German colonisation in Samoa from 1900 to 1914 was characterised by the interplay of
conflicting definitions of race. The central question this study asks is to what extent and in
which ways ideologies of race shaped German colonial policy in Samoa. It analyses the
administration's paternalist development policies debates over white settlement the
introduction and treatment of indentured labourers and the legal classification of mixed
marriages and half-castes. The author argues that rather than uniting the colonising community
in a racist mission of domination racial thought amplified the fissures in German Samoa's
population and supported the administration's Realpolitik.
