Notes concerning protectionism as post facto or a priori justificatory discourse and practices,
not concerning immediate responses to particular circumstances (e.g. person bearing down on someone with an axe):
- "I am protecting you" sets up a dichotomy between protector and protectee
- You = weak, Me = stronger
- It is generally understood in terms of power-as-possession (quantitative power) - You = Powerless, I have power to protect you.
- Sets up a stereotypically gendered dichotomy of “masculine” and “feminine” dynamics
- Often accompanied by essentialist generalizations, "I the man will protect you the woman", "I the anthropologist will protect you the native"
- Crucially, it also sets up a dichotomy between the good (protector and protectee) and the bad (those from whom one is protecting the protectee, which in some circumstances can actually be the protectee themselves)
- Using that dichotomy allows the protector to not acknowledge that any harm might come from their good intentions or their desire to protect. They are, after all, on The Side of the Angels. The thinking that frames the desire for protection is unlikely to be held up to scrutiny. This is a key factor in unenlightened 'development', anthropological, and psychoanalytic thinking, among many others. It also correlates with the Saviour Complex.
- Protectionism often allows for the evasion of more complex critique of the nuances of power and resistance in the experiences of ‘what actually happens’.
- In my own thinking, the rhetoric of protection (protection-as-persuasion) is a key red flag in the identification of possible enclosure dynamics.
