Eliminationism

The term eliminationism was coined by American political scientist Daniel Goldhagen in his 1996 book Hitler's Willing Executioners in which he posits that ordinary Germans not only knew about, but also supported, the Holocaust because of a unique and virulent "eliminationist antisemitism" in the German identity, which had developed in the preceding centuries.[1]

The purpose of defining eliminationism is the inherent weakness of the term genocide, which only allows for action where mass slaughter has already occurred. However, as Goldhagen argues, extermination is usually seen as one (and the most extreme) option of getting rid of an unwanted people group seen as a threat, and in any case of extermination many of the other methods of eliminationism will also be present and probably used first.

There are five forms of eliminationism:[2]

1. Transformation: deleting/changing the cultural identities of people. (Ex: Boarding schools for Native Americans, Re-education centers for Uighurs in China)
2. Repression: systematically limiting the power of the target group through political disenfranchisement, ghettos, slavery, segregation, or other legal means. (Ex: German 1930s laws against Jews, Jim Crow, voter registration restrictions)
3. Expulsion: removing the undesired group through deportation, forced removal, forced marches, concentration camps. (Ex: The Armenians in 1916, Japanese in California in WWII)
4. Preventing reproduction: forced sterilization, anti-misegynation laws, or systematic rape so that there will be no future for the group.
5. Extermination: mass murder/genocide.

In his 2009 book Worse Than War: Genocide, Eliminationism, and the Ongoing Assault on Humanity, Goldhagen argues that eliminationism is the root cause of every mass murder perpetrated in the 20th and 21st centuries, including:[3]

• War rape in Darfur (2003–2010)
• Suicide attacks by Islamic terrorists
• Rwandan genocide (1994)
• Ethnic cleansing and genocide during the Yugoslav Wars (1991–1999)
• Cambodian genocide (1975–1979)
• Operation Condor in Latin America (1973–1985)
• Death marches from the Auschwitz concentration camp (1944–1945)
• Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (1945)
• British concentration camps for the Mau Mau following their uprising in Kenya (1952–1960), and during the Boer Wars (1880–1881, 1899–1902)

American journalist David Neiwert argued in 2009 that eliminationist rhetoric is becoming increasingly mainstream within the American right wing, fueled in large part by the extremist discourse found on conservative blogs and talk radio, which may provoke a resurgence of lone wolf terrorism.[4]

American professor of law Phyllis E. Bernard argues that interventions in Rwanda and Nigeria, which adapted American dispute prevention and resolution methods to African media and dispute resolution traditions, may provide a better fit and forum for the U.S. to address eliminationist media messages and their impact on society.[1]

Theodore N. Kaufman self-published Germany Must Perish! in the United States in 1941. In the 104-page book, Kaufman advocated genocide through forced sterilization of all Germans and the territorial disassociation of Germany. The obscure book received very little attention in the US, but was eventually cited by the Nazi regime as proof of a vast Jewish conspiracy to annihilate Germany and Germans (Kaufman was a Jew). The Nazis published quotes from the book in wartime propaganda, pretending that the book was indicative of the views of the Allied Powers, which in turn was added justification for Nazi Germany's continued persecution of the Jews as part of the Holocaust.

During the 1991–2002 Algerian Civil War the predominant faction of the conflict's first phase was known as les éradicateurs for their ideology and for their rural and urban tactics. These hardliners were opposed in the Army and the FLN by les dialoguistes.

• Incitement to genocide