From Vught to Gaza: Racism, Colonialism, Secularism and Zionism, A Conversation with Arun Kundnani, Janneke Stegeman and Sinan Çankaya
This event explores the entangled legacies of racism, colonialism, secularism, and Zionism through the lens of historical memory, religious discourse, and contemporary political violence. Drawing connections between the Netherlands’ own colonial past and the current crisis in Gaza, the conversation asks: how are histories of European empire reproduced in state violence today? What roles do secular and religious narratives play in justifying racial hierarchies, border regimes, and occupation? How has capitalism and Christian Zionism contributed to Dutch complicity in the Gaza genocide?
We bring together three leading thinkers whose work interrogates the ideological foundations of Western liberal democracies and their complicity in systems of oppression, both within Europe and beyond.
Arun Kundnani is a political theorist and the author of What is Antiracism?, a major intervention into contemporary debates around race, identity, and resistance. Kundnani critiques mainstream antiracism as overly focused on representation and individual bias, arguing instead for a structural approach that foregrounds state power, capitalism, and imperialism. Kundnani’s work exposes how liberal secularism, often portrayed as neutral or progressive, has historically operated as a racializing force, particularly in relation to Muslims.
Janneke Stegeman, theologian and public intellectual, brings a theological perspective to questions of race and empire. In her book Uitverkoren: Op zoek naar de erfenis van een racistisch verleden, she uncovers how Dutch Protestantism has been historically complicit in colonial violence, through its theological justification of slavery, its missionary entanglements, and its racialized interpretations of Biblical texts. Stegeman critiques the notion of “chosenness” as it has been mobilized both within Christianity and Zionism, revealing how religious narratives have served as instruments of exclusion and domination. Her work opens a space for critical theological reflection and decolonial religious practice.
https://www.jannekestegeman.com/about-janneke/
Sinan Çankaya is a cultural anthropologist known for his critical engagement with Dutch identity, memory, and institutions. In his latest book Galmende Geschiedenissen. Çankaya examines how the Netherlands commemorates World War II. He argues that these rituals of remembrance often erase the colonial contexts in which Dutch nationalism is based on. By centering these silences, Çankaya challenges the moral exceptionalism of Dutch national memory and invites us to see how colonialism continues to echo in the present.
The Event Will be Moderated By: Nawal Mustafa & Anya Topolski
Nawal Mustafa is an Assistant Professor in Black Studies, Critical Race Studies, and Indigenous Studies within the Cultural Studies department at the University of Amsterdam. Her work explores the intersections of law, colonialism, slavery, and the regulation of intimacy. Nawal completed her PhD at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, focusing on migration and the historical regulation of interracialised intimacy in the UK following World War II. After her PhD, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher examining the legal history of slavery within the Dutch empire. Next to her academic roles, Nawal also serves as a strategic legal advisor at PILP, a human rights law firm and NGO based in Amsterdam.
Anya Topolski is an associate professor in ethics and political philosophy at the Radboud University Nijmegen. She holds a PhD from KU Leuven (2008), awarded the Auschwitz Foundation Prize for her work on Arendt, Levinas, and Jewish thought. In 2009 she worked in the Netherlands on the question of dehumnisation and genocide in relation to Srebrenica. Her research spans European identity, antisemitism, Islamophobia, genocide, Zionism and the race-religion constellation in Europe. She coordinates the Race, Religion, Secularism Network. Since 2023, she also coordiantes the Race in Academic network. Her books include Arendt, Levinas and a Politics of Relationality (2015) and Is There a Judeo-Christian Tradition? (2016). Articles of hers have appeared in Critical Philosophy of Race and Ethnic and Racial Studies, among others.
Funded by:
En/Gendering Europe’s “Muslim Question” Vici project; Feminist Transnational Sociology
