politics

Approximately half of all anthropologists in the United States contributed their expertise to the World War II effort. In his new book Anthropological Intelligence: The Deployment and Neglect of American Anthropology in the Second World War, anthropologist David Price explores the wide range of roles they played through dozens of accounts profiling their work.

In a review in Anthropological Quarterly that today was published in Red Orbit, Roberto J Gonzalez writes:

Price’s work reveals that even in a “good war” like WWII, anthropologists often stood on ethically shaky ground when working for military and intelligence agencies, and some of them came to regret the long- term consequences of their participation.

In addition, the book reveals that the during the war, military officials had a tendency of “selectively ignoring and selectively commandeering social scientists’ recommendations” (p. 198). All too often, anthropologists had little impact on policy making and functioned as cogs in large bureaucracies with clearly established goals.

Anthropologists were involved in many doubtful projects. But only “few anthropologists had second thoughts about the ethics of applying anthropology to warfare” according to Price’s book.

The Office of War Information employed nearly a dozen anthropologists, who among other things designed propaganda custom made for Japanese audiences for the purpose of convincing them to surrender.

(…)

Still others were recruited into the Office of Strategic Services (established in 1942), a spy agency that was the precursor to the CIA. For example, Gregory Bateson carried out clandestine missions in South Asia; Carleton Coon used his anthropological knowledge to train assassins and kidnappers in North Africa

(…)

Among the most shocking sections is a description of “social engineers” such as Henry Field (p. 127). Field and several other anthropologists were deeply involved in the “M Project” initiated by President Roosevelt in 1942. The goal was to search the globe for regions where millions of wartime refugees could be resettled.

Declassified documents reveal that “library bound bureaucrats [were] designing contingency plans to move tens of millions of people thousands of miles away from their native lands. Field and his staff appear[ed] comfortable planning to move inventoried people about the globe like fungible commodities” (p. 126).

Even more disconcerting is that fact that “in almost every case, the peoples identified for relocation were victims of the aggression of others (e.g., the Roma, Jews, etc.), as if the reward of being victimized was being moved so that the aggressor could live in peace” (p. 127).

Price concludes that anthropologists’ efforts might have helped defeat the forces of fascism. But at the same time, they unleashed other forces that could potentially be used for harm.

Gonzales has written a quite enthusiastic review. Price’s book is an “extraordinarily powerful and well-informed critique of wartime anthropology for the military”, he writes.

When I’m not very comfortable with the review, it’s because of the connections between the two anthropologists. Gonzales and Price are among the founding members of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists and have written several texts together, i.e. When Anthropologists Become Counter-Insurgents

>> read the whole review

There is also a short review in The Olympian

David Price seems to be a fan of open access anthropology. He has put online lots of articles, including about World War I & II and Anthropology

SEE ALSO:

Cooperation between the Pentagon and anthropologists a fiasco?

More and more anthropologists are recruited to service military operations

The dangerous militarisation of anthropology

Anthropology and CIA: “We need more awareness of the political nature and uses of our work”

Protests against British research council: “Recruits anthropologists for spying on muslims”

American Anthropologists Stand Up Against Torture and the Occupation of Iraq