American humanitarianism and the end of Portugal’s African empire: Institutional and governmental interests in assisting Angolan refugees in Congo, 1961–74

Joanna Tague

Abstract


Between 1961 and 1974, Portugal’s colonial empire in Africa disintegrated. As African liberation movements in Angola waged a protracted war for independence, hundreds of thousands of refugees fled to Congo. This article examines humanitarian assistance in Africa during decolonization to challenge the myth that humanitarian assistance has ever been impartial, neutral or independent. It compares the ways in which one organization, the American Committee on Africa (ACOA), and the US government assisted Angolan refugees in Congo. It asks: how can we understand the relationship between humanitarian aid and political positioning in a Cold War context? This article argues that the particular interests of humanitarian organizations and states determined the types of aid both provided. Cold War tensions prompted the US government to provide educational assistance as part of its humanitarian response to Angolan refugees in Congo, but the same crisis forced a nascent organization such as ACOA to open dialogue among its members in order to define its position on the relationship between African liberation politics and humanitarian intervention.Between 1961 and 1974, Portugal’s colonial empire in Africa disintegrated. As African liberation movements in Angola waged a protracted war for independence, hundreds of thousands of refugees fled to Congo. This article examines humanitarian assistance in Africa during decolonization to challenge the myth that humanitarian assistance has ever been impartial, neutral or independent. It compares the ways in which one organization, the American Committee on Africa (ACOA), and the US government assisted Angolan refugees in Congo. It asks: how can we understand the relationship between humanitarian aid and political positioning in a Cold War context? This article argues that the particular interests of humanitarian organizations and states determined the types of aid both provided. Cold War tensions prompted the US government to provide educational assistance as part of

References


(American Committee on Africa), US Library of Congress (15 February 1961), Letter for contributions, George Houser.

—— (2 October 1962), Letter from James Robinson to George Houser.

—— (15 November 1962), Memo from James Robinson to George Houser.

—— (7 December 1962), Memo from James Robinson to George Houser.

—— (14 January 1963), Minutes from the executive board.

—— (19 August 1963), Article on Angola and the refugees.

—— (25 September 1963), Steering Committee minutes.

—— (13 April 1964), To New York Radio Interview Programs from Collin Gonze.

—— (7 December 1964), Steering Committee minutes.

—— (17 December 1964), Inter-Office Memo to Collin Gonze from George Houser.

ACOA (1 February 1965), ‘South African Crisis’, Tuesday morning seminars.

—— (25 September 1970), Comment on Prexy Nesbitt’s report to the board.

—— (8 October 1970), Special executive board meeting.

—— (18 March 1971), Summary of minutes for special board meeting.

—— (19 September 1974), Executive board meeting minutes.

ARC (Amistad Research Center, New Orleans), Box 142, folder 55: Tanzania Correspondence, November–December 1968.

Arendt, H. (1963), On Revolution, New York, NY: Viking.

Barnett, M. (2011), Empire of Humanity: A History of Humanitarianism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Borstelmann, T. (2001), The Cold War and the Color Line: American Race Relations in the Global Arena, Cambridge, MA; Harvard University Press.

Burgess, G. T. (2010), ‘Mao in Zanzibar: Nationalism, discipline, and the (de)construction of Afro-Asian solidarities’, in C. J. Lee (ed.), Making a World after Empire: The Bandung Moment and Its Political Afterlives, Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, pp. 196–234.

Crisp, J. (2001), ‘Mind the gap! UNHCR, humanitarian assistance, and the development process’, International Migration Review, 35: 1, pp. 168–91.

Darwin, J. (2001), ‘Decolonization and the end of empire’, in W. R. Louis (ed.), The Oxford History of the British Empire, vol. V, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 541–57.

Dickinson, E. (2009), ‘A bright shining slogan: How “hearts and minds” came to be’, Foreign Policy. www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/08/13/a_bright_shining_slogan. Accessed 27 February 2014.

Gourevitch, P. (1999), We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda, New York: Picador.

