Is It Colonialism When Europeans Retire in Cheaper Countries?
I see many older Northern Europeans retiring to countries like Portugal or Morocco. And I know that some Americans are doing the same in Latin America. Is it fair to enjoy a different country's sun and cheaper living in retirement, or is this a new, sweet form of colonialism? — Taimaz Szirniks
From the Ethicist:
'Colonialism,' historically, happened when a state took over another territory, typically by force or fiat. It's a story about domination backed by state power.
When individuals retire abroad, though, they settle with the host government's consent, not a cannon. Societies have the right to decide whom they admit, within moral and legal bounds. International law protects refugees fleeing persecution, and decent nations avoid unfair discrimination or the splitting up of families. Beyond that, controlling residency and citizenship is a core piece of national sovereignty.
What these Northern Europeans are doing isn't colonialism; it's migration with permission. Retirees chasing a lower cost of living are simply doing transnationally what many do locally — moving where their resources stretch further, like Bostonians heading to Florida for sun and savings.
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Trump has wanted this kind of parade. And this is what he thinks the military does, is throw parades for the commander in chief. And he's doing it while he's sending troops into the streets of an American city, and I'm sure he's more than happy for that split screen to say, you know, These are my guys. This is my Army, my generals, my artillery. And if you screw with me, this is what it looks like in Los Angeles. Rosin: So you read it as my parade. Like, you read the split screen as necessary to understanding this military parade, not just as some kind of empty symbolism: He likes the look of it. He likes fit troops. Like, it's just aesthetically pleasing to him. That's not all it is, in your mind? Nichols: No. He obviously loves this stuff. I mean, Trump is, in many ways, very childlike. He likes shiny things and uniforms and big parades, and he's wanted this for a while, but I think he and the other people around him are also more than happy to create a second kind of symbolism here, of: I'm the president. I'm the commander in chief. I can put tanks in the streets anytime I feel like it. Because remember: He wanted to do this. He was aching to do this kind of stuff during the 2020 protests, and, you know, people in the Pentagon, including his own secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chief[s of Staff] said, This is a bad idea. And he has learned his lesson. He surrounds himself now with people who are never going to tell him that anything is a bad idea. Rosin: In the lead up to the parade, he gave this speech at Fort Bragg. Now, he's not the first president to give a speech in front of a military crowd. Presidents use the military as a backdrop all the time. What was different about this speech? Nichols: It wasn't a speech. It was a political rally. 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And when Donald Trump has been walking around like a wannabe dictator, talking about the military as his personal muscle, the symbolism of rumbling a tank down Constitution Avenue is, you know—I mean, look: These people know exactly what they're doing. They know the images they're creating. And part of the goal here is—and I think that this is true in Los Angeles, and I think it's true with the Washington parade—Trump and his people want to acclimate Americans to the sight of the U.S. military in their streets, which is one of the most un-American things, going all the way back to the Founders, who had a deep suspicion of a standing army. We honor the people who serve in our military. We value them. We cherish them. But no, we don't want them driving Humvees, you know, through the streets of D.C. every day. Rosin: Yeah, it's a really good point. I've obviously seen National Guard in the streets before, but seeing tanks in D.C. streets while, on the other coast, Marines are being deployed in Los Angeles has a very different feeling. Nichols: I think it feels wrong, and in part because, you know, part of the protection of American freedom is embedded in our system of federalism so that your local police are answerable to your local government, which in turn can be superseded by your state police, who answers to your state government. And if things really get tough, you have a National Guard of your fellow citizens, your neighbors, your friends who are then answerable, as well, to the governor. You should have to go through a whole bunch of blown circuits before you get to the United States military being in the streets of our own country, in part not just because it's such a violation of everything from, you know, George Washington onward. I mean, this whole thing with the parade is something I think that would make the father of the American Army, George Washington, ill. But it's also something that we avoid because it really is—you know, for conservatives who talk about not wanting to have a dictatorial central government, they're acting like they really want a dictatorial central government. And when you talk about the Army. You know, you're saying, State, local, county, government—none of that matters. The only real power in this country is right here in the White House in this one man. And it's also a bad idea because the military itself hates these missions. And that's good—you want a military that doesn't like domestic-policing missions. Rosin: Right. Well, speaking of bypassing local authority, this is all happening against the backdrop of Trump sending the National Guard and troops to Los Angeles to deal with the protests against ICE raids, which Trump has called 'lawless' and 'an invasion.' And Governor Gavin Newsom says he didn't ask for help and said the L.A. police could handle them. Why do you