they affirm themselves through love. Here lies the secret of harmony
prevailing in all the territories where Portugal settled."
(It should be noted that, perhaps because of this kind of thinking,
Prof. Dias is now spending a year at the famous Stanford Think
Programme.)
This image of harmonious partnership is extremely important to the Portugues*
colonial theorist in justifying the continued search for profit. Prof. Caetano
gives us a modern version of this marriage of interest with virtue:
"Nowadays, too, Portuguese policy places on parallel lines the interests
of European leaders in the transformation of backward regions and the
interests of the natives as a mass prepared to become part of a future
civilised people. Thus, Portugal cannot accept in absolute terms the
principle: 'paramountcy of native interests1 rather on the contrary her
traditional methods come closer to what Lugard called fdual mandate1".
Elsewhere in the same work he goes into more detail on this theme? to explai
the machinery through which this dual mandate is supposed to work:
"The modern colonial administration of the Portuguese is based on
four fundamental principles:
(a) Political unity
(b) Spiritual assimilation
(c) Administrative differentiation
(d) Economic solidarity"
and he goes on to give a full account of what he takes each of these "principles"
to mean.
This neat account of Caetano1s, giving as it does a very clear picture of
how the Portuguese see, or would like others to see, their colonial venture, makes
a convenient point of departure for our own evaluation of their work.
Political Unity and Administrative Differentiation
"Portugal is a unitary state with only one territory, only one population and only one government", writes Caetano, but "The population is
made up of two juridical classes: citizens and aborigines. The law
regards as aborigines the members of the black race or those descending
from it who continue to live in their traditional way and do not by
education acquire the outlook and manner of life of civilized men,"
and "The peculiar circumstances of territory, of society and of
economics in the colonies call for adequate administrative regimes,
and therefore for adequate administrative regimes which are different
from the system of administration ruling in the Metropolis."