Imperialism in Waiting for the Barbarians and The Mission

Throughout history, civilizations have attempted to expand their empires through the conquest and colonization of lands that belonged to other peoples. Beginning after the end of the European Renaissance, western European nations began to expand the borders of their countries exponentially by colonizing much of the non-European world. J. M. Coetzee's novel, Waiting for the Barbarians, and Roland Joffe's film, The Mission are both allegorical representations of imperialism. Through separate mediums and different techniques, both works analyze the institution and effects of colonization, focusing on the distinction drawn between those who claim to be civilized and those who are held to be barbarians.

Each of the two works depicts a separate empire that represents the concept of imperial power. The Empire, a nameless kingdom, is described by Coetzee as a highly influential and authoritative government, in which political power is the primary drive. The Empire is not directly representative of any historical entity, however it can be assumed, because of Coetzee's personal, South Africa background as well as general world history, that it is a European power. The work, then, stands as an allegory for all instances of imperialism throughout time, where the Empire represents any and all empires and the barbarians are all cultures oppressed by colonization. The Mission, as it is based on documented, historical happenings, portrays the Spanish and Portuguese empires in South America. In this situation, political advancement is only part of the imperial goal; as both Spain and Portugal were heavily influenced by the Catholic Church, missionaries accompanied the military and other settlers in order to influence the natives to convert to Christianity. The duality of the South American colonization presents a scenario where the imperialistic civilizations are not only at odds with the natives, but also with the other empire and often with the Catholic Church. This creates an environment of constant competition where different factions are forced to align themselves with others in order to achieve domination over their enemies. The Mission, even as a true story, is a single example of a system that could represent any case of imperialism, whether it be political or ideological. Whatever form the empire in question takes, it "represents... an ambiguity which governs all relationships and dissolves all clear-cut moral judgments" (Van Zanten Gallagher 278). When an empire sees itself as being infallible, it is at risk of acting immorally, as it takes it upon its leaders to not only act ethically, but also to define the parameters of morality. This ethical code, different in each work, is the product of an empire's assertion of supremacy, and may be less influenced by philosophical theories on virtue and more concerned with attaining control over the conquered land.

Given this opportunity to define values that are the most conducive to its own motives, imperialism's most direct victim, in any case, is the native population of the colonized region. In Waiting for the Barbarians, the anonymous indigenous peoples lose the majority of their land to the Empire. As the Magistrate digs in the ground surrounding the town, he excavates artifacts suggesting that the natives had once occupied the land now inhabited by the colonial power. In order to elicit subordination from the natives, Colonel Joll and his followers in the Empire torture the natives. This torture, an obvious violation of the humanity of the aboriginals, is a liberty taken by the Empire to impose the theory that its own will and intentions are more crucial than the rights of those that it is conquering.

One of the central arguments that runs throughout The Mission is that of the humanity of the natives. While the Portuguese allow the tribal people to be captured and enslaved, Spain does not; their enslavement, although not practiced by all, demeans the people and treats them not as sentient beings in their own right, but rather as ends to a means imposed by the imperialistic societies. Both nations also equally debate whether the natives are human or animal in being. While the local inhabitants are obviously human from a biological standpoint, members of both of the European empires believe that the differences between the conquerors and the indigenous people is too great to view them as equals, so the natives are labeled by most as "animals". They define "human" qualities as being qualities possessed solely by Europeans, such as an appreciation and aptitude for western music, clothing, religion, and social norms; since there is no way that the Americans could possibly have the same customs as the Portuguese and the Spanish, the very definition of "human" that they developed was one that excluded all but the Caucasian, Christian, Western Europeans like themselves. Like the physical torture imposed on the population of Coetzee's work, the European belief that the South Americans are sub-human creatures, coupled with the enslavement of the people, deprives them of their humanity and defines them as "barbarians" in the European eye.

