The International Day for Reparations Related to "Civilisation"

12 October 2014
It is often said that 'The West' civilised 'The Rest' of the world. We deny this. Europe did not civilise the wider world, it colonised it. Indeed, before European competitive colonisation of our planet, peoples of the wider world had civilisations of their own. Yet, because Europe saw the existence of these civilisations as contrary to its colonial agenda, it defamed them as not civilised, it misrepresented them as chattel, and it colonised, and continues to neo-colonise, them.  

For this reason, on a day celebrated by some as "Columbus Day", by others as "The Day of the Race", but by us as "The International Day for Reparations Related to Colonisation', University College London, in collaboration with the African Reparations Transnational Community of Practice (ARTCoP), is responding to recent public discussion about how to repair European chattel, colonial, and neo-colonial enslavement of African peoples.

At this planning meeting, in Brixton, thirty three activists and academics will co-produce arguments that both enrich public discourse and empower African people. This planning meeting will occur on Sunday 12th October, in the newly-opened Grade II-listed building of the Black Cultural Archives . This planning meeting is in preparation for a public meeting, in Tottenham, at which groups of young Diasporic African persons creatively and communicatively campaign on reparations, harnessing those very co-produced arguments, during the UK's General Election. The public meeting is generously supported by the UCL Public Engagement Unit, and the planning meeting is generously supported by the UCL European Institute and the UCL Centre for Research on the Dynamics of Civilisation (CREDOC).

For more information please contact Dr. Nathaniel Adam Tobias Coleman