During the Kenyan Emergency of 1952–1960, one of the most violent episodes in the history of the British Empire, humanitarian organizations colluded with the colonial state to shore up British power. This article examines how aid agencies that claimed to exemplify the progressive internationalism of the postwar period participated in colonial violence. Far from condemning the brutality of the imprisonment and torture during the Kenyan Emergency, aid organizations were deeply implicated in parallel projects for women and children that sought to achieve the same objectives: the remaking of Kikuyu hearts and minds and the weakening of anticolonial resistance. Far from acting as a check on colonial violence in an era of burgeoning rights discourses in 1950s Kenya, self-proclaimed “impartial” internationalist organizations, while claiming to uphold values of universal humanity, worked as auxiliaries to the colonial counterinsurgency. Taking their cue from military counterinsurgency in 1950s Malaya, humanitarians sought to win “hearts and minds” and undertook material provision for imprisoned anticolonial activists and their families on behalf of the colonial state. They did so by importing new humanitarian expertise developed in wartime Europe and adapting it to fit within racist, colonial norms. In providing this allegedly impartial expertise, humanitarian organizations lent credence to the myth that rehabilitation in Kenya was a progressive program enacted by a liberal empire to modernize its subjects, rather than a ruthless attempt to stymie anticolonial resistance by any means necessary. In this case, postwar humanitarian internationalism did not challenge colonial brutality but enabled it.

中文翻译：

---

复兴帝国：肯尼亚紧急状态期间与殖民国家的人道主义勾结，约 1954–1960

在 1952 年至 1960 年的肯尼亚紧急状态期间，这是大英帝国历史上最暴力的事件之一，人道主义组织与殖民国家勾结以巩固英国的权力。本文探讨了声称体现战后进步国际主义的援助机构如何参与殖民暴力。援助组织不仅没有谴责肯尼亚紧急状态期间监禁和酷刑的残暴行为，还深深地卷入了旨在实现相同目标的妇女和儿童平行项目：重塑基库尤人的心灵和削弱反殖民抵抗。在 1950 年代肯尼亚权利话语蓬勃发展的时代，这些自称“公正”的国际主义组织远非遏制殖民暴力，在声称维护普遍人性的价值观的同时，充当了殖民平叛的助手。从 1950 年代马来亚的军事镇压行动中汲取灵感，人道主义者寻求赢得“人心”，并代表殖民国家为被监禁的反殖民活动家及其家人提供物质保障。他们通过引进在战时欧洲开发的新人道主义专业知识并对其进行调整以适应种族主义和殖民规范，从而做到了这一点。在提供这种据称是公正的专业知识时，人道主义组织相信了这样一种神话，即肯尼亚的复兴是一个自由帝国为使其臣民现代化而制定的一项进步计划，而不是无情地试图以任何必要的方式阻碍反殖民抵抗。在这种情况下，