POSTCOLONIALISM - THE EMPERORS NEW CLOTHES

For Frantz Fanon, C.L.R. James, Aime Cesaire and Albert Memmi, colonia lism was fundamentally constituted through the economic exploitation a nd brutal repression of colonized peoples. I regard postcolonial analy ses as having a tendency to occlude recognition of the exploitation an d violence which continue to characterize the contemporary world. In o rder to excavate the continuities between the colonial world described by authors such as Fanon and the 'new world order', the article exami nes the persisting economic exploitation of many colonized peoples and their unalleviated repression through law. With particular reference to the latter, the article is also concerned with the relationship bet ween contemporary analyses of law and notions of postcolonialism and h ow this convergence has diverted attention away from the violence agai nst colonized peoples which continues to be perpetrated through law.