ABSTRACT This article situates itself in the theoretical space between the field of genocide, and postcolonial studies, advocating for a closer relationship between the two, particularly in relation to the emerging field of postcolonial genocide. The Rwandan genocide is illustrative of this need, as a case which remains firmly rooted in identity categories that have been imposed on the native populations during the colonial era. The article traces the persistence of the colonial racial hierarchies in Rwanda and the role they played in the Rwandan genocide of 1994. It fosters a particularly significant focus on modernity as the symbolic line that divides the imagined racial categories in the colonial gaze, resulting in a crucial impact of nesting colonialisms in the genocidal rhetoric of the late twentieth century. The Rwandan genocidal project contains within it a desire to fulfil the promise of modernity by facilitating the emergence of an ethnically cleansed nation state, while simultaneously rejecting it as the heritage of violence ridden exploitation colonialism. This paradox of ambivalent modernity presents itself both as a crucial characteristic of the Rwandan genocide as well as a persistent rupture in the formation of contemporary Rwandan identities.

Contrary to its conventional image as a social-democratic paragon, the Danish welfare state has, in recent decades, been undergoing significant changes as a response to the intrusion into the social sphere by self-regulating markets and a final departure from Keynesian politics of universalism and solidarity. This article examines the evident decline of the Nordic model as a result of neoliberal globalisation and establishes an association between the erosion of the welfare state and the emergence of fascist political sentiment in Denmark. An analysis of the Danish People's party and its growing public support among the disenfranchised working class communities in Denmark demonstrates how those overlooked by the free market and unrepresented by the liberal left become increasingly more receptive to the proposed social agendas of the far right campaigns.

The thesis “Genocide and Modernity: A Comparative Study of Bosnia, Rwanda and the Holocaust” attempts to address a gap in understanding within genocide studies. Within this field, which is dominated by case studies of the Holocaust as an embodiment of modernity, genocidal contexts such as Rwanda and Bosnia are excluded from the category of modern genocide, as a result of which the comparative method has been largely overlooked, negatively affecting the complexity of the scholarly debates. In order to resolve this, I have conducted a comparative study of three genocidal contexts in order to test each for the presence of indicators of modernity. Through the use of Critical theory and other theoretical standpoints, I have compared the genocidal contexts of Rwanda, Bosnia and the Holocaust along the lines of: organic nationalism, scientific racism, instrumental rationality, utopianism, obedience, efficiency, numbing and Gesellschaft/Gemeinschaft social ties, in order to create a complex understanding of the relationship between modernity and genocide. As a result of this analysis, my findings have proven that in relation to the execution of genocide, all three cases fit within the category of modern genocide and are not a result of ancient hatreds. However, in each of the contexts, I have also found a rejection of modernity, particularly obvious in the regressive organic-nationalist ideology of genocide. In fact, genocide itself seems to be a result of a disillusionment with the modern project as seen through the difficulties brought on by the age of industrialisation, but also as the project of Western hegemony, as the perpetrator states seem to be those that are both, at the time of genocide, excluded from the main circle of power, but also have a difficult history of foreign rule, which has made the transition towards the nation state difficult, particularly in terms of confusing identity categories.