page_title: Genocide of indigenous peoples
section_title: Famines in British India
hierarchical_section_title: Genocide of indigenous peoples / British Empire (pre-1945) / Famines in British India
caption_attribution_description: Famine in India: five emaciated children; a girl sitting and four boys lying on a mat. Photograph, 1876/1878. Iconographic Collections Keywords: starvation, india
context_page_description: The genocide of indigenous peoples is the mass destruction of entire communities of indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples are understood to be people whose historical and current territory has become occupied by colonial expansion, or the formation of a state by a dominant group such as a colonial power.
  While the concept of genocide was formulated by Raphael Lemkin in the mid-20th century, the expansion of various European colonial powers such as the British and Spanish empires and the subsequent establishment of colonies on indigenous territory frequently involved acts of genocidal violence against indigenous groups in the Americas, Australia, Africa and Asia. According to Lemkin, colonization was in itself "intrinsically genocidal". He saw this genocide as a two-stage process, the first being the destruction of the indigenous population's way of life. In the second stage, the newcomers impose their way of life on the indigenous group.
context_section_description: Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World is a book by Mike Davis about the connection between political economy and global climate patterns, particularly El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). By comparing ENSO episodes in different time periods and across countries, Davis explores the impact of colonialism and the introduction of capitalism, and the relation with famine in particular. Davis argues that "Millions died, not outside the 'modern world system', but in the very process of being forcibly incorporated into its economic and political structures. They died in the golden age of Liberal Capitalism; indeed, many were murdered ... by the theological application of the sacred principles of Smith, Bentham and Mill."
  Davis characterizes the Indian famines under the British Raj as "colonial genocide." Some scholars, including Niall Ferguson, have disputed this judgment, while others, including Adam Jones, have affirmed it.
caption: Victims of the Great Famine of 1876–78
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