=}}
* {{Cite journal|last=Anderson|first=Warwick|date=1995|title=Excremental Colonialism: Public Health or the Poetics of Pollution|journal=Critical Inquiry|volume=21|issue=3|pages=640–669|doi=10.1086/448767| issn = 0093-1896 |s2cid=161471633}}
* {{cite book |last1=Conklin |first1=Alice L. |title=A Mission to Civilize: The Republican Idea of Empire in France and West Africa 1895–1930 |date=1998 |publisher=Stanford University Press |location=Stanford |isbn=978-0-8047-2999-4 |edition= |access-date=}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Conklin |first1=Alice L. |title=Colonialism and Human Rights, A Contradiction in Terms? The Case of France and West Africa, 1895–1914 |journal=The American Historical Review |date=1998 |volume=103 |issue=2 |pages=419–442 |doi=10.2307/2649774 |jstor=2649774 |url=https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article-abstract/103/2/419/139987 |access-date= |issn=0002-8762|url-access=subscription }}
* {{cite book |last1=Costantini |first1=Dino |title=Mission civilisatrice. Le rôle de l'histoire coloniale dans la construction de l'identité politique française |date=2008 |publisher=La Découverte |location=Paris |isbn= |edition= |access-date= |language=fr}}
* {{cite book |last1=Daughton |first1=J. P. |title=An Empire Divided: Religion, Republicanism, and the Making of French Colonialism, 1880–1914 |date=2006 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-537401-8 |edition= |access-date=}}
* {{cite book |last1=Falser. |first1=Michael |title=Cultural Heritage as Civilizing Mission. From Decay to Recovery |date=2015 |publisher=Springer |location=Heidelberg, New York |isbn=978-3-319-13638-7 |edition= |access-date=}}
* {{cite book |last1=Findlay |first1=Eileen J. Suarez |title=Imposing Decency: The Politics of Sexuality and Race in Puerto Rico, 1870–1920 |date=1999 |publisher=Duke University Press |location=Durham |isbn=978-0-8223-2375-4 |edition= |doi=10.2307/j.ctv125jpk1|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/book/68910 |access-date=20 February 2022}}
* {{cite book |last1=Jerónimo |first1=Miguel Bandeira |title=The 'civilizing mission' of Portuguese colonialism |date=2015 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |location=Houndsmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire |isbn=978-1137355904 |edition= |access-date=}}
* {{cite book |last1=Manning |first1=Patrick |title=Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa, 1880–1995 |date=1998 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge |isbn=0-521-64255-8 |edition=2nd |access-date=}}
* {{cite book |last1=Mitchell |first1=Timothy |title=Colonizing Egypt |date=1991 |publisher=University of California Press |location=Berkeley |isbn= |url= |access-date=}}
* {{cite journal |editor1-last=Olstein |editor1-first=Diego |editor2-last=Hübner |editor2-first=Stefan |title=Preaching the Civilizing Mission and Modern Cultural Encounters |journal=Journal of World History |date=2016 |volume=27 |issue=2 |doi= |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/issue/34296 |access-date= |format=special issue |issn=1527-8050}}
* {{cite book |last1=Renda |first1=Mary |title=Taking Haiti: Military Occupation and the Culture of U.S. Imperialism, 1915–1940 |date=2001 |publisher= |location=Chapel Hill |isbn= |pages=131–181 |url= |access-date= |chapter=Moral Breakdown}}
* [[Jean Suret-Canale]]. ''Afrique Noire: l'Ere Coloniale'' (Editions Sociales, Paris, 1971)
** Eng. translation, ''French Colonialism in Tropical Africa, 1900–1945''. (New York, 1971).
* {{cite book |last1=Tezcan |first1=Levent |title=Das muslimische Subjekt: Verfangen im Dialog der Deutschen Islam Konferenz |date=2012 |publisher=Konstanz University Press |location=Konstanz |access-date=}}
* {{cite journal |last1=Thurman |first1=Kira |title=Singing the Civilizing Mission in the Land of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms: The Fisk Jubilee Singers in Nineteenth-Century Germany |journal=Journal of World History |date=2016 |volume=27 |issue=3 |pages=443–471 |doi=10.1353/jwh.2016.0116 |s2cid=151616806 |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/631575/summary |access-date=19 February 2022 |issn=1527-8050|url-access=subscription }}
* {{cite book |last1=Young |first1=Crawford |title=The African Colonial State in Comparative Perspective |date=1994 |publisher=Yale University Press |location=New Haven |isbn=0-300-06879-4 |edition= |access-date=}}
{{Refend}}

==External links==
{{wikiquote}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Civilizing Mission}}
[[Category:History of European colonialism]]
[[Category:Aboriginal title]]
[[Category:Christianization]]
[[Category:Cultural assimilation]]
[[Category:French colonial empire]]
[[Category:Portuguese Empire]]
[[Category:Eurocentrism]]
[[Category:White supremacy]]
[[Category:Military-related euphemisms]]