Grubbs, L. (2009), Secular Missionaries: Americans and African Development in the 1960s, Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press.

Keely, C. B. (2001), ‘The international refugee regime(s): The end of the Cold War matters’, International Migration Review, 35: 1, pp. 303–14.

Kibreab, G. (1993), ‘The myth of dependency among camp refugees in Somalia, 1979–1989’, Journal of Refugee Studies, 6: 4, pp. 321–49.

—— (1997), People on the Edge in the Horn: Displacement, Land Use, and the Environment in the Gedaref Region, Sudan, Trenton, NJ: Red Sea.

Lee, C. J. (2010), Making a World after Empire: The Bandung Moment and Its Political Afterlives, Athens, OH: Ohio University Press.

Loescher, G. (1993), Beyond Charity: International Cooperation and the Global Refugee Crisis, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

—— (2001), The UNHCR and World Politics: A Perilous Path, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Malkki, L. (1995), Purity and Exile: Violence, Memory and National Cosmology among Hutu Refugees in Tanzania, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

—— (1996), ‘Speechless emissaries: Refugees, humanitarianism and dehistoricization’, Cultural Anthropology, 11: 3, pp. 377–404.

Meriwether, J. H. (2002), Proudly We Can Be Africans: Black Americans and Africa, 1935–1961, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina.

—— (2008), ‘Worth a lot of Negro votes: Black voters, Africa, and the 1960 presidential campaign’, Journal of American History, 95: 3, pp. 737–63.

Minear, L. (2002), The Humanitarian Enterprise: Dilemmas and Discoveries, Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian.

Muehlenbeck, P. (2004), ‘John F. Kennedy’s courting of African nationalism’, Madison Historical Review, II, pp. 1–25.

—— (2014), Betting on the Africans: John F. Kennedy’s Courting of African Nationalist Leaders, New York: Oxford University Press.

NARA (National Archives and Records Administration), RG 59 Box 3, AID Portuguese Territories Mozambique and Angola 1965; Confidential Memo to Mr. Williams from Henry Tasca, ‘New Approach to Portugal’, 28 March 1962.

—— RG 59 Box 35, Tanganyika 1965; file REF Refugees & Migration Tanzania 1965, Confidential Memo from John Blacken to Chris Pappas, 10 March 1965.

—— RG 59 Box 42, Portuguese African Territories 1964; file Refugees Portugal 1964, Confidential Memo ‘Talking Points on Communist Exploitation of African Refugee and Exile Problems’.

—— RG 59 Box 42, Portuguese African Territories 1964; file Political Affairs POL 7 High Level Conversations Policy, ‘US-UK Africa Talks, Washington January 27–28, 1964: Refugees’.

—— RG 59 Box 42, Portuguese African Territories 1964; file ‘Eyes Only’, Secret Memo dated 23 January 1963 from Jesse MacKnight to Mennen Williams, Wayne Fredericks, Henry Tasca, ‘UN Resolution on Education for Portuguese Africans – Possible US Initiatives’.

—— RG 59 Box 42, Portuguese African Territories 1964; file ‘Eyes Only’, Letter from David Grenfell at Kibentele dated 25 September 1964.

Plummer, B. G. (1996), Rising Wind: Black Americans and US Foreign Affairs, 1935–1960, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

Rieff, D. (2002), A Bed for the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis, New York: Simon & Schuster.

Robinson, R. and Gallagher, J. (1978), Africa and the Victorians: The Official Mind of Imperialism, New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

Rodrigues, L. N. (2004), ‘“Today’s terrorist is tomorrow’s statesman”: The United States and Angolan nationalism in the early 1960s’, Portuguese Journal of Social Science, 3: 2, pp. 115–40.

Terry, F. (2002), Condemned to Repeat? The Paradox of Humanitarian Action, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Westad, O. A. (2005), The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Zolberg, A. and Brenda, P. M. (eds) (2001), Global Migrants, Global Refugees: Problems and Solutions, New York: Berghahn.


Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.