Frantz Fanon: Discussing the right to self-defense

Frantz Fanon: 22020172

Discussing the right to self-defense

In anger that is both justified and passionate Fanon characterizes the essence of the colonial system and justifies the counter-violence of those colonized as not only inevitable but also necessary.  As Fanon explains it: “At the level of individuals, violence is a cleansing force”.  In this blog, I will analyze this justification and attempt to apply it to modern society and current issues.

                A people who have been colonized through violence have all the right to respond. Using Fanon's ideas I will analyze this as a form of self-defense. The colonized had literally been oppressed in every aspect of life. Everything from culture to economic prosperity to even the most individualized virtues like self-respect and dignity and integrity had been violated through force by the colonizers. The varying levels of physical and mental violence used against the colonized give them every right to defend themselves by any means necessary. This becomes even more relevant when you consider how this violence was consistent. Every moment the colonizers dominated in Africa or elsewhere was domination kept enforced through either the use or the threat of violence. Even the establishment of local police and other armed forces to monopolize violence in the colonial state is a testament to its necessary and consistent use. In this context, the response of the colonized is no different than the response of any individual who attempts to use a stick to defend themselves against someone attempting to rob them with a gun. In this process of self-defense even if you significantly harm the thief or anyone else in the process you are on all moral grounds allowed to do so because it is an act of self-preservation.  The colonized thus in their state of helplessness had absolutely no other option but to use violence to protect themselves. This anger against the colonizers is a build-up of decades of persistent attacks on those colonized. It is then essential to understand that even if there were others harmed in this conflict those fighting for revolution or independence had literally no other option.  While any and all collateral in unfortunate, in my opinion, the person committing the violence out of self-defense and years of helplessness is in no moral abhorrence.

                In the modern state I believe the same principle applies to the working class or those oppressed seeking Marxist or similar revolutions. May they be the student unions in Pakistan and India with socialist tendencies or movements in Italy against the far right, those oppressed by a system kept in place through force and monopolization of violence have the complete right to use counter-violence if left with no other means. In today’s worlds where states like Pakistan use violence through the military or similar institutions to maintain a status quo of oppression those marginalized often have no way other than violence to defend themselves. The anger that must build up in them because of their constant helplessness may inevitably lead to a situation where any consequences of violence are better than the situation they face in status quo because at some point people value dignity and their right to freedom above all.