« The problem of the settler library out there: Dattatraya Kalbande, ‘Toward extraterrestrial librarianship: Designing knowledge systems for human settlements in space’, Journal of Space Safety Engineering, 2026

Resettlers are settlers: Cristian Cercel, ‘The emigration solution and the coloniality of migration: postwar plans of resettling German expellees’, Settler Colonial Studies, 2026

27Mar26

Abstract: This article examines the so-called ‘emigration solution’ to the ‘refugee question’ in postwar Europe and the plans to resettle Germans expelled from the East of Europe in Latin America. After laying down the theoretical framework, articulated around the concept of ‘coloniality of migration’, the article contextualizes the German presence in the East of Europe and the flight and expulsion of Germans at the end of the Second World War, emphasizing the parallels and links with settler colonialism and settler migration to Latin America. It then discusses the emigration solution as a response to the European displacement crisis, showing that it drew on a repertoire of ideas with affinities to settler colonialism. Subsequently, it engages with three postwar projects of resettling German expellees to Brazil, Chile and Venezuela, discussing how they are related to settler colonialism and how the coloniality of migration informed them. The article concludes with a discussion on how the coloniality of migration provides a framework enabling an understanding of the links between settler colonialism and settler migration and with a consideration of the interconnections between the East of Europe and Latin America in the global history of settler colonialism and settler migration.


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