The imperial boomerang effect is the theory that techniques developed to repress colonised territories and peoples will, in time, inevitably be deployed at home. Repressive policing, methods of detention and controlling dissent, forcing humans to produce goods and services for overlords in the metropolis, or even mass enslavement and killing: all “boomerang” back into that metropolis. First, they are used against those who are seen as inferior; then, they are deployed even against those citizens with full rights and privileges if they dare to question authority. In short, the remote other eventually becomes the intimate familiar.
Donald Trump’s second term has so far been a case study in how systems built for those whose rights have been diluted or taken away eventually devour those who were assumed to be safe from such violations. There are three ways in which this process of rebounding happens. The first is through the creation of a domestic caste system that mirrors the one outside a country’s borders, as demonstrated in the recent treatment of those foreigners with permanent US residency and valid work visas who expressed dissenting views on Gaza.
