Vatican rejects 'doctrine of discovery.' What's that? (pillarcatholic.com) The Vatican made headlines this week, when two of its dicasteries released a statement rejecting the “doctrine of discovery” that was used to justify centuries of colonialism. The Dicastery for Culture and Education, and the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development released a March 30 statement clarifying, with emphasis, that “The ‘doctrine of discovery’ is not part of the teaching of the Catholic Church.”
The Doctrine of Discovery is a legal principle that determined when a European Nation's subjects discovered a new place outside of Europe they could claim it for their nation as a possession. The principle was also allied to the notion of Terra Nullus - meaning no-ones earth - and on this basis, various lands were claimed and colonised, without particular reference to the people who were already resident. The English, French, Dutch, German, Portuguese and Spanish were all quite happy with this grab-and-run self-service system of ordering the planet. Most nations have moved away from such notions. I know in Australia Terra Nulus was debunked by the Mabo decision. The Dicasteries are administrative units in particular fields operating under the umbrella of the Vatican. As such they do not have authority in the areas of faith or morals, so their view expressed here is encouraging, but probably not definitive. I am not sure where the matter stands in the USA, whose judiciary was the first to enunciate the idea as a legal principle. Perhaps a North American could shed more light on that.
Not just Europeans. It was how things worked all over the world for millennia. Similarly slavery was practised worldwide by just about everyone.
That may be true, however, it distracts from the issue at hand, the legal premise of Terra Nullus. This was in the mind of European Expansion and Colonisation. The slaves were bought in Africa in this period and introduced into North America. It was not about the people who inhabited the land before. Equally, Cook and Phillip thought it was nobody's land, empty space, theirs for the claiming. The doctrine of discovery suggested that if they discovered it, it could be theirs, and they didn't have to be bothered about noticing that anyone else was there, so long as they were not European. These assumptions were not assumptions made in ancient days.
However it was not predicated on the assumption that it was empty space, but on the concept of it is yours and I want it so I will fight you for it. Putin's Military Efforts in Ukraine are not based on an argument of Terra Nullus but rather on an argument that Ukraine is really part of Russia.
As made clear in post 2 the Doctrine of Discovery is not the same as Terra Nullis, although the two are related. Terra Nullis means nobody's land, not empty land. It was a legal fiction that refused to recognise ownership by the original* inhabitants. The slaves bought in Africa were enslaved by other Africans. No race is innocent. It was apparently common in Biblical times for conquerors to remove the people from a conquered country and replace them with people from elsewhere. This happened to Israel when conquered by the Assyrians and Judah when conquered by the Babylonians. *Edit 7/4/23. I should have said current inhabitants since they might not be the original inhabitants.
I am sorry the subject of slavery was inserted into this post as it is non-core to the thread. The assertion of Sovereignty over 'New Lands' was a feature of the European Expansion in the colonial period following the discovery of things way beyond Europe. Trying to backread this into ancient history is not helpful. In the case of North America, it is North American Indians who are in question, and in the case of Australia, it is Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
The article states in part, "Those bulls, it’s important to understand, were political and legal documents — not framed or intended to convey the teachings of the Church, they were instead acts of governance or administration by the Roman Pontiff acting in the political role he played among European powers at the time." Well, those folks based in Rome certainly had a habit of putting out a lot of lousy bulls...