Aside from the political empires of Portugal and Spain, The Mission depicts the religious and ideological imperialism practiced by the Catholic Church. "Conceived as a way to proselytize among the Guarani while protecting them from the Sao Paulo slavers and the corrupting influences of Spanish settlers" (Crocitti), the missions set up in South America acted more as a way for the Catholic Church to form a religious and philosophical empire in which all people could have the same beliefs and ideas and, more importantly pay homage to the authority of the Church. In the same way that nations used colonialism to expand their borders, population, and economic viability, the Catholic Church used the vehicle of national conquest to spread the message of their religion through missionaries in order to increase the size of their global parish, the physical extent of the reach of the Church, and, by extension, the overall financial welfare of the institution. While political imperialism impresses culture and national loyalty on a people, religious imperialism imprints an ideological imperative on the people, changing the basic beliefs and views of the people that they are converting. Imposing the Catholic religion on the natives without learning about their existing convictions and cultural traditions implies that the Church, the missionaries, and the political leaders that sanction the accompaniment of the Church officials believe that Catholicism is inherently more valuable than any other way of thinking, and, by extension, do not recognize the value of the existing religions, beliefs, and ideas of the region, as well as the native people themselves, and they lose the opportunity and ability to learn anything from the other culture. While the Spanish and Portuguese missionaries certainly have the right to present the beliefs of the Catholic Church to the natives, they should then "have the right to choose and they have the right to go against what [the Europeans] think is in their particular interest" (Dempsey 7). Instead, the Church viewed it as a duty "to bring Christ to the heathens of what no one then called the Third World" (Dempsey 2).

Each of the two works has a main character that steps aside from the norm of their empire and makes a deep connection with the natives. The Magistrate of Waiting for the Barbarians forged a close, pseudo-romantic relationship with an unnamed barbarian girl for whom he ultimately sacrificed his lifestyle, job position, and his own humanity. One of the most important components of his relationship with the girl is his disgust for the torture that his government inflicted upon her; this drives their relationship, as it creates a fascination with her for him, but it also gives him an opportunity to distance himself from those that he disagrees with. When the Magistrate says, "No, No, No! I cry to myself... there is nothing to link me to the torturers, people who sit waiting like beetles in dark cellars... I must assert my distance from Colonel Joll! I will not suffer for his crimes!" (Coetzee 44). In this statement, The Magistrate knowingly and decidedly disconnects himself from the torturers and therefore disowns his society and condemns the Empire for its crimes, both of torture and imperialism.

Father Gabriel, a Jesuit priest in The Mission, lived for months with the Guarani people, learning of their language and culture, and eventually bringing others to the same conclusion about the native people as they join his cause. The priest, in defending the natives that he has vowed to protect, forfeits not only his honor and place in the Catholic Church, as he disobeys Church officials, but he also sacrifices his life in the final battle of the film. Rodrigo Mendoza, a former Portuguese mercenary, is the strongest follower of Father Gabriel, and ultimately forges strong bonds with the Guarani during his time at the mission. In the Battle of Mbobore, at the end of the film, Mendoza sacrifices his position in the Catholic Church, his political connections to the Europeans, and, in the end, his life, in an attempt to lead the natives to victory against the imperial powers. In the final battle scenes, as both Father Gabriel and Rodrigo Mendoza are killed defending the tribal Guarani people, the two men are shown to surpass the cultural barriers that exist between the natives and the Europeans in an attempt to prove that humanity is a uniting force that should not be pushed aside in the name of race or culture, but must rather be hailed as a universality that applies to all peoples.

Both Waiting for the Barbarians and The Mission focus on this division of humanity into contrived and separate groups: the civilized and the uncivilized. "As [Coetzee's] title suggests, [of both the novel and the film], the most salient binary opposition in the [works] is that of barbarity and civilization" (Eckstein 185). The ultimate dilemma of imperialism, then, as seen in both works, is the question of the right of one nation to lay claim to being "civilized" while dismissing another group as "savages", when the imperial civilization, is in fact, acting in a highly barbaric manner. This creates the task of an empire to "assert that wherever
Works Cited

Coetzee, J.M. Waiting for the Barbarians. Penguin Books: London: 1980.

Crocitti, John J. "The internal economic organization of the Jesuit missions among the Guarani. " International Social Science Review. (Spring-Summer 2002): 3(13). General OneFile. Gale. Chapman University. 26 Apr. 2008
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Dempsey, Michael. "Light Shining in Darkness: Roland Joffe on 'The Mission'". Film Quarterly (Summer, 1987): 40(4). Pp. 2-11.

Eckstein, Barbara. "The Body, the Word, and the State: J. M. Coetzee's 'Waiting for the Barbarians'". Novel: A Forum on Fiction. (Winter, 1898): 22(2). Pp. 175-198.

The Mission. Dir. Roland Joffe. Perf. Robert De Niro, Jeremy Irons. 1986.Van Zanten Gallagher, Susan. "Torture and the Novel: J. M. Coetzee's 'Waiting for the Barbarians'". Contemporary Literature. (Summer, 1988): 29(2). Pp. 277-285.