Postcolonial Roshar

[MistLord]

Something that really hit me, as a law student in New Zealand, was the conflict about who are the legitimate rulers of the land. 

• The Parshendi are native to Roshar.
• By their invitation, humans were allowed to arrive, being given Shinovar. 
• Humans, ever seeking to expand, were not happy with the small boundaries they were given, and took more and more.
• Eventually, the Parshendi were being properly invaded, and had to fight back.
• Now the invaders are considered the de facto rulers, and the natives are a minority. 

For those unfamiliar, New Zealand was an English colony before it became an independent country. But before that, the Maori had settled. Through a series of events that involved the injustices that colonialism has become known for, Maori now represent a minority of the population, both statistically and politically. The country is now in a position where it can question whether or not its own rule is justified or not. And it is not a question with easy answers. 

We study the justification for following the Common Law system of Western countries, instead of the Tikanga Maori law system. We study how the Treaty created for the English to be granted title is unfair and unrecognised throughout its history. 

 

Without getting too far into the politics of New Zealand, I thought it was analogous to the issue of Parshendi or Human land title. This is why I felt that the conflict was a lot more powerful than I've seen other people reporting it to be, even though it is predictable. The Radiants are bound by their Oaths, in ways that require them to feel justified in what they do. But when only the descendents of perpetrators remain to bear the guilt, and the victims are still calling for justice, what really is the right thing to do? Cooperation, though the ideal solution, is extremely hard to achieve throughout a history of injustice. New Zealand attempts to address this with affirmative action, but then there are those who say there is too little or too much reverse discrimination, and that racial bias still is a factor. 

I'm aware other analogies exist, especially the Native Americans, but this was what I was most familiar with. 

 

One last thing, I've always felt that Nale and the Skybreakers seemed a bit silly, following the law as it is written instead of by what it means (what could be called a strict textual, positivist approach). A little of that was cleared up with Edgedancer and Oathbringer (though Nale does say that he only asked for permission to kill Surgebinders after confronting lift, meaning he was illegally executing people before that), I still feel that they need a more developed sense of jurisprudence (philosophy of law) to give meaning to anything they do. The law exists for a reason, namely to bring order to the chaos of human interaction. This was mentioned many times by various Skybreakers. Despite that, by joining the Parshendi, they encourage an escalation of chaos and disorder. 

I'll make a separate post about this later, after I've had more time to think on it. 

 

Sorry for the wall of text 

[Greywatch]

Don't be sorry! I very much enjoyed reading this post. I wish I had something more intelligent to contribute, but all I can say is if you have more on this, I'd love to read more.