think he sent the troops then? Nichols: Specifically to show that Gavin Newsom is not in charge of the state of California, and that Karen Bass is not in charge of the city of Los Angeles. It's a very dramatic way of saying, All power in this country belongs to me, Donald Trump, and if I see something in Los Angeles I don't like, I don't care who the people of California elected—they mean nothing—I'm going to call out the Army because I can, and I want to establish that I can. [ Music ] Rosin: After the break, how to engineer a crisis—and how to counter it. [ Break ] Rosin: He does use the phrase 'liberate Los Angeles,' but I'm still not clear what it serves him. Why there? And you said he saw things that he didn't like. At least as Gavin Newsom puts it and reports from Los Angeles, they weren't especially violent. They didn't get out of control. It wasn't a situation that the L.A. police could not handle, at least according to Gavin Newsom. So what is it that he's trying to do or accomplish? What's the symbolism? What does it mean? Nichols: Oh, you know, Trump has a genius for picking the right fights. Remember: His goal has nothing really to do with Los Angeles or California. The strategy here is: Let's go to a blue state. Let's go to one of the bluest cities in the blue states. Let's totally humiliate people that the American right really hates. And let's do it in a place where our narrative that America is under foreign invasion, which allows me to invoke these old laws, Alien Acts, and so on in response to an invasion—let's go do it in the one place where I can count on the local population to do their part by cosplaying as exactly the kind of, you know, foreign-invasion force that I need them to play. They will play their role. And if there was any place they're going to do it, it's going to be in Los Angeles. Rosin: Right. So maybe it's an example of what people always say about Trump, that he can engineer his own reality. I mean, he can stage the theater and then walk into it. Nichols: When I taught strategy—there's an expression we use when we're talking about when you're trying to plan your operations and your opponent isn't particularly adept. We call that a 'cooperative adversary.' And Trump went someplace where he knows he has a cooperative adversary. Rosin: Right. So in his speech on Tuesday, Newsom said, 'It's time for all of us to stand up.' He left it vague what he meant by that, but that's what he said. You wrote a couple of what I thought were chilling sentences directed at the protesters, telling them not to provoke the soldiers. What you wrote was, 'You will not be heroes. You will be pretext.' What do you mean by that? Pretext for what? Nichols: A bigger crackdown, and for legislative action by these Republicans to say, Yeah, go ahead. We won't stop you if you want to invoke the Insurrection Act. The American people on both the right and the left, unfortunately, especially on the fringes, have—I think what George Will wisely once called—a ' hunger for apocalypse,' a kind of aching for drama, where they want to feel like they're part of a big tableau of a big adventure movie with a Hans Zimmer score. And Trump knows that. He has a great instinct for theater. He has a great instinct for what will trigger his opponents, and going to Los Angeles with the Army was just a very clever thing to do. And one of the things that you see that sometimes humiliates authoritarians is when they say, There are terrible things happening, and people say, I was at work today. Everything seems fine to me. Rosin: Yeah. Our writer Anne Applebaum wrote about this, that when there's a kind of a lull in the action or even a downturn in support, there's a need to engineer a crisis. And she's suggesting maybe this, what's happening in L.A. now, is the engineering of a crisis, to kind of whip that theater back up again. Nichols: It's absolutely what he's doing. And he's thinking ahead. Another of our colleagues, David Frum, made the point that this is a dress rehearsal. He's going to look for opportunities, perhaps even during voting, where he's going to say, Oh, I see irregularities. I see problems. I see people saying they are being harassed at the polls, and by then, he will have gotten us used to, you know, in this kind of 'boiling the frog' approach. He will have us used to the president just running roughshod over the governors and sending in the Army. Rosin: So if Americans have an appetite for this kind of drama, what do you think would be an effective way to counter this, what you call, authoritarian tendency? Nichols: Well, that's the thing. People on social media get mad at me and I say, Well, have you considered voting? Because people say, Well, I voted. Yes, but have you voted at the local and state level? There are things you can do. You can register people to vote; you can donate to organizations that are fighting this in court. And I think the courts—and I've written about this, the courts—have become the last line of defense, and I think they're actually doing well. And I think one of the reasons Trump is doing all this is because he's been losing so consistently. He's trying to figure out a way to short-circuit the boring drudgery of the legal process that keeps working against him. So, you know, my answer is, look—the Founders were great believers in stoicism. I believe there are times to go into the streets, but if the president is laying a gigantic trap, don't walk into it. Rosin: Tom, thank you so much for joining me. [ Music ] Nichols: Thanks for having me, Hanna. Rosin: This bonus episode of Radio Atlantic was produced by Jinae West and Rosie Hughes. It was edited by Claudine Ebeid and engineered by Rob Smierciak. Claudine Ebeid is the executive producer of Atlantic audio, and Andrea Valdez is our managing editor. Listeners, if you like what you hear on Radio Atlantic, you can support our work and the work of all Atlantic journalists when you subscribe to The Atlantic at
