To what extent was the trusteeship system born out of the sincere and honest desire to ‘bring the benefits of civilisation to all those who do not yet enjoy it’?

The debate over whether it was born out of the sincere and honest desire to ‘bring the benefits of civilisation to all those who do not yet enjoy it’, essentially revolves around whether trusteeship is (as stated in the lecture) ‘a real concern for the welfare of independent peoples’ or simply a proclaimed humanitarianism used as a window dressing of self motivated actions.

On one hand the idea of trusteeship holds an idea of a “standard of civilisation” (Paris 2002:650). If there is a belief in a standard of some sort there is the expectation that such a standard must be met. This standard was seen as a European responsibility and was articulated at the Berlin Conference on Africa in 1885 where colonial powers agreed to “bind themselves to watch over the preservation of the native tribes, and to care for the improvement of the conditions of their moral and material well-being” (Paris 2002:651). In this conference it appears that there was a sincere desire. However it is nearly impossible to correctly speculate as to the actual intentions of these European colonial powers.

It is a common idea in contemporary studies that trusteeship is seen as simply a way to disguise self interest and economically motivated actions within developing states. In this sense trusteeship relies on the fundamental idea of inequality. This idea of inequality can lead to a sense of responsibility and the ‘white man’s burden’. However this idea and sense of inequality can also distance the trusteeship state from its ‘dependents’. This can aid in justifying economically self interested motivations and their actions.

To a large degree the debate over the original intentions of trusteeship is problematic as it relies heavily upon a speculation of actual versus proclaimed intentions.